D&D 5E Short rests -- how often in a day?

[Bupp]

I see no reason to limit the number of short rests. After a couple, hit dice for healing and spell slots will start running low, so most players won't want to keep taking them if they are not getting any benefit from one and will start pushing for a long rest.

 

[Jeff Albertson]

I am really not into expected number of encounters a day, so contrived and immersion breaking.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

If a long rest is 8 hours, that leaves 16 hours for short rests, so a maximum of 16 short rests between long rests.

On a slightly more serious note, how about letting the PCs have a short rest any occassion they actually have the time to rest instead of arbitrarily limiting it? If you want to put the pressure on them, give them a situation where they don't have time to rest. Or if you need to spread the encounters out just scale up the difficulty to be appropriate for rested characters. Why put artificial limits on things when you can use in-world role-playing reasons?

That's actually a really interesting point. When it comes to Action Surge/whatever, just ask, "Has it been more than an hour since you used it last? Were you engaged in strenuous activity the whole time, or was some of it light activity like riding in a carriage?" The thing I like about this is that it reduces the use of the metagaming term "short rest" in favor of verbiage the PCs would actually use: "we're going to stop here and observe the outside of the haunted house for a while" is mechanically equivalent to "we'll take a short rest", but less disruptive to immersion.

I think I'll steal this perspective[1].

[1] Can't quite call it a "rule" because there's no mechanical impact.

 

[neobolts]

You gotta admit that's pretty realistic behavior. Have a fight, lick your wounds, unless there's some reason not to.

Yeah, I'm certainly not holding it against them. I'll give them more patrols and urgent crises down the road to keep them on their toes.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Yeah, I'm certainly not holding it against them. I'll give them more patrols and urgent crises down the road to keep them on their toes.

Certainly sounds like the best course of action to me. Particularly if, as emdw put it, you accept things like "we'll gather some intelligence and discuss it afterward" as a valid kind of "non-strenuous activity." Has the added benefit of making reconnaisance and scouting highly encouraged; your players will WANT to take it slow, when they can, so they have both tangible (PC abilities) and intangible (information, preparation) resources available to them.

 

[Tony Vargas]

While what you say here is technically true, I suspect that at many tables it does not matter. If players or a DM worry about how often some other player gets to use their per encounter abilities, it might matter.

Yes, it is 'technically true' that 5e class and encounter balance will be thrown off by pacing changes that result in more (or fewer) rounds per encounter, encounters between short rests, encounters per day, and/or short rests per day.

And, you're right, there are those who won't notice or won't care if class balance is thrown off - typically those dominating play because their class is being inordinately favored by the pacing rut the campaign has fallen into. Similarly, there are some DMs who won't notice or care if the party is rolling over what he intended to be meaningful challenges, or getting TPKs at the end of over-long days, or whatever distortion of the game they're reveling in.

The fact that a DM may find himself with a few such players is all the more reason to try to take the game's tenuous balance into account when thinking about campaign pacing.

If the players decide to have 8 short rests and the current scenario allows for it, let them. Why screw up their fun for some "number of short rests per adventuring day rule thumb"? Such a rule is not needed.

Unless it's a party made up entirely of fighters, monks and warlocks, it's likely someone is going to be pretty disappointed with that sort full-time-resting/part-time-adventuring day - in 5e.

5e chose to distinguish classes with different resources mixes. That means a good (enough) DM will run a campaign that either sticks slavishly to the implied rounds/encounter/short-rest/long-rest, or (better) keep it as an average with a little deviation around the mean to keep it interesting.

It's possible to design a game that doesn't suffer at all from pacing variations. 5e is not such a game. D&D never has been. It obviously doesn't need to be, but DMs do need to be aware of what that means to them.

 

[KarinsDad]

Yes, it is 'technically true' that 5e class and encounter balance will be thrown off by pacing changes that result in more (or fewer) rounds per encounter, encounters between short rests, encounters per day, and/or short rests per day.

And, you're right, there are those who won't notice or won't care if class balance is thrown off - typically those dominating play because their class is being inordinately favored by the pacing rut the campaign has fallen into. Similarly, there are some DMs who won't notice or care if the party is rolling over what he intended to be meaningful challenges, or getting TPKs at the end of over-long days, or whatever distortion of the game they're reveling in.

The fact that a DM may find himself with a few such players is all the more reason to try to take the game's tenuous balance into account when thinking about campaign pacing.

Campaign pacing is not necessary. The first casualty of any war is the plan, including the DM's plan to have x encounters per day (and specifically, these specific x encounters per day). By definition, the players are going to mess up the DM's plan, so there is no real need for him to plan how many encounters. Just prepare the adventure with the encounters and as the players get to them, they get to them. Granted, if there is some form of time critical situation, then if the players rest, they will face the consequences of doing that.

Unless it's a party made up entirely of fighters, monks and warlocks, it's likely someone is going to be pretty disappointed with that sort full-time-resting/part-time-adventuring day - in 5e.

Why? The only time it matters is if some one player is more concerned how much other players shine. So what if we rest for the fighters? It just means that the fighter is now more capable for the next fight. None of the players at my table would care. They do not consider the fighter player to be dominating play. They consider the party to be more effective if everyone has a lot of options.

It might be different at your table.

5e chose to distinguish classes with different resources mixes. That means a good (enough) DM will run a campaign that either sticks slavishly to the implied rounds/encounter/short-rest/long-rest, or (better) keep it as an average with a little deviation around the mean to keep it interesting.

