MOD's Modified Rests
Heroic though they might be, adventurers can't spend every hour of the day in the thick of exploration, social interaction, and combat. They need rest-time to sleep and eat, tend their wounds, refresh their minds and spirits for spellcasting, and brace themselves for further adventure.
This homebrew version of the Gritty Realism rest variant presents more forgiving, more interactive, and more rewarding rules for slower short and long rests.
Short Rests
A short rest is a period of downtime, at least 8 hours long, during which a character does nothing more than light activity. If a short rest is interrupted by an hour of strenuous activity, the characters involved must begin that rest again to gain its benefits. A stable creature that isn't healed regains 1 hit point after the first hour of a short rest.
A character can spend one or more hit dice at the end of a short rest, up to the character's maximum number of hit dice, which is equal to the character's level. For each hit die spent in this way, the player rolls the die and adds the character's Constitution modifier to it. The character regains hit points equal to the total (minimum of 0). The player can decide to spend an additional hit die after each roll.
Finishing a short rest reduces a character's exhaustion level by 1, provided that they have ingested some food and drink that day. A character can't benefit from more than one short rest in a 24-hour period.
Long Rests
A long rest is a period of extended downtime, at least 7 days long, during which a character sleeps for at least 6 hours per day and does nothing more than light activity besides from a workweek's worth of downtime activity. Each day during a long rest is called a day's rest. If a day's rest is interrupted by an hour of strenuous activity (excluding downtime activity), the characters involved must begin that day's rest again from the following day or they will not benefit from the long rest.
At the end of a long rest, a character gains inspiration and regains all lost hit points and spent hit dice. Finishing a long rest also resets a character's exhaustion level to 0, provided that they have ingested some food and drink daily.
Light and Strenuous Activities
Examples of light activity include light traveling, sleeping, eating, drinking, reading, standing watch, shopping for mundane goods, and performing idle talents (detailed later).
Examples of strenuous activity include strenuous traveling, fighting, casting spells, and similar adventuring activities.
Light and Strenuous Travel
The difference between light and strenuous travel is intentionally left undefined, as DM fiat is best used when judging if travel would interrupt a rest. It can be judged intuitively, such as a leisurely stroll through a paved city being light and a long trek across a heavily forested area being strenuous. For a more granular approach, factors such as travel pace, difficult terrain and environmental hazards could be considered.
Idle Talents
Idle talents are new abilities that allow all classes to benefit more from short rests. Before any short rest, PCs announce which idle talent they're using, which they then benefit from at the end of the short rest unless the talent specifies otherwise. The list of idle talents available is shown on the following page.
Magic and Ability Changes
- The durations of spells/abilities similar to spell effects (e.g. Way of Tranquility Monk's Path of Tranquility, Artillerist Artificer's Eldritch Cannon) are changed as follows: 10 minutes to 1 hour; 1 hour to 8 hours; 8 hours to 1 week (7 days); and 24 hours to 2 weeks (14 days).
- Spells that previously must be cast daily in order to enhance their effects or to cause them to become permanent must now be cast once every week instead.
- Magic items that previously recharged X amount of charges per day now recharge X amount per week (preferably from the 1st day of the week for convenience).
- The wizard's Arcane Recovery ability is changed to read as "Once per long rest, when you finish a short rest, ..." instead of "Once per day when you finish a short rest..."
- Special uses for tools that were long-rest-based (e.g. the alchemist's supplies' Alchemical Crafting) are now short-rest-based. If a tool's special use could be used during a short or long rest, only the long rest version is kept.
It should be noted that some abilities affected by slower rest rules, such as the catnap and tiny hut spells, the Genie Warlock's features, the duration of Wild Shape uses, and feats tied to performing hours of work such as Chef, are left unchanged. The DM may wish to change these abilities.
Going Without Sleep
Rests are never mandatory, but going without sleep does have its consequences. Whenever a character ends a 24-hour period without sleeping for at least 6 hours, they lose the ability to use idle talents and to remove exhaustion levels by completing short rests, and must succeed on a DC 10 Constitution saving throw or suffer one level of exhaustion.
It becomes harder to fight off exhaustion if they stay awake for multiple days. After the first 24 hours, the DC increases by 5 for each consecutive 24-hour period without adequate sleep. After having adequate sleep, the DC resets to 10 and they regain the ability to use idle talents and to remove exhaustion levels by completing short rests.
Rest-Related Abilities
Abilities that affect how you complete long rests, such as an elf's Trance or the Aspect of the Moon eldritch invocation, now behave differently. These abilities now affect short rests instead of long rests. If an ability now changes how quickly a short rest is completed, characters with it can perform strenuous activities in the time between them completing their short rests and their other unaffected companions completing their short rests.
Likewise, characters with abilities that alter their need/ability to sleep replace the daily 6-hour sleep requirement with their alternatives to sleep.
Druidic Companion
Available to druids and rangers.
Yyou gain the service of a familiar, as though you had cast find familiar. When obtained this way, it is a fey instead of a beast, and it uses your proficiency bonus instead of its own.
Fitful Rest
Available to barbarians.
You regain a number of uses of Rage equal to half of your proficiency bonus (rounded up). You may use this talent again after you finish a long rest.
