D&D 5E Solving the 5MWD

[Maxperson]

It doesn't. It eliminates the perception that 5MWD is a problem* by making 5MWD the only way to play the game.

* Excepting for those who might reject the game entirely. But we've never seen that happen.

If getting everything back every 24 hours = 5 Minute Workday, then getting everything back every hours = 20.83 second workday. I don't see that as an improvement.

 

[FrogReaver]

How does everything being short rest fix the issue?

I guess it would "help" in some ways.

Fighting 1 encounter and getting back all current spells is much stronger than fighting 1 encounter and only getting back half or fewer of them. So in the extreme cases it could help. However, it also potentially gives the caster more spells per day than he currently has - which helps out of combat scenarios much more - which means it's still an issue just not as much of a combat issue anymore.

Of course when looking at it for balance concerns - it virtually guarantees a full caster 1 big concentration spell per combat. It virtually guarantees that those combat resources don't compete with out of combat spells.

I'm thinking overall it could do more harm than...

 

[Maxperson]

I guess it would "help" in some ways.

Fighting 1 encounter and getting back all current spells is much stronger than fighting 1 encounter and only getting back half or fewer of them. So in the extreme cases it could help. However, it also potentially gives the caster more spells per day than he currently has - which helps out of combat scenarios much more - which means it's still an issue just not as much of a combat issue anymore.

Of course when looking at it for balance concerns - it virtually guarantees a full caster 1 big concentration spell per combat. It virtually guarantees that those combat resources don't compete with out of combat spells.

I'm thinking overall it could do more harm than...

The game is balanced around spreading abilities over 5-7 encounters before gaining the long rest abilities back. If you move those long rest abilities to short rest, you are virtually guaranteeing that everyone in the party can nova in every encounter. That's bad.

In order to get a monster/encounter that can stand up to a full party nova, it will have such increased damage, DCs and special abilities, that you pretty much guaranteeing a TPK. Avoid the TPK and the party nova melts the monster(s).

If you re-write the classes to only have short rest timers on all of their abilities, you have to re-write most of the game mechanics. You're talking 6e at that point.

 

[Harzel]

If getting everything back every 24 hours = 5 Minute Workday, then getting everything back every hours = 20.83 second workday. I don't see that as an improvement.

Increased productivity will reduce the number of adventurers we need. Reduced labor costs (fewer treasure hoards to fill) will increase profits, allowing us to do more magic-item buy-backs, thus reducing the medium-term risk of Prime Material plane disruptions of Outer Plane affairs.

 

[FrogReaver]

The game is balanced around spreading abilities over 5-7 encounters before gaining the long rest abilities back. If you move those long rest abilities to short rest, you are virtually guaranteeing that everyone in the party can nova in every encounter. That's bad.

Sure but the point is that the maximum power a wizard that's had his spell slots converted to short rest ones can wield per a given rest is much lower overall than a wizard who has more spell slots but recharges them on a long rest.

Since the worst case scenario is 1 encounter per ability recover action then the long rest version can wield more power in a single combat. That's the logic behind the notion that short rest conversion can help.

In order to get a monster/encounter that can stand up to a full party nova, it will have such increased damage, DCs and special abilities, that you pretty much guaranteeing a TPK. Avoid the TPK and the party nova melts the monster(s).

Not as bad as you'd think. Though it's more like rocket-tag - and 5e handles rocket-tag combat fairly well IMO.

If you re-write the classes to only have short rest timers on all of their abilities, you have to re-write most of the game mechanics. You're talking 6e at that point.

It's not something I'd advocate for - just saying there is a bit of sense behind the basic idea - even if it doesn't pan out after it's carefully examined.

By the way - it's almost like you seem to be trying to start a fight about short rest recharge conversion - even with me - when i'm not even advocating for the bad idea.

 

[coolAlias]

The game is balanced around spreading abilities over 5-7 encounters before gaining the long rest abilities back. If you move those long rest abilities to short rest, you are virtually guaranteeing that everyone in the party can nova in every encounter. That's bad.

In order to get a monster/encounter that can stand up to a full party nova, it will have such increased damage, DCs and special abilities, that you pretty much guaranteeing a TPK. Avoid the TPK and the party nova melts the monster(s).

If you re-write the classes to only have short rest timers on all of their abilities, you have to re-write most of the game mechanics. You're talking 6e at that point.

Mostly agreed, but the ability to nova could easily be limited by having some abilities such as spell slots replenish only partially on a short rest, much like the wizard's Arcane Recovery feature. It could even stipulate the same "only spell slots of 5th and lower can be recovered" limitation or whatever else makes sense.

If being guaranteed at least one spell (or smite or whatever) per encounter is unacceptable, then maybe implement some kind of diminishing returns, i.e. each short rest recovers fewers resources than the previous until they no longer regain anything at all except perhaps hit points (by spending HD).

I don't think converting everything to short rest mechanics is necessary, but it could certainly be made to work without crippling the current encounter design.

 

[FrogReaver]

Mostly agreed, but the ability to nova could easily be limited by having some abilities such as spell slots replenish only partially on a short rest, much like the wizard's Arcane Recovery feature. It could even stipulate the same "only spell slots of 5th and lower can be recovered" limitation or whatever else makes sense.

If being guaranteed at least one spell (or smite or whatever) per encounter is unacceptable, then maybe implement some kind of diminishing returns, i.e. each short rest recovers fewers resources than the previous until they no longer regain anything at all except perhaps hit points (by spending HD).

I don't think converting everything to short rest mechanics is necessary, but it could certainly be made to work without crippling the current encounter design.

It strikes me that if Wizard's got spells back on short rests that there'd be a lot more short rests in the game!

 

[coolAlias]

It strikes me that if Wizard's got spells back on short rests that there'd be a lot more short rests in the game!

Not too many people seem to have a problem with warlocks encouraging maximum numbers of short rests.

Hopefully no one is advocating that a Wizard would both maintain their current spell slot progression AND recover all of them during a short rest - I suspect no one is, but I haven't read the entire thread.

 

[Maxperson]

By the way - it's almost like you seem to be trying to start a fight about short rest recharge conversion - even with me - when i'm not even advocating for the bad idea.

I'm no trying to start a fight with anyone. I was just giving an assessment on what converting the current abilities from long rest to short rest would do within the 5e mechanics. It breaks them horribly. 5e isn't designed for PCs to be able to use all abilities in every fight. It literally breaks the game.

 

[Maxperson]

Mostly agreed, but the ability to nova could easily be limited by having some abilities such as spell slots replenish only partially on a short rest, much like the wizard's Arcane Recovery feature. It could even stipulate the same "only spell slots of 5th and lower can be recovered" limitation or whatever else makes sense.

If being guaranteed at least one spell (or smite or whatever) per encounter is unacceptable, then maybe implement some kind of diminishing returns, i.e. each short rest recovers fewers resources than the previous until they no longer regain anything at all except perhaps hit points (by spending HD).

I don't think converting everything to short rest mechanics is necessary, but it could certainly be made to work without crippling the current encounter design.

I'm sure you could do it, but I think that it would not only take balancing some abilities returning with a short rest, but also re-writing some or maybe even all such abilities to make them weaker so that novas don't melt the enemy. That's a lot of work. Far more work than just nixing the 5 minute workday.

I've switched to the 1 day/1 week, short/long rest mechanic from the DMG. It works well for stopping the 5 Minute Workday issues, as well as relieve the DM from having to shove a bunch of encounters into a short period of time. I can space them out over a week.