D&D (2024) The Problem with Healing Powercreep

[tetrasodium]

I know, and I agree with you that "press on or rest" is (or should be) an interesting decision point for players. I don't think it follows that "therefore resting should take days of game time and rather a lot of play time committed to busywork." The game logic alone applies narrowly to a specific kind of military scenario--one in which there are clear advantages to sustaining pressure on an enemy that wants to buy time.

The game logic doesn't apply particularly well to other kinds of military scenarios. What if the pressure of an invader has united the enemy, and relaxing that pressure will cause them to fall back to infighting? What if there is no common, united "enemy" at all? What if the enemy is so big and the problem on such a scale that the party can remain in Rivendell as long as it takes? All the clerical BS is just delaying the cool Council scene that's coming next. What if it's an exploratory expedition such as a hexcrawl, where pressing on into the unknown with insufficient resources is simply foolish? What if it's a pulp Sword & Sorcery adventure where the pacing between Act I, Act II and Act III should be fast and furious? What if the PCs would otherwise press on to the next level of the dungeon, but because they know they have days of recovery and clericry ahead of them, they choose to withdraw early and get it over with before delving deeper?

From my perspective, this is something very common in the OSR, or among dedicated old-school players in general: The idea that a particular game dynamic is cool, and therefore that the weird/wonky/idiosyncratic way it was handled in the classic rules is genius, actually. The best OSR stuff identifies the cool game dynamic but isn't afraid to explore different ways of handling it.

Anyway, so as not to be a complete thread derail, Shadowdark still feels old-school to me and still gives the DM a terrific, much more flexible toolbox with which to present that "press on or rest" decision point while still using 5e's "full heal on rest" rules. In 5e itself, IME and as I said upthread, attrition pressures scarce resources (daily uses and spell slots) long before it pressures hit points, so even if you value the attrition dynamic, buffed healing spells shouldn't be a big concern. It might enhance the game effects of attrition by blowing through spell slots more quickly!

A lot of those "what ifs" seem to be unfipping the squad/army based war gaming ->but now you get to control a single unit and focus on that unit's experience switch that d&d started with. Those seem more macro level things than d&d really handles.

 

[Greg Benage]

A lot of those "what ifs" seem to be unfipping the squad/army based war gaming ->but now you get to control a single unit and focus on that unit's experience switch that d&d started with. Those seem more macro level things than d&d really handles.

I'm not sure I follow. Which what-ifs? The LotR example? Pretty early on, D&D seemed to be about dungeon delving, hexcrawl exploration and at least an aspiration to play out Sword & Sorcery-inspired adventures, so I think it's fair to question whether the "days of clericry" model of resting was ever the best possible way to confront players with the "rest or press on" decision point.

 

[Krachek]

Putting pressure on players in a RPG is almost a fake.
Players are not at risk, they are seated comfortably with beer and pretzel and have a good time.
Players can play along and pretend that their characters are in a life or death situation.
Then choose to roleplay an heroic, pragmatic or coward character.

 

[tetrasodium]

I'm not sure I follow. Which what-ifs? The LotR example? Pretty early on, D&D seemed to be about dungeon delving, hexcrawl exploration and at least an aspiration to play out Sword & Sorcery-inspired adventures, so I think it's fair to question whether the "days of clericry" model of resting was ever the best possible way to confront players with the "rest or press on" decision point.

Even before that point. When gygax and them originally started making d&d it started forking off from squad/army based war gaming. The switch they flipped was to have each player controlling one guy rather than one army. A good chuck of your second paragraph in the post I quoted earlier (if not the entire thing) is talking about army based war gaming type concerns.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I miss the ever-so-heroic multi-day medical camping from the old Baldur’s Gate I & II games. Nothing says adventure like clicking the ‘camp’ button again.

The trick is, you don't rest in the wilderness for multiple days. You do it in town or in a haven, where other downtime activities are available.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

It was.

Forcing the party to have to choose between a) resting for long enough to give the enemy time to do stuff and b) pressing on at reduced strength to (ideally) prevent the enemy from doing stuff is important IMO, and that choice is lost when resting gives everything back to the PCs before the enemy has a chance to move.

Right. And this is one of the reasons I like to use gritty rests (with the additional "sanctuary" requirement.) It is way easier to have situations where this choice matters, if full rest means going back to the nearest town to recuperate for a week rather than camping for a night.