Full-Caster's Recovery
Available to bards, clerics, druids, sorcerers and wizards.
You choose expended spell slots to regain. The spell slots can have a combined level equal to or less than your proficiency bonus, and must be spell slots for the classes listed above. You may use this talent again after you finish a long rest.
Half-Caster's Recovery
Available to artificers, paladins and rangers.
You choose expended spell slots to regain. The spell slots can have a combined level equal to or less than half of your proficiency bonus (rounded up), and must be spell slots for the classes listed above. You may use this talent again after you finish a long rest.
Healing Surge
Available to all classes.
You treat the first hit die you spend as though it had rolled its highest possible value.
Inspiring Rest
Available to all classes.
You gain inspiration (PHB p.125).
Instant Infusions
Available to artificers with Infuse Item.
You infuse a number of items up to half of your proficiency bonus (rounded up) as though you had finished a long rest.
Maestro of Rest
Available to bards with Song of Rest.
When you use Song of Rest during the short rest, you roll the extra healing die twice and use the higher result.
Priestly Duties
Available to clerics and paladins.
At the end of the short rest, any creature that spends a hit die gains temporary hit points equal to twice your proficiency bonus. Also, if you expend 25 gp worth of powdered silver, you perform one rite of your choice shown on ceremony.XGE
Primal Healing
Available to barbarians.
At the end of the short rest, each time you spend a d12 hit die, you roll the hit die twice and use the higher result.
Quick Formulas
Available to wizards with Cantrip Formulas.TCE
You replace one wizard cantrip you know with another wizard cantrip as though you had finished a long rest.
Renewed Vigor
Available to rangers with Favored Foe.TCE
You regain a number of uses of Favored Foe equal to half of your proficiency bonus (rounded up). You may use this talent again after you finish a long rest.
Safe Haven
Available to barbarians and rangers.
You have a +5 bonus to your passive Wisdom (Perception) score and have advantage on all Wisdom (Perception) checks to detect hostile creatures for the duration of the short rest.
Sorcerous Renewal
Available to sorcerers with Font of Magic.
You regain a number of sorcery points equal to your proficiency bonus. You may use this talent again after you finish a long rest.
Spell Preparations
Available to artificers, clerics, druids, paladins and wizards.
You change any prepared spell lists you have of your choice. The number of spells you may newly prepare (replacing previously prepared spells) using this talent in total is equal to your proficiency bonus. You may use this talent again after you finish a long rest.
New Feat: Survivalist
You have learned to more efficiently prepare during moments of rest, granting you the following benefits:
- Increase one ability score of your choice by 1, to a maximum of 20.
- You can choose to use two idle talents instead of only one during short rests.
New Downtime Activities
This homebrew comes with the following downtime activities added to be used during week-long long rests, alongside those found in the Player's Handbook, the Dungeon Master's Guide, Xanathar's Guide to Everything, and with any other homebrew downtime activities in use.
Versatility Training
Given enough free time, a character can shift the focus of their martial and magical practices. This is represented by them using a "versatility" feature they have, namely those shown in Tasha's Cauldron of Everything, as though they had reached a level in the relevant class that grants the Ability Score Improvement feature. These features are:
- the bard's Bardic Versatility
- the cleric's Cantrip Versatility
- the druid's Cantrip Versatility
- the fighter's Martial Versatility
- the paladin's Martial Versatility
- the ranger's Martial Versatility
- the sorcerer's Sorcerous Versatility
- the warlock's Eldritch Versatility
Resources
The character must have one of the "versatility" features shown above to use with this downtime activity. This downtime activity takes one workweek to perform.
Complications
Training on your own rarely comes with complications. If you want to make life complicated for the characters, introduce an action or an event connected to a rival.
Notice
This is unofficial Fan Content permitted under the Fan Content Policy. Not approved/endorsed by Wizards. Portions of the materials used are property of Wizards of the Coast. ©Wizards of the Coast LLC.
Rote Learning
Given enough free time, certain characters can replace options they have chosen with other options, specifically:
- an artificer can replace one of the artificer cantrips they know with another cantrip from the artificer spell list.
- a bard can choose one of the bard spells they know and replace it with another spell from the bard spell list, which also must be of a level for which they have spell slots.
- a ranger can choose one of the ranger spells they know and replace it with another spell from the ranger spell list, which also must be of a level for which they have spell slots.
- a sorcerer can choose one of the sorcerer spells they know and replace it with another spell from the sorcerer spell list, which also must be of a level for which they have spell slots.
- a warlock can choose one of the warlock spells they know and replace it with another spell from the warlock spell list, which also must be of a level for which they have spell slots.
- at the DM's discretion, characters with subclass features that provide options at certain levels (e.g. Arcane Archer Fighter's Arcane Shot) can switch one option for another.
Resources
The character must match one of the conditions shown above in order to perform it using this downtime activity. This downtime activity takes one workweek to perform.
Complications
Honing your skills rarely comes with complications. If you want to make life complicated for the characters, introduce an action or an event connected to a rival.
Credits
- Ludovico Tellatin for the Adventuring party artwork used throughout this document.
- Rest for the Weary by Benjamin Huffman for the concept of idle talents.
- Dwiz's Gritty Realism article for inspiring this homebrew.
