D&D 5E Why does a long rest only restore half the hit dice?

[abirdcall]

I imagine that with the 1 long rest/24 hours rule they assumed there would be 1 long rest per expedition on average. This would then result in 1.5 levels of hit dice per expedition. Don't know why that is the magic number.

I've also changed the rule to have all hit dice back.

Long rest abilities recharging is a much greater impact than hit dice. The tension is reset anyway, might as well go the rest of the way.

Restricting long rests through both dangerous areas and time specific goals is the way to go.

 

[Lakesidefantasy]

We usually forget the rule and take all of our hit dice back.


I agree with Charlequin above. I believe it makes resting in the dungeon less appealing than going back to town.


After reading this thread I'm thinking of implementing a house rule (that will be easily forgotten). I'm thinking of giving a number of hit dice back depending on the quality of sleep we got through the night.


If we sleep in the dungeon and suffer a random encounter then maybe we'll only get one hit die back. If we camp then we'll get half of our hit dice back. But, if we sleep in a safe bed overnight then maybe we'll get more than half our hit dice back.


However, like I said, we'll probably just forget because it's usually not what our games are about.

 

[Lakesidefantasy]

But why 2 days of rest to get all HD back?
Why not 3 or 4 days?

Why not five? Or seven? Or three and a half?

I think half your hit dice just facilitates ease of play. Not the math, but rather remembering which rule uses a half versus a third, or a quarter. Like I said earlier, I have trouble just remembering the rule in the first place.

 

[Li Shenron]

As the title says, why do you guys think the design choice was made, to only restore half the hit dice on a long rest?

I think it was the result of not wanting to alienate either camp of playtesters, those who prefer the gamist "full reset" and those who wanted a little bit more realism in slower recovery.

To be honest, everything else already fully resets on a long rest, so I think it would have been more consistent to also restore all HD, and then rely on variant DMG rules to slow it back down if you want.

 

[Ringtail]

But why 2 days of rest to get all HD back?
Why not 3 or 4 days?

You've got a point. The number is pretty arbitrary really. Maybe it was a decision they made during playtest or simply thought it felt right?

 

[Yardiff]

Not everything resets on a long rest, exhaustion levels are the other thing. You can only remove one level of exhaustion per long rest, of course if your high enough level for greater restoration you can remove them that way.