Suppose I mess with the default time frame of the game...

[FireLance]

Healing becomes much more difficult.

Synergy between powers becomes pretty pointless, since dropping several 'encounter' powers in a single fight is huge investment of resources. It becomes better to build around spamming an at will (Twin Strike, the pumped up Magic Missile wizard, the charging barbarian).

Class features and abilities that provide constant bonuses become a lot more valuable than a power.

Good point on the synergy - if you break up a "standard" encounter into a larger number of smaller fights, fights will be shorter and the PCs will need fewer encounter resources to overcome each fight, and so there will be less scope for synergy across combat rounds and between PCs.

However, if you don't change the overall level of challenge that the PCs are expected to face between rests, I don't see why they would need to use more at-wills than normal. Area effects may be less valuable since the PCs may face fewer foes at once, but the trade-off is between area effects and single-target effects, not at-will abilities.

 

[FireLance]

What are you trying to accomplish? What's your goal?

As previously mentioned, it's more of a thought experiment.

A gritter game? Then keep the same amount of encounters, but possibly use lots more minions. Certain creatures would be a lot tougher - like the healing surge sucking undead. I think it would a more brutal world. Diseases would be deadlier too. Maybe it would be better for a warhammer world.

I'm not so sure about the undead - draining healing surges simply means that the PCs have to take a week's rest sooner. It's no different from a monster damaging a PC enough that he has to spend multiple healing surges to get his hit points back after a day's rest.

The point on diseases is noted, though. If the time frame for disease progression is not changed, the mechanical effect would be that the PCs have to make Endurance checks at the end of every short rest instead of after every extended rest. If the time frame for disease progression is changed, we get diseases that act very slowly in terms of game time.

 

[Jack99]

Assuming you don't change the default encounter difficulty so that the PCs can take on more fights between rests, would the only difference be with respect to the narrative, in the amount of game time that elapses? In other words, the party simply fights one encounter per day instead of one encounter every five minutes, and rests for one week instead of one day between significant fights that require the use of daily abilities?

Gonna make it hard to run dungeons with that thought experiment, no?

 

[FireLance]

Gonna make it hard to run dungeons with that thought experiment, no?

I think it might depend on the dungeon. A relatively static dungeon (e.g. mostly traps, undead and constructs that defend a specific room or area and do not patrol) would probably require the least changes. Narratively, the PCs take on a room, expend most of their "encounter" resources, and rest a day.

For more dynamic dungeons where more encounters per day may be expected, the DM would have to use a lower XP budget for each encounter. A party may thus end up facing one or two equal-level opponents per encounter (or one opponent plus a few minions), or more lower-level opponents.

 

[Umbran]

What this would do to gameplay depends on both what the players do, and what the GM does.

Let us assume, for the moment, the GM continues to make encounters as before, and does not redefine what "encounter" means. I think then this change pushes towards the "15 minute workday" (or really workweek) scenario.

You're a player - your character is not going to heal quickly, and your really big powers are now only rarely available. On top of that, in order to work, most of those big powers require some cooperation between characters to pull off - to gain positioning, gain advantages or disadvantages on foes, and suchlike ("You use your at will, then Max's encounter power will probably work, then my daily has a better chance of making the hit roll...). And if they fail, it is days or weeks before they can try again.

Ergo, they enter the adventure, go as far as they can on at-wills. Once things get tough, they have to pull out the stops, and get tapped out. Unless the adventure plotline imposes a time pressure, they are going to retreat, and that retreat is going to last a week.

Dungeons won't get cleared - new monsters can move in faster than parties can clear them out.

Large organizations or groups have a major edge on the PCs. The PCs can only take on major opposition once a week, but a large organization can send a group of major foes more frequently and still maintain a defense.

I don't think this would be much fun to play, for either GM or players.

Now, if the GM changes encounter or adventure design, the picture may be different, but exactly how would depend on the changes.

 

[FireLance]

Ergo, they enter the adventure, go as far as they can on at-wills. Once things get tough, they have to pull out the stops, and get tapped out. Unless the adventure plotline imposes a time pressure, they are going to retreat, and that retreat is going to last a week.

Dungeons won't get cleared - new monsters can move in faster than parties can clear them out.

Well, if the PCs only use their "encounter" abilities, they can get back into the dungeon after a day's rest. In addition, why would monsters necessarily move in faster than the rate that the PCs can clear them? A world with a lower population density of monsters might see much less movement than "standard" D&D assumes.

Large organizations or groups have a major edge on the PCs. The PCs can only take on major opposition once a week, but a large organization can send a group of major foes more frequently and still maintain a defense.

