Sure they might have non-combat encounters, but if we are talking the amount of decent combats you can have without resting...
1-3 combats between short rests, 6-8 between long rests, is a pacing that works perfectly well when a short rest is a night.
That'd make for 3-ish short rests between long rests though, so not really one long rest per week.
It's entirely reasonable to have days with no combats.
It is, but it does kind of dictate the pace of the adventure. Six days of encounters followed by a week off averages out to the same number of encounters per rest as half a week on, half a week off but in terms of resources per encounter it's a world of difference. The pacing you suggest implies timing everything per week and leaving the party in peace for half of every week. Deadlines and timing are often a meaningful tool for keeping things interesting for me, so having my hands tied to that pace would be a bit of a bummer. Not the 'downtime', whatever form that may take, but the rhythm would be my issue.
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It is, but it does kind of dictate the pace of the adventure. Six days of encounters followed by a week off averages out to the same number of encounters per rest as half a week on, half a week off but in terms of resources per encounter it's a world of difference. The pacing you suggest implies timing everything per week and leaving the party in peace for half of every week. Deadlines and timing are often a meaningful tool for keeping things interesting for me, so having my hands tied to that pace would be a bit of a bummer. Not the 'downtime', whatever form that may take, but the rhythm would be my issue.
It's a lot easier to maintain deadlines that are relevant on a scale of weeks than on a scale of day.
It is, but it does kind of dictate the pace of the adventure. Six days of encounters followed by a week off averages out to the same number of encounters per rest as half a week on, half a week off but in terms of resources per encounter it's a world of difference. The pacing you suggest implies timing everything per week and leaving the party in peace for half of every week. Deadlines and timing are often a meaningful tool for keeping things interesting for me, so having my hands tied to that pace would be a bit of a bummer. Not the 'downtime', whatever form that may take, but the rhythm would be my issue.
It's a lot easier to maintain deadlines that are relevant on a scale of weeks than on a scale of day.
How so? If everything's on the scale of a day, it doesn't matter if the PCs are busy every day for three weeks straight and then have two months downtime or if they get plenty of rest every other day. They can be pushed at the maximum suggested encounter frequency for days on end or they can get to be lazy - either way, I can choose to push for the full allotment of encounters per rest or not. But if your pace says 1-3 encounters/day and 6-8 encounters/week, then it's pretty much half a week of hard work (to make them feel the limit of what short rests should allow) and half a week of no work (so they don't significantly exceed what long rests should give them). Deadlines beyond 3-4 days out become meaningless.
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It is, but it does kind of dictate the pace of the adventure. Six days of encounters followed by a week off averages out to the same number of encounters per rest as half a week on, half a week off but in terms of resources per encounter it's a world of difference. The pacing you suggest implies timing everything per week and leaving the party in peace for half of every week. Deadlines and timing are often a meaningful tool for keeping things interesting for me, so having my hands tied to that pace would be a bit of a bummer. Not the 'downtime', whatever form that may take, but the rhythm would be my issue.
It's a lot easier to maintain deadlines that are relevant on a scale of weeks than on a scale of day.
How so? If everything's on the scale of a day, it doesn't matter if the PCs are busy every day for three weeks straight and then have two months downtime or if they get plenty of rest every other day. They can be pushed at the maximum suggested encounter frequency for days on end or they can get to be lazy - either way, I can choose to push for the full allotment of encounters per rest or not. But if your pace says 1-3 encounters/day and 6-8 encounters/week, then it's pretty much half a week of hard work (to make them feel the limit of what short rests should allow) and half a week of no work (so they don't significantly exceed what long rests should give them). Deadlines beyond 3-4 days out become meaningless.
It's a full week spent on investigation, travel, or other non combat activity, with occasional interludes of combat. 6-8 encounters per day is a maniacal frenzy of activity.
It is, but it does kind of dictate the pace of the adventure. Six days of encounters followed by a week off averages out to the same number of encounters per rest as half a week on, half a week off but in terms of resources per encounter it's a world of difference. The pacing you suggest implies timing everything per week and leaving the party in peace for half of every week. Deadlines and timing are often a meaningful tool for keeping things interesting for me, so having my hands tied to that pace would be a bit of a bummer. Not the 'downtime', whatever form that may take, but the rhythm would be my issue.
It's a lot easier to maintain deadlines that are relevant on a scale of weeks than on a scale of day.
