Sleeping in armor?

[aurance]

Given the arguments for class balance, and ValhallaGH's input, I'm inclined to rule that PCs suffer no penalties whatsoever for sleeping in armor*.

*At least for the 1-3 week stretches where they may be out in the field.

 

[Amphimir Míriel]

Rest in safe places.

This.

Since 4E is less vulnerable to the "15min workday", you can be a lot more strict about not letting characters sleep in dungeons without consequences.

Now, if the party insisted on sleeping in the dungeon, I would then have to bring up the "sleeping in armor" issue.

Improvising a bit, I would say that sleeping in light armor has no consequences (at least for a few nights), but sleeping in heavy armor requires an endurance check: failure means you start the next day with one less healing surge.

Probability of a midnight ambush would depend on how well the party prepares... If they hole up pretty well, hide their position, keep quiet and setup a guard rotation, their chances are low... However an adventuring party that decides to sleep in the middle of a corridor without any guard or preparation deserves what they get!

Now, if the plot requires a midnight ambush in an inn, where half the party is missing armor, then I would do it, but of course I would take their lowered defenses into account...

Edit (after reading Doctor Proctor's post): I haven't yet tried Paragon or Epic play, but how about making the ambush a "wolfpack" type of encounter with 4 minions and 3 skirmishers, all of them of one or two levels below the party?

 

[Noumenon]

I hope that was helpful.

That's really, really interesting since I thought that rule was total verisimilitude. Thanks for sharing your unique experience sleeping in armor. XP.

 

[LittleFuzzy]

Do you have any idea of how many adventures where this simply isn't an option?

A friend with an arcane lock ritual is a friend indeed.

And Proctor, I think you're missing one of the easiest ways to handle that sort of discrepancy. AC is not the only defense in the game. I can't recall which creatures in the MM primarily target non-AC defenses but even if they don't fit, change attack bonuses and changing a monster which does fit into one that attacks non-AC a fairly easy adjustment to make even on the fly.

 

[Doctor Proctor]

Improvising a bit, I would say that sleeping in light armor has no consequences (at least for a few nights), but sleeping in heavy armor requires an endurance check: failure means you start the next day with one less healing surge.

Realistically speaking though, it's probably easier to sleep in Chain armor than even leather. Leather armor isn't like a leather jacket, it's boiled leather that's very thick and very stiff. Chain at least is flexible and has padding underneath...I would think you could get away with one night's sleep wearing it.

Of course, then we would need rules for individual armor types...

Probability of a midnight ambush would depend on how well the party prepares... If they hole up pretty well, hide their position, keep quiet and setup a guard rotation, their chances are low... However an adventuring party that decides to sleep in the middle of a corridor without any guard or preparation deserves what they get!

Part of the problem with that is that sometimes the "party" makes decisions that some members don't like. For example, in our last adventure the rest of my group decided that we were taking an extended rest inside the dungeon using some back room. I repeatedly voiced my concerns and said we should either press on, or leave the dungeon. They didn't agree, so we rested there. Under your rules I would've been screwed when we got ambushed (which we did right as the adventure ended. Our next session will actually be playing the ambush encounter) because I would've had to take my armor off. Either that, or I could've passed up the Extended rest entirely...but that's not a great choice either.

Edit (after reading Doctor Proctor's post): I haven't yet tried Paragon or Epic play, but how about making the ambush a "wolfpack" type of encounter with 4 minions and 3 skirmishers, all of them of one or two levels below the party?

Even if you went a couple levels down, you still run into the same problem. Certain classes will be almost guaranteed hits, and others will fight quite effectively. If you went, say, 4 levels down, the monsters should have 4 less to hit...give or take. So that level 16 Abyssal Ghoul with the +21? That would become a +17. It's still basically a guaranteed hit on the non-DEX PC's (2+17=19, against AC 18. They'd only miss on a 1.) but it does compare more favorably with the high DEX PC's as they have an AC of 24 (hitting on a 7, as opposed to a 3).

I suppose if you could fine enemies that weren't really high damaging such that they wouldn't kill the PC's in 3 or 4 rounds of guaranteed hits, then it might work. However, if you're throwing that easy of an encounter at them, then what's the point? They're resting after a day of fighting level 16 and up monsters and then they get ambushed by level 12 or lower pushovers? It just doesn't really make a lot of sense. You're basically going to either have an encounter that sticks out like a sore thumb, or one that will most likely kill one or more players, if not result in a TPK.

(If you're going for something special like them getting ambushed at an inn, then the weak enemies might work. Basically, whoever was trying to kill them should've sent better assassins. Out in the field or in a dungeon though, it really sticks out.)

