A Short Rest is 1 hour long, during which the character can't do anything strenuous.
A Long Rest is 8 hours long, during which a character can stand watch for up to 2 hours and take part in combat or other strenuous activities for up to 1 hour. For an Elf a Long Rest is only 4 hours instead of 8.
These mechanics are likely to lead to a number of issues.
- The Fighter's signature abilities of Action Surge and Second Wind require a Short or Long Rest before it can be used again. Thus the Fighter needs/wants to take a Short Rest after every combat, but can't unless the entire party is in a place where they won't be interrupted at all. Thus the Fighter's primary class abilities are essentially "once per dungeon" or other adventure location, since the location essentially needs to be cleared of monsters before he can take a Short Rest. And at that point, there is no reason not to take a Long Rest so that the Wizard and Cleric can also restore spells.
- The Wizard wields reality altering magic that can win most combats and bypass most Skill challenges. The only real limit on the Wizard's power is his limit of spells. Most D&D players tend to think of this as a "daily" limit on resources, but it's not. the Wizard's spell casting limit is a Rube Goldberg Machine, with class abilities that allow him to bypass this limit in a variety of ways (Cantrips, Rituals, Arcane Recovery, Spell Mastery, Signature Spells). He rarely runs out of spell resources while clearing a dungeon, and then has a strong incentive to take a Long Rest after doing so. And then the Long Rest almost always successful, if if the players are attacked by monsters during their rest. Thus the Wizard basically gets full resources at the end of each adventure location, unless the DM places a plot limitation on it. (You must rescue the princess by sundown!)
- The Cleric's has a narrower spell list, and so he fills a more balanced and defined role/niche. (For now. Once a few supplements get published, he could theoretically fill any niche, especially since Domains explicitly allow access to certain Wizard spells). The Cleric's resource management is similar to the Wizards, in that the Cleric's spells are replenished by a Long Rest, and he has Cantrips, Rituals, and Channel Divinity (which is restored by a Short Rest). So again, the Cleric clears out the dungeon, and then takes a Long Rest to get all of his resources back, unless the DM places an artificial plot limitation on it.
- The Rogue is the only "all day" class so far. All of his class abilities can all be used at-will, with the exception of his 20th level capstone, which requires a short or long rest between uses.
- In addition, It's not clear to me from the description if multiple short interruptions prevent a Long Rest or not. For example, if players are attacked by monsters 59 times during their Long Rest, but each combat is a minute or less long, does the Long Rest still count? Although in fairness I think this is just poor wording, and the intention is "you can't be interrupted more then once for combat or something else."
- Finally, because you can't "stand watch" for more then 2 hours at a time, adventuring parties of 3 or less basically can't take Long Rests unless they're in a protected area, or they risk getting ambushed while sleeping, which basically results in death for the entire party in most cases. So there's huge artificial difference between adventures with 3 or fewer players and adventrues with 4 or more. (Unless there are exactly three player and at least one of them is an Elf).
There's actually a very simple solution to all of the above issues. Short Rests are for a very short period of time, say 1 or 5 minutes. That way a Short Rest is basically a stand in for "once per Encounter." Long Rests are for 8 completely uninterrupted hours of sleep. That way a Long Rest is basically a stand in for "if you're in a dangerous location you may not get your spells back, so you have to go back to town and rest in an inn or other protected area inbetween adventures" and the Wizard and Cleric's limits on spells become meaningful limitations. The Elf Trance ability should also be removed, so players can partially circumvent this limitation.
Another solution would be to reintroduce At-Will, Encounter, and Daily mechanics from 4E. I think that would be a cleaner and more balanced distinction, and I have no problem with different classes having different levels of each type of resource, as long as they're roughly balanced overall. But clearly none of the mechanics from 4E are allowed in 5E for some unknown reason.
Another solution is to just impose homebrew changes of some kind. But this could create radically different power levels for other classes as they're introduced. For example, if the Warlock has a bunch of class abilities that are restored by a Short Rest, unilaterally changing Short Rest from "when you clear the dungeon" to "once per Encounter" would make the Warlock radically more powerful.
Thoughts?
I actually prefer something like this:
Reduce the number of spell slots all spellcasters have for spell levels 1-5 by 1 slot each. Then remove the daily limit on arcane recovery. Give a similar recovery feature to clerics. Next, reduce the time a short rest takes to 15 minutes and a long rest to 6 hours.
Now all classes (except the rogue, maybe give them action surge) get a significant benefit from a short rest.
I don't see the problem.
Fighter's should not be able to second wind every 5 minutes, or take double actions every easy battle. Those are powerful abilites. It's like casting cure wounds and time stop.