How so? If everything's on the scale of a day, it doesn't matter if the PCs are busy every day for three weeks straight and then have two months downtime or if they get plenty of rest every other day. They can be pushed at the maximum suggested encounter frequency for days on end or they can get to be lazy - either way, I can choose to push for the full allotment of encounters per rest or not. But if your pace says 1-3 encounters/day and 6-8 encounters/week, then it's pretty much half a week of hard work (to make them feel the limit of what short rests should allow) and half a week of no work (so they don't significantly exceed what long rests should give them). Deadlines beyond 3-4 days out become meaningless.
It's a full week spent on investigation, travel, or other non combat activity, with occasional interludes of combat. 6-8 encounters per day is a maniacal frenzy of activity.
Possibly, but since the regular rules of thumb don't tie my hands I can pretty much do what I want. Moreover, not all encounters have to be about combat, but they can still all consume resources - particularly spell slots and bardic abilities. And I don't have to set a high pace of encounters all the time in order to affect how sparingly the PCs use their per rest abilities: if they get pushed to the limit every now and then their players will try to ration their limited resources accordingly even on days they only face a single encounter, because they don't know what else might happen before they (get to) rest. And none of this seems to suggest why a week-based scale for deadlines is easier to maintain than one based on days.
If I want to ramp things up a few times in order to instill that sense of it being a bad habit not to use per rest abilities sparingly (or just because occasionally pushing the PCs hard is fun and interesting), I can't do that if I can't push against the limits of both types of rests; I can't push against the limits of both types of rests if pushing the short rest limitation for a couple of days requires having an equal number of days of using little or no timed resources in order not to exceed the long rest limitation.
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So not for nothing, but I think mercy monk is one of two healers that get any capacity back on short rest(celestial warlock could use their two slots on healing)
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So do I, but my point was that 'no more than 1-3 combats per day' and 'no more than 6-8 per week' are perfectly compatible.
It is, but it does kind of dictate the pace of the adventure. Six days of encounters followed by a week off averages out to the same number of encounters per rest as half a week on, half a week off but in terms of resources per encounter it's a world of difference. The pacing you suggest implies timing everything per week and leaving the party in peace for half of every week. Deadlines and timing are often a meaningful tool for keeping things interesting for me, so having my hands tied to that pace would be a bit of a bummer. Not the 'downtime', whatever form that may take, but the rhythm would be my issue.
Want to start playing but don't have anyone to play with? You can try these options: [link].
It's a lot easier to maintain deadlines that are relevant on a scale of weeks than on a scale of day.
How so? If everything's on the scale of a day, it doesn't matter if the PCs are busy every day for three weeks straight and then have two months downtime or if they get plenty of rest every other day. They can be pushed at the maximum suggested encounter frequency for days on end or they can get to be lazy - either way, I can choose to push for the full allotment of encounters per rest or not. But if your pace says 1-3 encounters/day and 6-8 encounters/week, then it's pretty much half a week of hard work (to make them feel the limit of what short rests should allow) and half a week of no work (so they don't significantly exceed what long rests should give them). Deadlines beyond 3-4 days out become meaningless.
Want to start playing but don't have anyone to play with? You can try these options: [link].
It's a full week spent on investigation, travel, or other non combat activity, with occasional interludes of combat. 6-8 encounters per day is a maniacal frenzy of activity.
Possibly, but since the regular rules of thumb don't tie my hands I can pretty much do what I want. Moreover, not all encounters have to be about combat, but they can still all consume resources - particularly spell slots and bardic abilities. And I don't have to set a high pace of encounters all the time in order to affect how sparingly the PCs use their per rest abilities: if they get pushed to the limit every now and then their players will try to ration their limited resources accordingly even on days they only face a single encounter, because they don't know what else might happen before they (get to) rest. And none of this seems to suggest why a week-based scale for deadlines is easier to maintain than one based on days.
If I want to ramp things up a few times in order to instill that sense of it being a bad habit not to use per rest abilities sparingly (or just because occasionally pushing the PCs hard is fun and interesting), I can't do that if I can't push against the limits of both types of rests; I can't push against the limits of both types of rests if pushing the short rest limitation for a couple of days requires having an equal number of days of using little or no timed resources in order not to exceed the long rest limitation.
Want to start playing but don't have anyone to play with? You can try these options: [link].
So not for nothing, but I think mercy monk is one of two healers that get any capacity back on short rest(celestial warlock could use their two slots on healing)