D&D 5E How many short rests?

[Gadget]

I've heard a lot of speculation on the short/long rest being one of those 'dials' that will be adjustable in the DMG. Some have spoken of Long rests being moved to a once a week, or only in a safe haven type of thing, while the short rest becomes a night spent roughing it in the wilderness/dungeon. This is a wonderful way for each group to adapt the mechanics to their particular play style.

The problem arises when the ratio of short to long rests changes with the dial. If everyone has to high tail it to Rivendell or Lorien to get the benefits of a long rest, then those classes that get more out of a short rest are going to be a lot more effective than they would in the default system. That is unless the DM is very careful to also dial back the number of encounters between long rests, it could make a very noticeable difference with certain classes.

 

[Sword of Spirit]

I've heard a lot of speculation on the short/long rest being one of those 'dials' that will be adjustable in the DMG. Some have spoken of Long rests being moved to a once a week, or only in a safe haven type of thing, while the short rest becomes a night spent roughing it in the wilderness/dungeon. This is a wonderful way for each group to adapt the mechanics to their particular play style.

The problem arises when the ratio of short to long rests changes with the dial. If everyone has to high tail it to Rivendell or Lorien to get the benefits of a long rest, then those classes that get more out of a short rest are going to be a lot more effective than they would in the default system. That is unless the DM is very careful to also dial back the number of encounters between long rests, it could make a very noticeable difference with certain classes.

Personally I hate the idea that changing the length of long rests is somehow being supportive of old-school playstyles.

Changing long rests doesn't just make it so you heal slower, it means you can't regain your spells* on a daily basis. That's not exactly the best way to mimic an old school play style. D&D has had always had daily spell slot recovery.

*And a lot of other important class features.

 

[Mercule]

Changing long rests doesn't just make it so you heal slower, it means you can't regain your spells* on a daily basis. That's not exactly the best way to mimic an old school play style. D&D has had always had daily spell slot recovery.

As opposed to 1E, where a high-level magic-user could take longer than 24 hours to memorize his spells, if he didn't carefully ration them?

I wouldn't want to do the short rest == overnight camp and long rest == safe haven for every campaign, but I think it's genius for a certain style of game that I'd definitely consider. I also don't expect everyone to like it -- or even think it's sane/playable -- but that's the beauty of the 'dials' being discussed.

 

[Hussar]

As opposed to 1E, where a high-level magic-user could take longer than 24 hours to memorize his spells, if he didn't carefully ration them?

I wouldn't want to do the short rest == overnight camp and long rest == safe haven for every campaign, but I think it's genius for a certain style of game that I'd definitely consider. I also don't expect everyone to like it -- or even think it's sane/playable -- but that's the beauty of the 'dials' being discussed.

To be fair though, you had to be a VERY high level wizard and blow every memorised spell to take that long to fill your tank back to full. Most of the time, you're talking a rest (8 hours?) and two hours of memorisation to cover the majority of situations. If you change long rests to 1/week, that would be pretty far from how Magic Users and Clerics operated back in the day.