Wizards also likes a short rest to regain his spell slots with arcane recovery, or rather at least once.
Channel divinity is also powerful, and again, not something you want to let them spam.
I do wish the rogue had a 1/short rest ability, but he can at very least spend hit dice. But this really isn't an "issue".
I agree the long rest wording could be better, but i stil don't see a big issue here. It's upto the DM.
The only "issue" i really see is the 3 party members * 2 hours < 8 hours thing.
In general, classes seem to be balanced around getting 1 short rest a day.
Lawolf wrote:
mellored wrote:
Lawolf wrote:
Interesting. So in a sense it's 'easier' to pull off a long rest than a short one?
Well, even so, there are bound to be some days when you can get a short rest. What do you think that'll run? Half of adventuring days including a short rest? 1 in 10? Any days with more than one?
It does seem like the upshot is that there should be very little difference in power between long-rest-recharge mechanics and short-or-long-rest ones. Which is counter-intuitive, and not how it seems to have been designed.
Rastapopoulos wrote:
If I play 5e, the short rest will be an encounter ability for the non-magic using classes. It won't exist at all for casters. For multiclasses only the non-magic part will get the rest effects.
I think a one hour rest is a dumb idea. I agree with the OP that anyone able to take a one hour rest is able to take an eight hour rest. The only exception would be a ticking clock. It's pretty rare in my games for the group to be able to rest without consequences inside the dungeon. Typically it's after the defeat of some major enemy and before they contact the next group.
I'm pretty anti-arcane recovery anyway. I'm sure I'll get rid of it regardless. If I am feeling generous I'll give a few extra slots to the wizard after a long rest.
Length of the short rest is definitely something I'd look at houseruling...after first giving it a chance in play.
Short rests will be difficult in dungeons, but ample in city or wilderness adventures, but Rope Trick will give you a free one (or more, depending on how many slots your party mage is willing to use). So fighters will tend to be stronger outside of dungeons than inside. Wizards will be stronger in dungeons than wilderness/city. It is very interesting that the rogue - already a very strong class, probably the strongest all rounder of the 4 presented in basic - is great in all situations.
Making short rests 1-5 mins would completely break the game imo. And wizards utility spells are mostly not a good replacement for a skilled rogue (there are some exceptions, kind of, like invisibility allows a chance to hide when you normally couldnt try to hide at all, but you still need to be a good hider in the first place to really use it reliably!). the devs appear to have been very careful about this and purposely designed 5e spells in this vain. Which overall I think is good. As long as everyone gets some shine time.
Psikerlord wrote:
I'm not trying to be snarky, but we've all developed a rather odd sense of time flow and exploration of ruins because of our influence by movies, video games, and other such. When you get into a tomb, ruin, or even a cave crawl while spelunking... there's a lot of down time of travel in there. In a ruined house or other building of a sizable amount (more than a 4 bedroom house, for example), you're likely to scour a few rooms at a time examining everything for useful items. Unless you were just "clearing" the house of hostile persons (such as when clearing a condemned house in the city), you take your time. That time goes by very quickly, and before you know it you have been in a house for two or three hours or a few hundred yards into a cave in the same amount of time.
By the same token, those four rooms could potentially be quite a few "encounters," but what is the realism of those in the other rooms not hearing your fight and joining the encounter? Likely, they will engage you as well.
It's a very different understanding of reality. If you need an hour break after fighting for your life (which is actually rather nice, especially if you've ever been LARPing in close quarters at full contact, rather than an open field with touch rules), then spend that hour scouring the room you're in for everything. Have a wizard? Ask them to scribe that entire mural down. Rogue? Heck, they can examine the lock type and take it apart to find out what make and model it is for future reference (Advantage on future tool attempts in the dungeon). There's plenty to do in that hour in the dungeon that isn't just "sit and be safe." So long as you're not in combat for that hour and not over-exherting yourself, that's a rest.
But, then again...
... I like swords.
I prefer a 4e-esque approach to it as well. I'm thinking of allowing short rests to be short, ie: 5-10 minutes. So, unless you are in a hostile lair, they are always possible. I even allow long rests in some dungeons; natural ones. I don't always make a dungeon that has stone walls, rooms, and an encounter in each room. Some are actively patrolled, some are just ruins, necropoli, dense forests, canyons, or cave systems were encounters are more likely than on a road or in a field. The 70's/80's and video game model of a 'dungeon' always seemed fake and, well, 'gamey' to me. It's fun and all, but I don't use that model anymore.
