D&D 5E Short Rest Poll

[GMforPowergamers]

The players also had a tantrum over it. One actually said that the DM is not allowed to to do that it is cheating. They had this real entitlement issue that as PC they had rights that the DM was not allowed to violate because that was how the game was designed.

In that situation as a player regardless of the system I would get out of dodge if the party was badly injured and could not handle a new encounter. I certainly would not chose to rest in the same room.

boy do I agree with the amount of times I had PCs complain when short rest where interrupted. I also had PC push themselves because they new they had X amount of time... then when they choose not to take the short rest still complain...

What I consider stupid behavior is thinking that just because you are a PC you get some kind of plot immunity. Some stupid things I have seen is a low level rogue picking powerful nobles pockets at a ceremony that the PCs had been invited to because they had helped young prince out of a scrape. He failed a roll and got caught and searched and they found all these stolen items. The King stopped to much bad from happening so instead of getting his hand cut off the price of thievery well known in the city. The rogue was given a warning that if he was ever caught stealing in the city again he would lose not his hand but his life. The rest of the party was furious.The player excuse was well I am rogue this is what I do.

man that is a classic problem... I once saw a PC get caught trying to pick pocket a god...and get pissed at being killed.

 

[pemerton]

When an NPC that was let free to run off comes running back with reinforcements... the quantity and power of those reinforcements is determined many different ways based upon individual DMs. For some DMs (like pemerton it seems)... the decision on the reinforcements comes down to what will make this new fight interesting in and of itself. And the monster group that shows up is based almost entirely on creating that interesting fight (based partly on the monsters further in the dungeon that might show up). For other DMs (like Elf Witch it seems)... the decision on the reinforcements comes down to who that NPC might logically have come into contact with, and convinced to join the fight.

As a DM I had a situation where an encounter turned out much harder than I had planned and the party got their butts handed to them. I had been rolling listening checks to see if the goblins in the guard room heard them. When it went so bad I stopped rolling and decided that the guards were drinking and making to much noise to hear. The players did not know this so they hurriedly searched the room, put a guard on hall and then hide the bodies while the wizard cast prestidigitation to clean up the blood. Then they went in search of a place to hide and rest. They were low on any kind of healing. I made a snap decision that one of the scrolls was rope trick so they could safely rest without worrying about being interrupted.

For my part, I don't see the radical difference between deciding that an escaped NPC hides in a cupboard, and decding that the PCs discover a Rope Trick scroll so that they can take a safe rest. They both look to me like GMing devices to regulate the pacing of play.

I don't run a Gygaxian D&D game - I've tried and I'm not a good GM for that style - but I think I have a pretty reasonable understanding of it. The dungeon is keyed in advance, and the GM doesn't depart from that key. This is what then enables the players to exhibit skill in play, by scouting and divining and so on in the way that Gygax describes in his PHB, and then settling on targets and launching dedicated raids for planned purposes. If you are playing in that style, then the behaviour of the escaped NPC should be determined by a combination of pre-planned facts about the personalities in the adventure (which the players can learn about via rumours, ESP etc) and a dispassionate application of the moral rules.

But once you are not playing in Gygaxian style - and once you start placing Rope Trick scrolls out of sympathy to the players I don't think you are - then I personally don't see much point in maintaing certain of its tropes in an illusory fashion. If the unexplored parts of the dungeon are morphable then they are morphable - not just in terms of the rope trick scrolls they might contain, or the drunkenness of carousing goblin guards, but in whether escaped NPCs will bring back reinforcements or hide in cupboards, and also in whether those reinforcements will take 3 minutes or 5 minutes to turn up (and for a 4e short rest we're only talking about 5 minutes), and even in whether those reinforcements are goblins warriors (standard creatures) or goblin cutters (minions).

this kind of thing can't be solved by a single ruleset. Not in the least. We HAVE to have options for both sides available to us, because I don't think there's even a close-to-consensus on one side or another.

Whereas I don't think it's primarily a rules issue at all. It's about (i) the purpose of play (Gygaxian skilled play vs someting else), and (ii) about what sort of approach to encounter design will provide a fun play experience relative to (i) and also relative to the action resolution mechanics.