Again, this may be a factor of how quickly a large organization can bring its strength to bear on the PCs. Perhaps the organization's more skilled members are widely scattered, or the PCs initially take on a small branch of the organization far from its centre of power.

Now, if the GM changes encounter or adventure design, the picture may be different, but exactly how would depend on the changes.

Yes, and if nothing else, this thread has helped me to think of ways to make the altered default time frame work both mechanically and narratively.

Thanks for all the responses so far, and keep them coming!

 

[Umbran]

Well, if the PCs only use their "encounter" abilities, they can get back into the dungeon after a day's rest.

Yes. Take it this way - take normal play. Every time PCs would stop for a few minutes, they are now stopping for the day. Every time they'd stop for 6 to eight hours of rest, they are now stopping for a week.

Most adventure designs I have seen expect you to be using encounter powers in every encounter. That's kind of the point of having them recharge on that timescale. So, after every encounter or two, the party will have to stop and rest for 8 hours.

In addition, why would monsters necessarily move in faster than the rate that the PCs can clear them? A world with a lower population density of monsters might see much less movement than "standard" D&D assumes.

Assume a normal game, where the PCs could have come back the next day. if the PCs chose to walk away for a week, would the DM keep the situation static? Probably not.

Look over the Kobold Hall in the back of the DMG. For most of the encounters, you can posit that the PCs can take a few minutes break between encounters and have it play out as written. If they leave for an entire night, though, the occupants are going to know something is up, and the thing won't play out as written.

It is vaguely plausible that the PCs could leave for the night just before the final encounter, and come back fresh (and really, if they don't, they're probably hamburger). It is not at all plausible that they can disappear for a week.

Again, this may be a factor of how quickly a large organization can bring its strength to bear on the PCs. Perhaps the organization's more skilled members are widely scattered, or the PCs initially take on a small branch of the organization far from its center of power.

Remember, we are positing no change to adventure design. To first approximation, the "large organization" is the contents of whatever dungeon, thieves' guild, or wizard's tower the party was entering. All that force is available immediately. And teleporting away is not generally an option until 8th level.

Thus, for some reason if they party is to survive, the "large organizations" must not be particularly large, or must be diffuse, as you suggested. However, having a logical rational for every large organization the party's apt to deal with to be organized that way, when the heads of said organizations know how slowly powers recover, will take some doing. Bit of a plausibility stretch, if you ask me.

The general thought is as follows - there's some basic timescale of communication among the enemy. "Adventures" need to be no larger than what the party can deal with in that timescale, or it will not play out as written. There is no point in statting out a huge dungeon with all it's populace in detailed locations, if all that population is going to reshuffle after the party has gone through three or four encounters.

This is true regardless of system - in Shadowrun, the typical incursion has a timescale of minutes to an hour, because that's the response time when the bad guys have radios and telephones and cars. And because if the party is in there for more than an hour, they are probably dead.

 

[Umbran]

So, with the above I was largely thinking as I wrote.

The question is, how do you change adventure design to suit.

I think it becomes a general powering down of everything. Now, your characters have "at will", "daily" and "every once in a while" powers. No sane adventurer is actually counting on what used to be daily powers in their planning of day-to-day operations and pacing.

The real issue is not getting healing surges back for a week. That's the killer, kind of literally. The difference among the classes kind of gets washed out on such timescales. In the long average, if you need to use more than one or two surges per day, you have a problem, as you'll run out before the week is out.

Use of four surges a day is not sustainable for more than a couple of days. When your normal melee weapons are doing d8+ or d10+ damage, your first level fighter cannot (on average) get whapped with one more than four or five times a day for more than a couple of days without risking death.

The GM has to design with that in mind - PCs can manage much in short bursts, but cannot stand long engagements. If they take more than their own hit points in damage per day for multiple days, they will die. For a first level fighter, you can't expect him to engage more than a handful of orcs each day for multiple days.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I think the biggest thing to change is to apply the encounter design guidelines to a dungeon.

The "new" encounter becomes something that is worth 1/2 to 1/5th of a usual encounter.

You don't fight 5 equal level monsters any more. You fight 2 at most, or maybe 1 and 4 minions. And then you go on to the next.

You'll probably get a very strong feeling of attrition over each adventuring day. In a way, you are going back to an earlier edition attrition model - 3E without Wands of Cure Light Wounds or AD&D/OD&D.

 

[LostSoul]

I think you should do yourself a favor and divorce completely the story-driven notions of "encounters" from the in-game realities of days and hours.

How do you think this impacts the player's ability to strategize?

Not at all, I'd guess, except they have to convince the DM that they can take an extended rest here and now instead of running out the clock. Giving the DM that extra bit of responsiblity in making a judgement call might be a good thing for the game.