Exploration counts as a short rest too, even if the basic PDF doesn't say so (I haven't read the whole thing yet.) Really, unless your raiding an incampment, bandit base, or whatever, there's always time for a short rest while the party looks around, tends wounds, searches and/or hides bodies, discusses plans, etc.
I'll even interrupt long rests in town with rowdy parties, brawls, fires, burglaries, or worse. Becuase it's fun, and then the PC's are as cranky in real life as their character would be about being woken up out of a sound sleep at the Inn. 
I don't know what to give a rogue for a short rest recovered ability (ie: encounter power), but, an experienced rogue player will get sneak attack at least once in an encounter, so that counts, lol.
I am glad wizards aren't left with using a staff or light crossbow after one fight (thanks to attack cantrips).
So, PC's seem like they can go without a rest every encounter, if the encounter-building tools work...Something I'm not convinced of yet in light of yesterday's L&L post...
ivstin wrote:
Psikerlord wrote:
Don't forget about a very important resource to manage: Time. When PCs are inactive, grim portents accrue and approach the impending doom. Resting should cost time and that should translate into bad things happening in the setting.
CCS wrote:
I agree (sorta) with something Emerikol said, that there's not much point to breaking out a short rest, especially an hour-long one. Re-setting encounter resources between encounters, more or less regardless of what happened between the end of the last and rolling initiative on the next, wouldn't be a bad mechanic, at all.
Keeping the time of the short rest vague would also be good. Give the DM the flexibility to pace his campaign how he likes. If he wants to space a traditional 'day's worth of challenges over a week, he could allow the short-rest benefits after a night's sleep, and extend-rest only when the 'story' is resolved, for instance. If he wants to pack a half-dozen vicious battles into a single night (like the 'clearing a house of hostiles' example) short-rest-recharges could happen between combats no matter how brief the break between them.
Just let the players know upfront what pacing their dealing with.
seti wrote:
I'm going to houserule it to say that a short rest is 8 or more hours when out in the field. Kind of what a long rest is defined to be now.
A long rest is extended down time in a secure location, like a fortified town.
Healing and spell resource management will definitely be issues for the players in my campaign.
I think the 'period of strenuous' activity section for long rests is poorly worded. It makes more sense if you read it like a bulleted list.
Long rests can be interrupted by a period of strenuous activity.
-1 hour walking
-Fighting
-Spellcasting
-etc.
The reason being that the idea that 59 straight minutes of fighting is comparable to walking is preposterous. Most combats last well under a minute and few adventurers get into 60 of those a day.
My thought is that it's just telling you that "Hey, if they take part in strenuous activities for too long, they have to start over". Then it gives some examples of those activities and leaves it up to you. Casting a quick spell may not interrupt a rest, but you might say that casting rituals does. A minor scuffle where you kill a goblin and chase off the rest may not, but a full on camp assault will.
As to short rests: I'm of the opinion that it's exactly what it says, just a 1 hour period of downtime without strenuous activity. In Encounters I've seen DMs say that you basically sit still during this, but a sedate walk and relaxed investigation actions seem fine to me. Downtime doesn't literally mean "sitting down doing nothing".
So it's clear from this thread that different DMs are often going to manage Rests very differently. And that's what makes it such a poor mechanic as currently written.
Person_Man wrote:
mellored wrote:
I kind of wish there were 3 types of rest.
Quick: 5 minute breather. You recover minor abilities.
Short: 1 hour rest. You recover major abilities.
Long: 8 hour rest. You recover epic abilities.
Then you can classify all abilities as minor, major, and epic. Action surge and second wind might be major. At level 5 a 3rd level spell slot might be epic but a 2nd level spell slot is only major and a 1st level spell slot is minor. Superiority dice might be minor. Etc.
This would have been much easier to balance classes with differing resource management systems
Lawolf wrote:
Lawolf wrote:
Person_Man wrote:
mellored wrote:
Mommy_was_an_Orc wrote:
Nah, nah, nah, they beta test this for TWO YEARS, you think they didn't get their most basic mechanics every party will use several times practically every session PERFECT? Come now! What are you, haters?
There is no reason you can't take a 1 hour between encounters unless you're in a rare chase situation or on some other type of clock. In a normal game if your encounters are so close together you can't get to safety and rest for an hour, then your encounters are so close together the noise of combat and cries for help from your last victims would have cascaded the two encounters into one.
If an orc bellowing at the top of their lungs "help help, we're being oppressed" doesn't get the orcs behind the next door to come and investigate, you resting for an hour won't.
Emerikol. wrote:
Person_Man wrote:
Tony_Vargas wrote: