D&D 5E Long Rests vs Short Rests

[S'mon]

I think I prefer combat powers that replenish on a short rest, but hit points & healing replenish on a long rest so as to allow for attrition. One thing I do is limit short rest resource recovery to 3/day, if implemented generally I think that's the best approach overall - PCs enter most fights at about the same strength & resilience, but there is still attrition.

 

[aco175]

It seems most people are choosing the unposted 3rd option of a mix between the two. Which is a bit squishy since the poll only gave two options. In these parameters, I would have to choose the short rest option. The OP did also talk about some powers remaining with long rest and such, so I was somewhat confused on the total idea.

I did like 4e with encounter powers and daily powers. To make something all short rest, maybe the daily powers would become weaker, or done away with, but something like fireball may need to scale with level. To be a short rest recharge it could be half the damage dice at 5th level and add one die every other level until it is where it should be. Not sure how many other spells would need to be changed.

Although it may not matter if all the other class powers simply become encounter powers. Even the fighter power to make a save becomes more powerful if it is a short rest. Now it get used every chance instead of maybe saving it.

Overall I would rather see a 4e type system, but chose short rest.

 

[Krachek]

I can’t decide. Both option have their own + and -.
5ed has a tendency to keep on the roots, so I would prefer Long rest, at least when bugs occur we can say that it is the old way of dealing with power.

Short rest recover is tainted with 4ed tag, so it´s a no go for some true believer. Short rest recover makes balance more precise, but that don’t left players enough range if things go bad. It will make encounter more normalize and maybe more boring on the long run.

Finally I would recommend Long rest.

 

[Charlaquin]

That's kinda the point though. That way relatively easy encounters still have a purpose. The challenge is not whether you can win, the challenge is to win whilst not burning all your resources.

Yes, that’s why I say the ideal would be to have a mix of short and long rest resources. We’re also talking largely about powers here, you’ve still got hit points as a daily resource.

 

[Krachek]

Yes, that’s why I say the ideal would be to have a mix of short and long rest resources. We’re also talking largely about powers here, you’ve still got hit points as a daily resource.

I like that, actual classes are polarized on recovery, short, long or don’t care like the rogue.
What if Warlock rely more on some daily ressources and wizard have less spell slots and more short rest refresh?

 

[el-remmen]

Yeah, I really cannot remember ever playing or running the sort of game where there are six to eight fights in one day (in any game, in any edition, ever.) That seems absolutely bonkers to me, and that to be some sort of norm that must repeated every day utterly surreal. Do people actually play like that?

Six to eight seems like double the usual amount to me. In my games, 3 to 4 encounters during an "adventuring day" (however nebulous that idea is) is more the norm, though not all of those are necessarily combat (though some could be).

So my last two sessions (most of which happened within a 24 hour period):

• PC barbarian fight off drug-thugs at an inn by himself but gives in to poison and is captured - one encounter (at about 2 AM, the rest of the party is having a long rest elsewhere)
• The rest of the party come looking for him after breakfast - fight some more goons at the inn, but barby is not around! - one encounter
• Party uses magic resources (locate object) to find barby's gear and thus find him, whacked out in a root cellar - he is so drugged out he has not had the effect of a long rest despite it being over 8 hours they fight the people holding him - one encounter
• After a short rest, the party travels to local temple to investigate something [session ends here and new one begins]- but are turned away - this encounter includes no combat, but they were prepared for some and two members of the party searched the perimeter - one encounter
• Party discovers missing mayor has returned to town surrounded by new guards and acting weird - consider a fight, but leave instead b/c the guards look tough and there are innocents around. Barbarian manages a long rest while everyone else chills out waiting for night fall. - one encounter
• At midnight party returns to temple is ambushed - very tough fight (one encounter)
• Immediately after encounter, have barely collected themselves when evil monks burst into the temple room - (one encounter). Party takes a short rest.
• Party searches temple and fights some zombies (one encounter)

So except for the oddity of the barbarian's rest being "off-schedule," that is nine encounters, six of which featured some combat and two of which could have been a fight, but weren't.

Today's session we start off immediately after the zombie fight. . . I doubt they'll take another short rest just yet and won't be trying for a long rest until after they leave the temple - and even then the barbarian is still going to be off schedule until they have a couple days of downtime.

Anyway, this is a little more than normal - I'd say counting combat encounters only 2 to 4 is more likely - though obvi many "adventuring" days can sometimes go by with no combat encounters - it just depends on the adventure and PC choices.

 

[el-remmen]

It’s really difficult as a player to predict how many encounters there are going to be in any given day, which makes it a nightmare to try to manage your daily resources. If you blow through them all early and it turns out there’s still a lot more to go, you screw yourself, but if you try to conserve them and it turns out there was only one encounter that day, they go to waste.

That just sounds like playing D&D to me! (though obvi, I wouldn't use the words "nightmare" or "waste")

 

[Disgruntled Hobbit]

Like the mix of both. Specially having martial type abilities tied to quick short rests and magic types tied to long rests
Like that the classes aren't samey

 

[Quartz]

This inevitably leads me to reconsider a project I had abandoned a while ago: converting the long rest recovery classes into short rest classes. What if the full casters used the warlock casting chasis, potentially tweaked a little?

Take a look at this post

D&D 5E - How would you balance this modification to spellcasters?

Ignore this - was trying to respond to an alternate in a comment and responded to the main thread instead.

www.enworld.org

Basically spellcasters have about half the spell slots and recover 1 spell per spell level on a long rest and 1 spell per spell level up to Proficiency Bonus minus 1 (minus 2 for half-casters) on a short rest.

 

[Charlaquin]

That just sounds like playing D&D to me! (though obvi, I wouldn't use the words "nightmare" or "waste")

I mean, given that the vast majority of limited class resources have been daily for most of D&D’s history, it’s not surprising that it would feel like D&D to many. That doesn’t mean it’s a good player experience. And spells that don’t get used by the end of the day are absolutely wasted.