I played a lot of D&D in the 1980s, AD&D 1e & 2e, and I recently started playing 5e as a DM.
I really like 5e, but I find the 5e rule for regenerating HP with rests patently ridiculous, and a destroyer of fantasy realism. A short rest gives up to your level in replacement hit dice, and a single long rest restores all HP.
I played most of a module without realizing that the characters' natural healing rate in 5e was so potent and fast. I gave no HP for short rests, and long rests were irrelevant, because the party had enough magical healing to always be at full HP (and spell slots) by the next morning. The characters had no problems managing encounters and healing without the short rest HP boost, so I decided to nix it. I feel that my system gets a lot closer to the realism of actually being wounded and naturally healing.
As one who has taken a large amount of bludgeoning damage in my own life (car accident at 20 years old), I know how long things take to heal, and a major, shock-producing trauma is not something one will shrug off overnight. I looked at the Gritty Realism option in the DMG, and found that better, but still unsatisfying.
My house rule for short and long rests has been created as follows:
For everything but natural hit point regeneration, short and long rests work the same as in the PHB. Spell slots, special abilities restoration, etc. Non-magical HP healing, works in my game as follows:
1) Applying a healing kit stabilizes a 0 HP character, or adds 1d4 to a character above 0 HP. A healing kit can only be of benefit once after a character takes damage. 2) After a healing kit, a character with more than 0 HP heals on the next rest his CON bonus (ignore negatives) + 1/4 max HP. Only applies once on the day of the HP loss. 3) The next rest after damage without a healing kit restores only the character's CON bonus (ignore negatives) 4) After the 1st long rest, natural healing regenerates HP at the following rate: 1/4 max HP + CON modifier per tenday. Minimum of 1 HP per tenday. 5) Strenous activity or combat undoes the healing for that tenday. 6) Magical healing can augment natural healing at any time.
I'm playing in Forgotten Realms, so I based healing on the tenday, rather than a week, because they don't have weeks in Faerun.
A player with no CON bonus and no magical healing would be fully healed in almost 30 days if a healing kit is applied initially; in 40 days with no healing kit. Healing kits staunch blood flow, set bones, and various other vital things, so I think this will be workable and feel realistic. Also, makes healing kits as useful as they ought to be, not just for stabilizing 0 HP characters. I had a bit about continued application of healing kits after each long rest, but I felt it was getting too complicated.
There actually already are some rules for doing what they call "Gritty Realism" in 5e, which is located in the Dungeon Masters Guide which i recommend you get if you don't already have it. It essentially just makes a Short Rest rest be the current long rest (so 8+ hours of sleep and low activity would grant you the benefits of a short rest) and a long rest would be 7+ days of non extraneous activity, which in my opinion could include things like light shopping and such.
While i like the rules you have created for how the Healing Kits work (because those are probably the most useless item in the game as is) the rest of your rules in my opinion are overly complex especially when mixed in with the almost overly simplistic rules set that the rest of this edition follows. Not to mention depending on the build of the character playing with the rules as they are above, they could potentially gain more health over a short rest than over a long rest.
As long as you space out encounters to reflect the reduced availability of healing resources it shouldn't be an issue how quickly characters heal. I would just be worried about slowing the pace of a game if every other combat encounter requires weeks of downtime that you insist on playing out.
As one who has taken a large amount of bludgeoning damage in my own life (car accident at 20 years old), I know how long things take to heal, and a major, shock-producing trauma is not something one will shrug off overnight.
That's because taking damage in D&D doesn't imply major trauma, it implies minor cuts and bruises. The major trauma happens when you hit 0 hit points, your luck and stamina runs out and you receive the full brunt of whatever the source of damage was. HP worked like this in AD&D too, the only difference is 5e lets heroes get their second wind more quickly.
The DMG has guidelines for adding real injuries that can't be recovered from simply by taking a break.
As one who has taken a large amount of bludgeoning damage in my own life (car accident at 20 years old), I know how long things take to heal, and a major, shock-producing trauma is not something one will shrug off overnight.
That's because taking damage in D&D doesn't imply major trauma, it implies minor cuts and bruises. The major trauma happens when you hit 0 hit points, your luck and stamina runs out and you receive the full brunt of whatever the source of damage was. HP worked like this in AD&D too, the only difference is 5e lets heroes get their second wind more quickly.
The DMG has guidelines for adding real injuries that can't be recovered from simply by taking a break.
I’ll look for those.
