D&D (2024) Long rests getting better but GM needs still not being considered

[Olrox17]

Also 4e was so different from every other edition on a mechanical level that it's difficult to make comparisons.

As someone who has played and DMed 3e, 4e and 5e extensively, it really wasn't. The biggest difference was the language used and the mechanics > fluff approach.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Yes I did, I skipped 4e when that was a thing. My 4e experience is extremely limited so I didn't feel comfortable maybe finding the right section of rules & maybe extrapolating how that combines with other aspects of that system in actual play that I may or may not remember right or may hor may not have been exposed to in a couple one shots. Also 4e was so different from every other edition on a mechanical level that it's difficult to make comparisons.

As someone who liked 4E a lot, and played it a ton, I think it's fine to skip, because the approach is different enough that it's less directly relevant.

Just to summarize (and generalizing a little):

1) Everyone had some Daily resources, but only some, because everyone also had Encounter, Utility and At-Will stuff (not getting into the slight deviations from this in Essentials). This by itself reduced the desire for a 5MWD, in part because of the design of the Dailies, which made them only part of your toolkit, and not always the right tool to be using on any given round (indeed often not). All the rest of your toolkit, which was considerable, refreshed between combats, essentially. So PCs were basically never on less 70%-ish of their toolkit in a combat, which made for way less reason to take a rest.

2) Combat was a lot less swing-y than other editions, so there was less feeling that you had to "floor it" and take out scary enemies to prevent deaths etc, but rather to use the right abilities/teamwork to deal with them tactically. I saw a number of TPKs or near-TPKs in 4E, and several of them were against not-super-hard encounters, but ones which required good tactics. One of the near-TPKs showed you couldn't just Daily your way out of a hole if you'd dug deep enough too! They got saved because one player used smarter tactics than the rest and didn't expose himself to withering sling-fire (instead forcing the remaining enemies to essentially come at him one at a time through clever use of terrain/corridors).

3) You pretty much always got back to full HP between combats thanks to Healing Surges, and usually reached a natural stopping point before Healing Surges ran out (I'd say most PCs had slightly too many but that's a separate discussion)

4) The encounter design system (with "roles" for monsters, minions, etc.) was significantly more solid and the math whilst arguably boring, was more reliable than 5E. This also disincentivized wild spending of daily abilities, or attempting to 5MWD things, because it just wasn't that helpful, and easier for a DM to prepare an encounter for it, if it was definitely going to be a 1-encounter day, without much risk of TPK.

Anyway!

I think there's some design inspiration to be had there maybe, but less direct.

 

[Olrox17]

4) The encounter design system (with "roles" for monsters, minions, etc.) was significantly more solid and the math whilst arguably boring, was more reliable than 5E. This also disincentivized wild spending of daily abilities, or attempting to 5MWD things, because it just wasn't that helpful, and easier for a DM to prepare an encounter for it, if it was definitely going to be a 1-encounter day, without much risk of TPK.

Just a minor disagree here: a normally optimized mid paragon 4e party would absolutely crush any encounter if they went in nova with dailies. Especially if they had a controller or two, holy crap.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Just a minor disagree here: a normally optimized mid paragon 4e party would absolutely crush any encounter if they went in nova with dailies. Especially if they had a controller or two, holy crap.

That's probably right. We stopped playing 4E fairly early in Paragon because the issues with Immediate Actions, Interrupts, Reactions, abilities that rearranged initiative and so on started slowing the game down so much - yet also seemed dumb not to take because they were many of the best abilities. And yeah control Dailies were definitely by far the most OP ones. So I'm thinking more of the Heroic tier.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

I find all or nothing nature of long rests, as well as fully refreshing basically everything with good night's sleep pretty problematic.

I would prefer one night's sleep to refresh only some portion of your resources.

 

[mellored]

As someone who has played and DMed 3e, 4e and 5e extensively, it really wasn't. The biggest difference was the language used and the mechanics > fluff approach.

Agreed. 4e was more "table top game" and less "role playing".

But as far as resting goes. It kind of just embraced the 15 minute work day. You got most of your power back after each battle, so no need to stop.

So to do that in 5e, you would need to reduce the number of spells slots, and increase arcane recovery / channel divinity / wild shape. And shorten short rest to like 10 minutes.

 

[Olrox17]

Agreed. 4e was more "table top game" and less "role playing".

But as far as resting goes. It kind of just embraced the 15 minute work day. You got most of your power back after each battle, so no need to stop.

So to do that in 5e, you would need to reduce the number of spells slots, and increase arcane recovery / channel divinity / wild shape. And shorten short rest to like 10 minutes.

The 5e warlock might the closest to a 4e AEDU class.

 

[Willie the Duck]

The 15minute working day was a issue in the 3x era and I do not believe that the rest rules had much impact.
I also think that the issue is fundamentally a play culture issue and one that can only be solved by discussion and agreement around the table. Rules are never on their own going to address all issue.
In so far as the 4e rules solved this, in 4e the character always had at will and encounter powers in every combat and in most combats a daily power available (assuming they were somewhat conservative with daily's) They generally rested when they ran out of healing surges rather than other power.

Definitely remember the 5/15-minute workday being a thing for 3e. Fundamentally, the 15-minute workday has been an issue pretty much since the play culture of 'if you leave to rest we stop play for the session' and 'my other play group might loot the place while you are gone' ended (and for many, it never existed in the first place). TSR-era D&D often had longer natural-healing and spell memorization times -- and multiple days rest might mean multiple wilderness encounter rolls -- but if an average day's wilderness encounter would drain more resources than you would recover, going into the dungeon in the first place would be a fool's errand (as you need all your resources to survive the trip home). Mechanically, going and resting after every encounter (whenever not challenged by in-game consequences) has always been the strategically optimal choice. I think in most of the TSR-era, there was just a strong play culture about that being cheezy or the like (or just more house rules on the matter), or just more dungeons where in-game consequences (people notice the disturbance and run away with the loot) are more inherent to the setting.

 

[Haplo781]

Agreed. 4e was more "table top game" and less "role playing".

That's D&D in general. 4e just made the combat engaging enough that there was more reason to actually fight things.

 

[Stalker0]

IMO: There should be levels of rest.
I.e.

Poor rest: regain hit dice (spend the ones you have first) and half your spells.
Moderate rest: as written
Comfortable rest: also regain 2 levels of exhaustion.

Possibly tie in something like getting a level of exhaustion when you drop to 0. And have Rangers/survival checks can also help make rest more comfortable.

This is probably the best idea because it gives the DM a mechanical toolbox to adjust rests. While the DM always has this power of course, it never hurts for the rules to grant that specific expectation.

This gives the DM license to say "sleeping in a dungeon ain't great" vs "paying for that luxurious inn does have some benefits".


Probably the biggest difference between 5e and 3e is the removal of CLW or Lesser Vigor wands. So in my experience past the low levels most DMs ensured the party had these, so healing between combats was mostly trivial. Rests were all about spell recovery. 5e there is more a mix