 

[Greg Benage]

Even before that point. When gygax and them originally started making d&d it started forking off from squad/army based war gaming. The switch they flipped was to have each player controlling one guy rather than one army. A good chuck of your second paragraph in the post I quoted earlier (if not the entire thing) is talking about army based war gaming type concerns.

Wow, I don't see that at all and I'm the one who wrote it! My take was that @Lanefan's perspective on the benefits of rules requiring multiple days of clerics memorizing and casting healing spells to recover hit points really applied to one sort of military scenario: One in which the attacking force didn't want to allow "the enemy" to regroup. This creates an interesting decision point--do we press our advantage despite the fact that our own resources are depleted, or do we withdraw and recover, with the risk that the hard-pressed enemy will do the same? Maybe revisit @Lanefan's comment that I was responding to?

My point was that the benefits of that model of resting don't necessarily accrue even to other military contexts, let alone bog-standard D&D scenarios such as exploratory hexcrawls, dungeon-delving, or Sword & Sorcery pulp adventures. Focusing on the latter example, this is in fact something Zeb Cook contemplated explicitly in CB1 Conan Unchained (1984):

HEALING
Howard normally depicted the Hyborian deities in his stories as cold and aloof. No one turned to them except in times of greatest need. Crom, the god of Conan's tribe, was a grim and harsh deity. None called on him for aid, as he sent doom and death more often than he helped his followers. Because of this, clerics as they appear in the AD&D rules are almost non-existent. There is very little magical healing of any type, yet Conan heals and recovers from ferocious battles quickly.

In a Sword & Sorcery pulp adventure inspired by the Conan stories, slow natural and/or magical healing doesn't create an interesting decision point for the players--it just jacks up the pacing of the adventure. Likewise, I think it's a bad fit for many other very typical D&D scenarios (exploratory hexcrawls, dungeon delving, etc.). My dissatisfaction with it has nothing at all to do with army-based wargaming concerns.

 

[MoonSong]

@Daztur I'm late to this thread, but let me tell you, I share some of your concerns, but not your conclusion. I worry about the hit point inflation that has been trending since the 2e to 3e switch. But, honestly, the buff of healing is about one of the few things I found enticing from 5.2.

Let me tell you, I know it isn't for everybody, but being a dedicated healer can be very rewarding. I could easily prepare all heals and not feel I'm missing out. I loathe having to spend my actions on "the real fun", and I would feel proud of ending a day with my party at or near full HP.

And I find 5e the least fun edition to be a healer. It is just too hostile to healers, and part of it is that in-combat healing is not enough to offset monster damage and thus not viable to do proactively. Add that to the existence of ranged and bonus action healing taking away the heal a fallen comrade mini-game, and out of combat and long term it is just gone. (Plus with monster HP being so high now there's too much peer pressure to do damage every turn) So what is left? Sneeze a few times a combat while you do your "real contribution" to the party? At least with higher healing proactive casting of cure wounds can be a thing again. Hopefully.

 

[Vaalingrade]

To be fair, by the power of concentration, 5e is openly hostile to ALL support concepts, not just healers.

 

[Greg Benage]

@Daztur I'm late to this thread, but let me tell you, I share some of your concerns, but not your conclusion. I worry about the hit point inflation that has been trending since the 2e to 3e switch. But, honestly, the buff of healing is about one of the few things I found enticing from 5.2.

Let me tell you, I know it isn't for everybody, but being a dedicated healer can be very rewarding. I could easily prepare all heals and not feel I'm missing out. I loathe having to spend my actions on "the real fun", and I would feel proud of ending a day with my party at or near full HP.

And I find 5e the least fun edition to be a healer. It is just too hostile to healers, and part of it is that in-combat healing is not enough to offset monster damage and thus not viable to do proactively. Add that to the existence of ranged and bonus action healing taking away the heal a fallen comrade mini-game, and out of combat and long term it is just gone. (Plus with monster HP being so high now there's too much peer pressure to do damage every turn) So what is left? Sneeze a few times a combat while you do your "real contribution" to the party? At least with higher healing proactive casting of cure wounds can be a thing again. Hopefully.

This is a good reminder. If dedicated healer is a viable role while still not being mandatory, that would be the sweet spot.