Assuming the designers are clear about what their action resolution mechanics are (eg is the game fun even if players don't have access to their short-rest recharging abilities?) then they should be able to write play advice that canvasses a range of answers to (i) and hence a range of answers to (ii). If they want to, they can even canvass a range of possible short rest durations and explain how choices in respect of that will matter to both (i) and (ii).

This is hardly a trivial dial. While DMs can easily change the resting time for their tables, published adventures depend on knowing how long the rest is, as they have to be designed totally different when the PCs can rest between battles for 5 minutes and get their power back or not.

The difference between 5 minutes and 1 hour is significant in a dungeon environment, for the sorts of reasons [MENTION=18333]Neechen[/MENTION] mentions upthread. But once you are playing adventures set in countryside or urban areas it's actually not that significant a difference.

As far as published adventures are concerned, I would expect the designers to explain at what point they expect the PCs to be "recharged" before pressing on or encountering further enemies, and to give some advice on how this might be handled at different tables using different resting times. This is hardly rocket science in adventure design.

 

[pemerton]

What I consider stupid behavior is thinking that just because you are a PC you get some kind of plot immunity. Some stupid things I have seen is a low level rogue picking powerful nobles pockets at a ceremony that the PCs had been invited to because they had helped young prince out of a scrape.

<snip>

The rest of the party was furious.The player excuse was well I am rogue this is what I do.

Knowing only what you have said about this situation, it sounds to me like a bored and/or railroaded player pushing back aginst what s/he found to be unsatisfactory GMing.

 

[Elf Witch]

Knowing only what you have said about this situation, it sounds to me like a bored and/or railroaded player pushing back aginst what s/he found to be unsatisfactory GMing.

I disagree but then I know the DM and have played with him and he does not railroad he is always scrupulously fair and imo is a fantastic DM.


It sounded to me exactly what it was a whiny spoiled player. Throwing a tantrum at a table it is a sign of immaturity. I would boot any player who pulled that at my table and I would not want to play with a player who acted that way. The did not lose the second fight they had taken less than ten minutes to win the first combat they had not lost a significant amount of hit points and from what he has told me. There was no reason other than they were used to playing with a DM who never interrupted their rest and he planed the encounter that if it proved to easy to have a secondary wave of NPCs come in. I don't see how that is bad DMing.

The point of my post was not to second guess the DM but to explore if rules written like this encourage players to believe and plan that they will always have a guaranteed rest no matter what so they can go nova on every encounter.

I really dislike that style of play. It leads to we have to stop I stubbed my toe and lost a hit point kind of play style.

 

[Elf Witch]

For my part, I don't see the radical difference between deciding that an escaped NPC hides in a cupboard, and decding that the PCs discover a Rope Trick scroll so that they can take a safe rest. They both look to me like GMing devices to regulate the pacing of play.

I don't run a Gygaxian D&D game - I've tried and I'm not a good GM for that style - but I think I have a pretty reasonable understanding of it. The dungeon is keyed in advance, and the GM doesn't depart from that key. This is what then enables the players to exhibit skill in play, by scouting and divining and so on in the way that Gygax describes in his PHB, and then settling on targets and launching dedicated raids for planned purposes. If you are playing in that style, then the behaviour of the escaped NPC should be determined by a combination of pre-planned facts about the personalities in the adventure (which the players can learn about via rumours, ESP etc) and a dispassionate application of the moral rules.

But once you are not playing in Gygaxian style - and once you start placing Rope Trick scrolls out of sympathy to the players I don't think you are - then I personally don't see much point in maintaing certain of its tropes in an illusory fashion. If the unexplored parts of the dungeon are morphable then they are morphable - not just in terms of the rope trick scrolls they might contain, or the drunkenness of carousing goblin guards, but in whether escaped NPCs will bring back reinforcements or hide in cupboards, and also in whether those reinforcements will take 3 minutes or 5 minutes to turn up (and for a 4e short rest we're only talking about 5 minutes), and even in whether those reinforcements are goblins warriors (standard creatures) or goblin cutters (minions).

