D&D 5E (2024) Mike Mearls explains why your boss monsters die too easily

[Maxperson]

It doesn't have to have a number attached to it to be a factor in determining a course of action.

Okay? This is about PCs knowing the mechanics vs. some vague or not so vague pattern that might or might have a bunch of different possible answers for why it happens.

 

[Maxperson]

I've been under the impression that this has been about 5e and some form of d&d or d& d-like setting. Was there a sudden context switch I missed where this was about some kind Lovecraftian horror based default?

What I said applies to 5e. The PCs know that once in a 24 hour period they can rest and recover magic. Nothing says that they know why that happens. It could be that the mystical moon frogs don't allow magic to come back to someone more frequently than that.

They have the correlation, but the causation could be any number of things. The PCs do not know the game mechanics. They only know the fiction. The game mechanics are for the players of the game.

 

[Micah Sweet]

There is virtually always a time pressure.

I don't agree. There's a time pressure if the world or the GM puts it there and the OCs care about it. That simply doesn't happen all the time.

 

[Maxperson]

I cast fireball to investigate how many hit points they have.

There's no way for your PC to know. Your wizard casts the fireball, but he does not know how much damage he did with it. Whether any of them saved or not. Whether any of them had resistances or not. He only knows whether any of them died, were hurt, not hurt, or whatever.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Okay? This is about PCs knowing the mechanics vs. some vague or not so vague pattern that might or might have a bunch of different possible answers for why it happens.

If the pattern is consistent it can be investigated and acted upon. You can choose not to act, but it's a choice, and acting in the face of that pattern is hardly ridiculous IMO.

 

[Maxperson]

I don't agree. There's a time pressure if the world or the GM puts it there and the OCs care about it. That simply doesn't happen all the time.

Almost all the time.

Here's a situation. Your PCs have just snuck into the mansion of the local Mayor, who you guys suspect of being a local cult leader. You kill 6 cultists in the entryway to the mansion and hear movement beyond coming towards you. You rolled poorly and are down about 40% of your resources, so you decide to leave and rest for 24 hours before coming back to the mansion.

What is going to happen at the mansion while you are resting?

 

[Maxperson]

If the pattern is consistent it can be investigated and acted upon. You can choose not to act, but it's a choice, and acting in the face of that pattern is hardly ridiculous IMO.

Sure. What you can't know is the result of your action. Oh, you can know that in 24 hours you will recover your resources, but you can't know the cost of taking 24 hours of time to do it.

 

[bedir than]

You see 4 elves. All use longswords in one hand and no shield. They all wear chain shirts. They all have 2 attacks with the longsword. What class and levels are they?

I'm sorry. What in the world are you talking about?
Why would I see elves in the real world special operations environment?

If someone says it is unrealistic for characters to know their own skills, abilities, rests, etc and then the response is to give a real world example that said person is completely and utterly wrong what do NPCs have to do with this?

 

[Not a Decepticon]

I disagree. Once you notice a pattern you can exploit it. You don't have to, but IMO choosing to do so isn't a "that guy" behavior to be scorned and censured.

I want to play with people who play the game, not exploit it.

What you described is in fact pretty blatant railroading. The word no is a tool in the arsenal, but only when it makes sense in the fiction. "Can my character take a running leap and land on the other side of the grand canyon?" "No." "My fighter(1st level) runs up and grabs the king's crown off of his head." "No he doesn't. Before you can get within 10 feet of the king, his 8 guards(all 10th level) grab you and bear you to the ground."

If you say no to the group wanting to take a rest and there's nothing happening in the fiction that would actively prevent it, you are taking away their agency to force your personal agenda to happen. That's classic railroading.

"We want to implement game-breaking exploit"
"I will ask you not to because it will make game less fun for all, you and me alike".
I had this conversation with my players when I banned shoving enemies into the bag of holding, said why ("I need to improvise rules for it on the spot, it feels like you're trying to skip the encounter, first time you used it it was funny, second time was funny but by third it gets boring and annoying"). Everyone accepted it and moved on. If that is railroading, call me Transformable Thomas

Instead, just let the fiction flow as it makes sense. Once when one of my groups took a day to rest after hitting the first few caves of a humanoid cavern complex village, they arrived to find the enemy had fortified the area and set a bunch of traps. It went worse for them than if they had just pushed on. Another time there was a group of goblins that they hit hard and then ran away to rest. The remaining goblins knowing about the group of ogres that lived several miles away, went and bribed the ogres to help them defend themselves. When the PCs returned, they found the remaining goblins and 4 ogres. It went worse for them than if they had not stopped to rest.

I literally said the same as far back as page 37

And really, if you have players give you up to 32 hours, while they sit idle...well, a lot can happen in that time. Baddies get reinforcemens, emptied rooms get refilled, traps get reset, ritual goes off snd now you have Cthulhu to deal with on top of the boss, or villain summon backu/bodyguards. Stop running static world that waits for pcs.

And then everyone ignored it as not feastible solution because it was inconvenient to treating me with condescension for not agreeing with them. If people will act like this is not valid solution, like this is a solution not even worth adressing, then my second solution is to simply refuse to let them use the expoit to begin with.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Almost all the time.

Here's a situation. Your PCs have just snuck into the mansion of the local Mayor, who you guys suspect of being a local cult leader. You kill 6 cultists in the entryway to the mansion and hear movement beyond coming towards you. You rolled poorly and are down about 40% of your resources, so you decide to leave and rest for 24 hours before coming back to the mansion.

What is going to happen at the mansion while you are resting?

Then again, D&D has a lot of mindless monsters, golems, undead, slimes etc. Like a while a go in my campaign the characters were exploring forgotten tomb. They fought some things on the way there, they encounters some traps and undead inside the tomb. And had it not been gritty rests with sanctuary requirement, they totally could have just taken long rest after each fight outside the tomb, no problem. The undead had been guarding the tomb for centuries, they were not going to leave now, nor had they intelligence or initiative to make any new defences.