Edit: On a side note, if anyone is going to run or is in a campaign that has rules about sleeping in armor like this, I suggest you look at the Summoned armor mod in the Adventurer's Vault (p 53). You don't get access to it until level 6 (+2 enhancement minimum), but it costs the same as regular magic armor so it's cheap and easy to keep up.

Summoned Armor Level 6+
One need never worry about being caught unarmored while
possessing this extraordinary armor.
Lvl 6 +2 1,800 gp Lvl 21 +5 225,000 gp
Lvl 11 +3 9,000 gp Lvl 26 +6 1,125,000 gp
Lvl 16 +4 45,000 gp
Armor: Any
Enhancement: AC
Power (At-Will): Minor Action. You banish this armor
to a secure extradimensional location. At any point in
the future, unless you are wearing armor, you can use
another minor action to recall the armor. The armor
appears on you as though you had donned it normally.

So, one thing you could always try is to keep a set of Summoned Armor that's a little behind your "good" armor. If you ever find yourself surprised and without your armor, then you just need a minor action to don it. Even if it's 1 or 2 points behind your normal armor in terms of enhancement bonus, it's better than losing ALL of your AC bonus. If your DM was nice enough, he might even be willing to houserule up a set of +1 Summoned Armor.

 

[El Mahdi]

Yes, I have.
It's not bad. Kind of like having a blanket wrapped around your torso, only. And it keeps the rocks from poking you in the back. It is rigid, meaning you can't curl up if that's your inclination, and the layer around the torso makes it difficult to keep the body evenly insulated (causing some odd cold spots / warm spots). Still, I've had many an hour of sleep in armor.
Helmets are great. They're like a pillow that's strapped to your head. No complaints at all about sleeping in my helmet.

In my experience (2000 to 2003), the drawbacks are mostly psychological. Your hindbrain doesn't fully relax while you're wearing armor, so the sleep isn't quite as good as what you get when you're in a safe bed back home. Nor is it quite as good as what you get curled up in a sleeping bag with no armor on. Still, even that's not really a problem for the first three weeks or so.

I hope that was helpful.

I'd agree with all of this (I've done my fair share of sleeping with body armor and kevlar helmet on also - although I'd admit that sleeping in a vest without trauma plates is much more comfortable that when they are installed - but of course that defeats some of their protection). If you are used to it (i.e.: Proficient), then it's not really a problem, and I wouldn't penalize players. If they aren't proficient, they'd have penalties anyways, but I'd rule they can't get adequate rest (no HP recovery, no spell recovery, etc.).

However, if you really want to catch your players with their pants down (so to speak), I'd say you can't leave your armor on 24 hours a day (or more depending on the rotational period of your game world). When you stop to eat, or are lounging around the campfire, or bathing/washing up (if your character even does this at all), or even just getting a drink of water from a brook or pond, you may deem that they have loosened up their armor, or even partially take it off, for a short period of time. It would make for a fun and slightly different encounter. I just wouldn't use this very often, maybe once or twice during an entire campaign. However, it does work well if your enemy npc's or monsters have scouts watching the party. They could inform the rest of their group about the parties state of unreadiness and attack them. You may even allow certain Feats to nullify any possible penalties for party members (i.e.: Alertness and maybe Combat Reflexes or Combat Expertise - possibly class abilities like Evasion, Uncanny Dodge, etc.).

 

[Hambot]

thanks two those two servicemen that contributed their real world experience to this thread. I can now show this thread to the player in my group who keeps asking about why 4e lets him sleep in armour. So no probs each night, as long as they take it all off when they finally reach the holiday inn. I might have one ambushed while bathing or at the inn encounter during the whole campaign, just for a change.

experience >>>>> long theoretical arguments

 

[brehobit]

experience >>>>> long theoretical arguments

Modern body armor !=plate

I've worn chain enough to know that I could sleep in it, though the sleep would suck (not proficient either). I strongly suspect plate is a lot worse.

 

[Doctor Proctor]

Another issue here too is that medieval armor, and it's various replicas, weren't designed to be slept in. It's entirely possible that in D&D world where adventuring and dungeon crawling is relatively common that they would've developed more mobile versions of different armors that could be slept in for a period of time.

 

[aurance]

Modern body armor !=plate

I've worn chain enough to know that I could sleep in it, though the sleep would suck (not proficient either). I strongly suspect plate is a lot worse.

True, but characters in D&D can do and endure things that no one can do in the real world, and for me that's enough to handwave the difference.