Whereas I don't think it's primarily a rules issue at all. It's about (i) the purpose of play (Gygaxian skilled play vs someting else), and (ii) about what sort of approach to encounter design will provide a fun play experience relative to (i) and also relative to the action resolution mechanics.

Assuming the designers are clear about what their action resolution mechanics are (eg is the game fun even if players don't have access to their short-rest recharging abilities?) then they should be able to write play advice that canvasses a range of answers to (i) and hence a range of answers to (ii). If they want to, they can even canvass a range of possible short rest durations and explain how choices in respect of that will matter to both (i) and (ii).

The difference between 5 minutes and 1 hour is significant in a dungeon environment, for the sorts of reasons [MENTION=18333]Neechen[/MENTION] mentions upthread. But once you are playing adventures set in countryside or urban areas it's actually not that significant a difference.

As far as published adventures are concerned, I would expect the designers to explain at what point they expect the PCs to be "recharged" before pressing on or encountering further enemies, and to give some advice on how this might be handled at different tables using different resting times. This is hardly rocket science in adventure design.

Of course both are a way to pace the game and there is nothing wrong with choosing not to continue the encounter the way you planned because you don't think the party can handle it. Just like there is nothing wrong with the style of play of letting the dice fall where they may and running an encounter as written if your players are okay with that kind of game.

But that is not what I am talking about. I am talking about pulling your punches because the players are behaving in a way that is stupid and basing that stupidity on the DM does not dare do this to me because I am a PC.

That is not the same as players making mistakes because they don't know the system or forgot something. Basically it is saying the rules say we can rest and get back hit points and powers after a short rest so that is what we are doing and you the DM can't stop us no matter how we chose to do it. That to me is a big problem and the kind of entitlement that some players bring in the game.

 

[Li Shenron]

This is hardly a trivial dial. While DMs can easily change the resting time for their tables, published adventures depend on knowing how long the rest is, as they have to be designed totally different when the PCs can rest between battles for 5 minutes and get their power back or not.

No, I don't think so. First, I've never seen a published adventure so strictly paced that you have to take rests exactly at specific points, and that's because it would be a mistake, because it would assume too much about what the players are supposed to do and when (talking about railroading AND forcing a specific pace). Even in such case, the adventure can never require a pace faster than the maximum allowed by default resting rules, thus the designer's choice of 1 hour for short rest is actually better than choosing e.g. 5 or 10 minutes. Finally, if I stumbled upon such an adventure so railroaded that it is timed by the hour or minutes, I don't see why I couldn't just as easily change those times.

If anything, changing resting times might shift the balance between classes, if the game has some classes (e.g. IIRC only the Warlock at this time) heavily based on abilities regained with a short rest while others regain only a couple of things. Still, everybody is limited by their HD healing, which mean additional short rests don't help with that, although there are some exceptions (if you have Cleric of Life in the party, and if you dial short rests down to 5 minutes, you practically have unlimited healing).

 

[Lanefan]

If anything, changing resting times might shift the balance between classes, if the game has some classes (e.g. IIRC only the Warlock at this time) heavily based on abilities regained with a short rest while others regain only a couple of things. Still, everybody is limited by their HD healing, which mean additional short rests don't help with that, although there are some exceptions (if you have Cleric of Life in the party, and if you dial short rests down to 5 minutes, you practically have unlimited healing).

No adventure can ever be designed to account for every possible party composition that will attempt it; that way lies madness.

But some adventures are - or seem to be - very much on a time clock; and this doesn't always come off as intended. Keep on the Shadowfell is one - the design assumption seems to be that you'll wade through the upper decks and get to the last encounter within at most a day or two, before Kalarel either completes his ritual or starves to death (he has no food down there...). I had to rethink this on the fly once it became obvious my crew wasn't going to finish in one go and instead were going to (repeatedly, as it turned out) head back to town: a 6-day trip each way plus time spent in town.

From the time the party first entered the dungeon it took three in-game months for them to finish.

In fairness they had no idea going in that there was any sort of time crunch, and in fact their original reason for going there at all was to rescue one of their own who had been captured in their previous adventure and taken there. In this they succeeded, then went back and over something like 4 separate visits wiped out the place.