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“It means nothing to be able to transport yourself anywhere,” I heard her say, “if you are a fool in all places.” --Roger Zelazny
As long as you space out encounters to reflect the reduced availability of healing resources it shouldn't be an issue how quickly characters heal. I would just be worried about slowing the pace of a game if every other combat encounter requires weeks of downtime that you insist on playing out.
Good critique. The party has a good cleric with Life Domain, and he is a very strong healer. Like I said, the party made it most of the way through the module using old-style encounter management before I even realized short rests could restore nearly all hit points. They managed their damage and healing wisely, and never had any trouble with having full hit points and healing spells at the start of the next day. I think with the magical healing available, the party would never be sidelined for more than a day.
Clerics are so much stronger in 5e than in 2e that I already thought game balance was tilted strongly toward the characters by comparison. One thing the 5e rule does is allow more varied styles of parties, without Clerics if desired. This allows Fafhrd and Grey Mouser style stories in your campaign, and I can appreciate that. OTOH, I do not really like to see Clerics made unnecessary.
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“It means nothing to be able to transport yourself anywhere,” I heard her say, “if you are a fool in all places.” --Roger Zelazny
As one who has taken a large amount of bludgeoning damage in my own life (car accident at 20 years old), I know how long things take to heal, and a major, shock-producing trauma is not something one will shrug off overnight.
That's because taking damage in D&D doesn't imply major trauma, it implies minor cuts and bruises. The major trauma happens when you hit 0 hit points, your luck and stamina runs out and you receive the full brunt of whatever the source of damage was. HP worked like this in AD&D too, the only difference is 5e lets heroes get their second wind more quickly.
The DMG has guidelines for adding real injuries that can't be recovered from simply by taking a break.
I’ll look for those.
I looked at it. Thanks for the tip. I like the injury rules, and I think I'll use them in addition to my revision, not instead of.
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“It means nothing to be able to transport yourself anywhere,” I heard her say, “if you are a fool in all places.” --Roger Zelazny
In older versions of the game you HAD to have a cleric along to heal the party. With 5e it's still a good idea but not a necessity.
The drawback with gritty realism (short rest=weekend, long rest=vacation) is the reset on character abilities. Fighty characters get theirs back with a short & casty characters get theirs back with a long. This translates in campaign to all characters, particularly those that are spell-centric, hoarding their abilities & slots until just before the reset rest when they let fly with everything they've got. It can work well in a magic poor campaign, but in other campaign settings characters end up spending an awful lot of time getting magic items to compensate for casters that don't do anything most of the time.
Caster ineffectiveness also rolls over into challenge ratings. A party of 5-5th level characters should have no problem with a CR 5 monster, but if 3 are casters hoarding their spells (or out of spell slots for the next few game sessions) what you've really got fighting that CR 5 baddie is a party of 2, which doesn't look good for the home team.
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I played a lot of D&D in the 1980s, AD&D 1e & 2e, and I recently started playing 5e as a DM.
I really like 5e, but I find the 5e rule for regenerating HP with rests patently ridiculous, and a destroyer of fantasy realism. A short rest gives up to your level in replacement hit dice, and a single long rest restores all HP.
I played most of a module without realizing that the characters' natural healing rate in 5e was so potent and fast. I gave no HP for short rests, and long rests were irrelevant, because the party had enough magical healing to always be at full HP (and spell slots) by the next morning. The characters had no problems managing encounters and healing without the short rest HP boost, so I decided to nix it. I feel that my system gets a lot closer to the realism of actually being wounded and naturally healing.
As one who has taken a large amount of bludgeoning damage in my own life (car accident at 20 years old), I know how long things take to heal, and a major, shock-producing trauma is not something one will shrug off overnight. I looked at the Gritty Realism option in the DMG, and found that better, but still unsatisfying.
My house rule for short and long rests has been created as follows:
For everything but natural hit point regeneration, short and long rests work the same as in the PHB. Spell slots, special abilities restoration, etc.
Non-magical HP healing, works in my game as follows:
1) Applying a healing kit stabilizes a 0 HP character, or adds 1d4 to a character above 0 HP. A healing kit can only be of benefit once after a character takes damage.
2) After a healing kit, a character with more than 0 HP heals on the next rest his CON bonus (ignore negatives) + 1/4 max HP. Only applies once on the day of the HP loss.
3) The next rest after damage without a healing kit restores only the character's CON bonus (ignore negatives)
4) After the 1st long rest, natural healing regenerates HP at the following rate: 1/4 max HP + CON modifier per tenday. Minimum of 1 HP per tenday.
