D&D 5e is balanced on an assumption of 6-8 combat encounters per day, but many storylines don't naturally lend themselves to that pace, and using a different number of encounters per day both messes up encounter balance, and balance between classes.
The obvious way to fix the balance is to reduce number of uses, but that's problematic for abilities that start with fewer than 6-8 uses, which is most of them. I made a couple tries on solving this before I realized that I don't need to be some mathematical formula, I can just use a randomizer. For example, cards. Just create a deck with one card per power use you have, plus filler cards, and your available cards are your hand. For that matter, we can also toss encounter powers in there (just put 3 copies in the deck).
I was tempted by a flow of draw 1 card per round, but this runs a risk of people deliberately dragging out a combat for more card draws, so not ideal. Instead, I would use a mechanic like this:
Build a deck consisting of one card for each use of each long rest ability you have, plus half your hit dice, plus three copies of each short rest ability. If you wind up with an overwhelming number of short rest abilities (e.g. monk Ki points), you might want to use a different mechanic.
Add filler cards to increase deck size to target size. Target size should be a multiple of 12. Most low tier characters work fine with 24 cards.
At the start of the day, you shuffle your deck and draw a hand of 1/6 your deck size (so 2 cards for deck size 12, 4 for deck size 24, etc) and discard any filler cards. If you wind up with a hand size of zero, reshuffle and redraw.
To use a power or spell, play the required card.
At the end of an encounter, you gain face down cards based on the encounter difficulty: 1/12 for Easy, 1/6 for Medium, 1/4 for Hard, 1/3 for Deadly.
If you have face down cards, you may add one of them to your hand at the start of your turn, discarding any filler.
When you take a short rest, add all your face down cards to your hand, discarding filler, and you may spend hit die cards.
There is no minimum or maximum hand size (so you might actually be better off fighting the BBEG at the end of a day than at the start).
If you run out of cards, you're running on fumes. Time to take a long rest.
To do this with a standard deck, use numbered cards for spell slots (you can't have more than 4 at any level, so ace through nine is plenty), ten or face cards for other abilities, and anything you don't have for filler. You will need to note down a key for your class. With Magic cards you can use lands of varying colors for filler and hit dice. Some online tools will let you build arbitrary decks (for example, roll20).
It’s just easier to make all of the encounters as “Deadly.” Then you can hit about 4 combats per long rest and it balances better. At least, that’s what I do.
It’s just easier to make all of the encounters as “Deadly.” Then you can hit about 4 combats per long rest and it balances better. At least, that’s what I do.
That messes up the balance between short and long rest classes, and getting four encounters per day can still be a challenge.
Yeah, 4 can sometimes be a stretch. But as long as the party can still take 2 short rests in the day then the balance between the two class types hasn’t seemed to be an issue as yet.
D&D 5e is balanced on an assumption of 6-8 combat encounters per day, but many storylines don't naturally lend themselves to that pace, and using a different number of encounters per day both messes up encounter balance, and balance between classes.
The obvious way to fix the balance is to reduce number of uses, but that's problematic for abilities that start with fewer than 6-8 uses, which is most of them. I made a couple tries on solving this before I realized that I don't need to be some mathematical formula, I can just use a randomizer. For example, cards. Just create a deck with one card per power use you have, plus filler cards, and your available cards are your hand. For that matter, we can also toss encounter powers in there (just put 3 copies in the deck).
I was tempted by a flow of draw 1 card per round, but this runs a risk of people deliberately dragging out a combat for more card draws, so not ideal. Instead, I would use a mechanic like this:
To do this with a standard deck, use numbered cards for spell slots (you can't have more than 4 at any level, so ace through nine is plenty), ten or face cards for other abilities, and anything you don't have for filler. You will need to note down a key for your class. With Magic cards you can use lands of varying colors for filler and hit dice. Some online tools will let you build arbitrary decks (for example, roll20).
Thoughts?
It’s just easier to make all of the encounters as “Deadly.” Then you can hit about 4 combats per long rest and it balances better. At least, that’s what I do.
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting
That messes up the balance between short and long rest classes, and getting four encounters per day can still be a challenge.
Yeah, 4 can sometimes be a stretch. But as long as the party can still take 2 short rests in the day then the balance between the two class types hasn’t seemed to be an issue as yet.
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting