Anyone playing 5e without the cheesy healing and resting rules?

I'm just looking to play in an old school 5e game, but so far I haven't been able to find one.

"without the cheesy healing and resting rules?" So... With an invincible character..?

Johnathan B. said: "without the cheesy healing and resting rules?" So... With an invincible character..? He probably means the opposite.

I was having a talk with Jason about this the other night. By the rules, you regain all your hit points after an extended rest, instead of having to use your personal hit dice heals. Being able to heal totally would allow a DM to make tougher encounters, as it does effectively remove the attrition of an extended trek through some place bad. I 'think' I understand what Kevin means. I believe the 'regain all your hit points' just because you have 8 hours to sit around is too forgiving as well.

Page 186 Long Rest. I don't think you should be gifted with all your hit points in all circumstances. If you got to rest in a friendly temple surrounded by clerics, then ok. Trying to rest in a a swamp on day 4 of a day 5 journey... why should you get all your hit points back automatically?

OH! Okay, that makes sense. I thought he was going the other way with it. Yeah, I kind of agree. If, in reality, you fall asleep with a gash in your face, and your losing blood quick, you can't just have a good night's sleep and be fine. I understand it slightly from a gaming standpoint, but a FULL heal is a bit much, yeah.

I am a different Kevin than the OP, however I do understand the sentiment, I thought about this topic a lot myself. I will counter though that all you do is end up trading spell slots of healers, so unless you can keep up constant encounter pressure all it does is slow down the party. You could counter this by adding time urgency in the mission, but this alone will pressure people to push their resources to the limit. As a DM, I haven't been able to find a reasonable balance.

Yes, I mean playing with healing and resting rules of past editions. For example, a long rest would only allow you to recover 1/hp per level. In addition, I would want to remove hit dice completely and/or only allow you to use them when you are subject of magical healing. I know there are some mediocre alternative rules in the 5e DMG, but trying to find a group that at least plays with them is rather difficult. Sure, I can DM a game with all the house rules I want, but I'm actually looking to be a player right now.

I'm a fan of the Gritty realism healing rules in the DMG. I think rolling hit dice that dont regen very often while you sleep is a better mechanic than 1 hp per level per night. But that is just me :)

Many are fans of those rules, but few play with them. :) I think that rolling hit dice during a long rest and not during a short rest might be ok. I found that full healing after a long rest can make random encounters rather pointless, especially during overland travel. Unless a character dies, getting lost has zero consequences

Not trying to pick a fight or anything, but if the only point of the random encounter is to remove some hit points it _is_ kinda pointless regardless of healing rules. Maybe the best solution is to design more meaningful encounters?

I wouldn't say that's the only point of a random encounter, but it certainly is one of them. I'm also not interested in every random encounter being fully designed. I just want them to have some impact. Resource attrition should be a consideration.

Here's a tip I use in my games to stem the abuse of the "Short Rest", first use the Encumbrance Variant, then allow only two short rests within a 24 hour period, and finally require the each player to eat one pound of food and drink one pint of water during the short rest, during a long rest I also require eating two pounds of food and drinking 1 quart of water. Due to the extra weight the PCs must carry i.e. 4 pounds of food and 2 quarts of water per day it becomes a strategy problem. -Ajax

I do agree with the other Kevin, that removing the full heal during a long rest shifts the game towards healing spell slots, but I think that's preferable. It's simply a mater of narrative preference that healing be conducted by those who heal. Anyway, there is a host of reasons why people don't like the full heal, I'm just wondering if there are any games out there that use the opional rules in the DMG or some varriant.

Well OP Kevin, not that it will make much difference to you but as soon as enough of the campaigns I run end, I plan on running a "harder" version of 5e with some of the optional rules and my own - more inline with the old school style of play. That will be a long time off, though...