5) Strenous activity or combat undoes the healing for that tenday.
6) Magical healing can augment natural healing at any time.
I'm playing in Forgotten Realms, so I based healing on the tenday, rather than a week, because they don't have weeks in Faerun.
A player with no CON bonus and no magical healing would be fully healed in almost 30 days if a healing kit is applied initially; in 40 days with no healing kit.
Healing kits staunch blood flow, set bones, and various other vital things, so I think this will be workable and feel realistic. Also, makes healing kits as useful as they ought to be, not just for stabilizing 0 HP characters. I had a bit about continued application of healing kits after each long rest, but I felt it was getting too complicated.
“It means nothing to be able to transport yourself anywhere,” I heard her say, “if you are a fool in all places.” --Roger Zelazny
Regards,
Russmax
There actually already are some rules for doing what they call "Gritty Realism" in 5e, which is located in the Dungeon Masters Guide which i recommend you get if you don't already have it. It essentially just makes a Short Rest rest be the current long rest (so 8+ hours of sleep and low activity would grant you the benefits of a short rest) and a long rest would be 7+ days of non extraneous activity, which in my opinion could include things like light shopping and such.
While i like the rules you have created for how the Healing Kits work (because those are probably the most useless item in the game as is) the rest of your rules in my opinion are overly complex especially when mixed in with the almost overly simplistic rules set that the rest of this edition follows. Not to mention depending on the build of the character playing with the rules as they are above, they could potentially gain more health over a short rest than over a long rest.
As long as you space out encounters to reflect the reduced availability of healing resources it shouldn't be an issue how quickly characters heal. I would just be worried about slowing the pace of a game if every other combat encounter requires weeks of downtime that you insist on playing out.
That's because taking damage in D&D doesn't imply major trauma, it implies minor cuts and bruises. The major trauma happens when you hit 0 hit points, your luck and stamina runs out and you receive the full brunt of whatever the source of damage was. HP worked like this in AD&D too, the only difference is 5e lets heroes get their second wind more quickly.
The DMG has guidelines for adding real injuries that can't be recovered from simply by taking a break.
The Forum Infestation (TM)
I’m aware of the gritty realism rule, as I noted in my post. I know, tldr.
I realize what you’re saying about short rest vs long rest. It’s the first test that matters.
“It means nothing to be able to transport yourself anywhere,” I heard her say, “if you are a fool in all places.” --Roger Zelazny
Regards,
Russmax
I’ll look for those.
“It means nothing to be able to transport yourself anywhere,” I heard her say, “if you are a fool in all places.” --Roger Zelazny
Regards,
Russmax
Good critique. The party has a good cleric with Life Domain, and he is a very strong healer. Like I said, the party made it most of the way through the module using old-style encounter management before I even realized short rests could restore nearly all hit points. They managed their damage and healing wisely, and never had any trouble with having full hit points and healing spells at the start of the next day. I think with the magical healing available, the party would never be sidelined for more than a day.
Clerics are so much stronger in 5e than in 2e that I already thought game balance was tilted strongly toward the characters by comparison. One thing the 5e rule does is allow more varied styles of parties, without Clerics if desired. This allows Fafhrd and Grey Mouser style stories in your campaign, and I can appreciate that. OTOH, I do not really like to see Clerics made unnecessary.
“It means nothing to be able to transport yourself anywhere,” I heard her say, “if you are a fool in all places.” --Roger Zelazny
Regards,
Russmax
I looked at it. Thanks for the tip. I like the injury rules, and I think I'll use them in addition to my revision, not instead of.
“It means nothing to be able to transport yourself anywhere,” I heard her say, “if you are a fool in all places.” --Roger Zelazny
Regards,
Russmax
In older versions of the game you HAD to have a cleric along to heal the party. With 5e it's still a good idea but not a necessity.
The drawback with gritty realism (short rest=weekend, long rest=vacation) is the reset on character abilities. Fighty characters get theirs back with a short & casty characters get theirs back with a long. This translates in campaign to all characters, particularly those that are spell-centric, hoarding their abilities & slots until just before the reset rest when they let fly with everything they've got. It can work well in a magic poor campaign, but in other campaign settings characters end up spending an awful lot of time getting magic items to compensate for casters that don't do anything most of the time.
Caster ineffectiveness also rolls over into challenge ratings. A party of 5-5th level characters should have no problem with a CR 5 monster, but if 3 are casters hoarding their spells (or out of spell slots for the next few game sessions) what you've really got fighting that CR 5 baddie is a party of 2, which doesn't look good for the home team.