Why? Can a DM not be good and still ignore that stuff? Sure he can. It's unimportant. Just because it is written down in the book does not mean that a DM should be a zombie and follow it verbatim. It's a guideline. Use it. Don't use it. It doesn't matter. Fun can still be had regardless.

 

[steeldragons]

Two.

 

[Tony Vargas]

Campaign pacing is not necessary.

All campaigns have pacing, it's unavoidable. What's avoidable is getting stuck in a rut, especially the wrong rut, like the 5MWD...

The first casualty of any war is the plan, including the DM's plan to have x encounters per day (and specifically, these specific x encounters per day). By definition, the players are going to mess up the DM's plan, so there is no real need for him to plan how many encounters.

5e gives the DM a chest of tools and carte blanche to customize the game to his campaign. You don't need the kind of plan you're talking about - a script or set of rails - you just need to be aware of the system you're using and the players you're running for.

Why? The only time it matters is if some one player is more concerned how much other players shine.

It only matters if everyone wants to have fun, and not everyone has that opportunity. There are players who can't have fun unless no one else is, and players who can handle sharing the spotlight. 5e deals with having both by trying to move the spotlight around. That requires the DM keep his game varied, and keep the pacing close to the point at which the various resources mixes balance out. It's not a new strategy for D&D, and a lot of us are used to it, just as part of what DMing entails. There are also plenty of players who are used to exploiting that kind of roving spotlight balance, either via system mastery, or by trying to manipulate the DM. It's an age-old dynamic in D&D, really, which 5e captures in a fairly faithful-to-the-classic-game way.

Why? Can a DM not be good and still ignore that stuff?

There are some who run on sheer talent and familiarity without consciously thinking about exactly what they're doing and why, sure. Some of those may even be unable to benefit from a more mindful approach, suffering from the centipede's dilemma.

It's unimportant. Just because it is written down in the book does not mean that a DM should be a zombie and follow it verbatim. It's a guideline. Use it. Don't use it. It doesn't matter. Fun can still be had regardless.

Funny thing is, it's at best implied in the guidelines. Spelled out might've been better for some DMs, making it easier to run the game, but for others - and for a whole segment of the player base, it seems - "seeing the wires" that way is unsatisfying. Whether you analyze the game and work at it consciously, or depend on talent, experience, or luck, you're dealing with the issue one way or another - and to some degree of success or another.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Campaign pacing is not necessary.

Events which proceed in a sequence by definition have a rate at which they occur, and thus a pacing (which, if I had to give it a rigorous definition, is something akin to frequency, e.g. event-cycles per time, though the relevant aspect is the human perception thereof). It is not possible to conduct a sequence of events, plural, and have it fail to have a pacing of some kind. (A sequence of one event could be said to have no pacing, as it has no defined time between events, but I would assert that few games manage to be singular events!) The pacing can be chosen or allowed to simply happen, but either way, it happens.

The first casualty of any war is the plan, including the DM's plan to have x encounters per day (and specifically, these specific x encounters per day). By definition, the players are going to mess up the DM's plan, so there is no real need for him to plan how many encounters. Just prepare the adventure with the encounters and as the players get to them, they get to them. Granted, if there is some form of time critical situation, then if the players rest, they will face the consequences of doing that.

This strikes me as an enormous fallacy. "Plans cannot be perfect, thus plans should never ever be used in even the smallest degree." The perfect is the enemy of the good; just because it is impossible to plan for every possible detail does not mean that plans are worthless. Plans can and should be made, as long as they are flexible. That will, of course, require that the DM (and the players) think on their feet, rather than slavishly obeying a wrote script--but I sincerely doubt that anyone who thinks campaign pacing is important is slavishly devoted to scripts, if only because that requires an extremely uncharitable perspective of one side of the discussion.

Why? The only time it matters is if some one player is more concerned how much other players shine. So what if we rest for the fighters? It just means that the fighter is now more capable for the next fight. None of the players at my table would care. They do not consider the fighter player to be dominating play. They consider the party to be more effective if everyone has a lot of options.

It might be different at your table.

So you're saying it is utterly impossible for one person to feel like they couldn't contribute enough to make a meaningful impact, while others were able to solve problems (be they combat or non-combat) almost singlehandedly? That it's impossible for one person to feel sheepish for always being the "I Win button presser"? Because you can easily have such a situation in a game where the rest cycle favors one group over another, and (apparently) 5e keeps its line rather close to points of divergence. What I mean by that is, having zero short rests per day pretty thoroughly shafts certain classes but not others, while having four or more pretty significantly empowers those classes, yet that's a difference of only +/- 2 from the number typically recommended.

Why? Can a DM not be good and still ignore that stuff? Sure he can. It's unimportant. Just because it is written down in the book does not mean that a DM should be a zombie and follow it verbatim. It's a guideline. Use it. Don't use it. It doesn't matter. Fun can still be had regardless.

Depends on what you mean--and whether "be a good DM" is all and exclusively what a group needs. I would assert that there is more than that. You can have a good DM and still have a poor game experience if the game doesn't enable you to participate. Having a drought or surplus of resources is precisely the kind of situation where even with a good DM, people can end up unhappy.

So...yes, "slavish" devotion to resource schedules is unimportant for "being a good DM," but "being a good DM" is not sufficient for "everyone at the table has fun." It's a big and useful step in the right direction, to be sure, but that alone isn't enough--and a DM aware of the impact of variable resources will understand that.