Lan-"sometimes Kalarel just has to be a very patient man"-efan

 

[Li Shenron]

But some adventures are - or seem to be - very much on a time clock; and this doesn't always come off as intended. Keep on the Shadowfell is one - the design assumption seems to be that you'll wade through the upper decks and get to the last encounter within at most a day or two, before Kalarel either completes his ritual or starves to death (he has no food down there...). I had to rethink this on the fly once it became obvious my crew wasn't going to finish in one go and instead were going to (repeatedly, as it turned out) head back to town: a 6-day trip each way plus time spent in town.

This is exactly a case that makes me even more convinced that there is no issue.

First of all, the 5e designers' choice of 1 hour short rest means that most (probably all) of the DMs who don't like it, are going to shorten this time, effectively speeding up the PCs, i.e. allowing them to do more stuff each day. I don't think anybody's going to make short rests longer, although some DMs who particularly hate the idea might completely eliminate short rests or limit them to e.g. 1/day.

Timed adventures might have a maximum time to complete the quest, and allowing the players more resources per day (by shortening short rests) might at worst make the adventure easier, but this is IMO not something truly perceived.

In any case, the time required is very simply inevitably made up. Why should it really take 2 days to complete a ritual? It's made up number, it could have been 2 hours or 2 weeks. Why does the BBEG has to starve in 2 days, why can't he push through an extra day?

So if the DM significantly changes how far the PCs can go in a day, she can also trivially change the time limit for the quest, and can also do so in the course of the adventure itself: just because it was announced at the beginning that the ritual takes 2 days, it doesn't have to stay the same, maybe the PCs discover that the BBEG had a breakthrough and now they only have 14 hours to save the Earth, or viceversa something positive happened and granted them more time. Or maybe just don't change it... for some DMs the PCs should always win after all.

 

[Hedonismbot]

This is exactly a case that makes me even more convinced that there is no issue.

First of all, the 5e designers' choice of 1 hour short rest means that most (probably all) of the DMs who don't like it, are going to shorten this time, effectively speeding up the PCs, i.e. allowing them to do more stuff each day. I don't think anybody's going to make short rests longer, although some DMs who particularly hate the idea might completely eliminate short rests or limit them to e.g. 1/day.

Timed adventures might have a maximum time to complete the quest, and allowing the players more resources per day (by shortening short rests) might at worst make the adventure easier, but this is IMO not something truly perceived.

In any case, the time required is very simply inevitably made up. Why should it really take 2 days to complete a ritual? It's made up number, it could have been 2 hours or 2 weeks. Why does the BBEG has to starve in 2 days, why can't he push through an extra day?

So if the DM significantly changes how far the PCs can go in a day, she can also trivially change the time limit for the quest, and can also do so in the course of the adventure itself: just because it was announced at the beginning that the ritual takes 2 days, it doesn't have to stay the same, maybe the PCs discover that the BBEG had a breakthrough and now they only have 14 hours to save the Earth, or viceversa something positive happened and granted them more time. Or maybe just don't change it... for some DMs the PCs should always win after all.

Definitely this. The PCs might be told 'You have 2 days to complete this quest or the consequencse will be dire' but the DM is basically saying (and should be thinking when creating that time limit) 'You can take a maximum of this many short/long rests, and/or complete this many out-of-combat actions to solve this problem'. The actual time values are mostly just fluff.

 

[Lanefan]

Definitely this. The PCs might be told 'You have 2 days to complete this quest or the consequencse will be dire' but the DM is basically saying (and should be thinking when creating that time limit) 'You can take a maximum of this many short/long rests, and/or complete this many out-of-combat actions to solve this problem'. The actual time values are mostly just fluff.

Er, not all of us think in terms of nothing but game mechanics; either as DMs or players.

If I-as-DM put a strict time limit on an adventure I'm in effect challenging the characters (via their players) to manage their resources a bit differently than normal, find the most efficient way of getting stuff done, and to stay on mission instead of getting distracted. I'm not at all thinking "you can take a maximum of x rests and-or out-of-combat actions", I'm thinking "you can tackle this however you like as long as it gets the mission done in x time".

Side question: why would there be a limit on out-of-combat actions? Combat isn't always the solution...

Lan-"time, gentlemen, please"-efan