[mipadi]

This might seem like a dumb, easy question, but how do you handle sleep in your campaigns? Traditionally, the group I usually play with has handled sleep by having three watches per night; characters each take one watch and sleep the other two, except in the case of elves, who do their elf-thing one watch, and stay on guard the other two. That's how I learned how to do it, so I've subsequently brought that idea to other groups I have played with.

However, I am DM of a group now, and I started scrutinzing that play style. I've come up with two problems:

• If a "night" lasts, say, nine hours, players aren't really getting enough sleep (only six, assuming no interruptions);
  
• If a night lasts longer (say, twelve hours), players are spending a good amount of time sleeping, which is inefficient for a party, to say the least.

So, how do you handle sleeping/night watches in your campaigns?

[Dthclaw]

I make them keep watches when they are in dungeons and other similarly dangerous areas. I don't really fret about how long the day or night is - it might seem vital, but after a while it'll probably fade from any degree of import.

[Axel]

The way we've always done it is in the wild you set a watch, with an average of 10 hours per day spent on camping and sleeping. You make up for lost sleep when you reach a town. Which is also more or less how we live, being in college. Is there such a thing as a Saturday morning?

[Dthclaw]

If you're in marching band, yeah...

10 hours? That seems a bit much.

[Rintaran]

I leave it up to the PCs what kind of watches they want to set. If they don't mention anything about a watch, they have none (and I can be teh evil). If they arrange watches, they arrange watches.

[Raven Bloodmoon]

I normally start by hinting to them that they are getting tired. It is up tot hem to decide to sleep or to push on. If they choose to sleep, most people know my reputation for being as cruel as possible, so they decide to set a watch. They normally take the night in shifts, but I really could care less what they do, and depending on my mood and the mood of the game (and especially if they forget to mention that they set watches) random marauding monsters run out of know where and attack the party for not apparent reason other than to disturb their sleep and point out the fact that they'd be bleeding a lot less if they hadn't done something as dumb as go to sleep in the middle of an adventure without setting a watch. But that's just me. I've also been known to have a family of badgers eat all of a party's food because they failed to set a watch. I think they liked that less than actually being attacked, as they were about three days from teh nearest town.

[CMB]

Raven Bloodmoon, on Jun 9 2006, 12:35 AM, said:

I normally start by hinting to them that they are getting tired. It is up tot hem to decide to sleep or to push on. If they choose to sleep, most people know my reputation for being as cruel as possible, so they decide to set a watch. They normally take the night in shifts, but I really could care less what they do, and depending on my mood and the mood of the game (and especially if they forget to mention that they set watches) random marauding monsters run out of know where and attack the party for not apparent reason other than to disturb their sleep and point out the fact that they'd be bleeding a lot less if they hadn't done something as dumb as go to sleep in the middle of an adventure without setting a watch. But that's just me. I've also been known to have a family of badgers eat all of a party's food because they failed to set a watch. I think they liked that less than actually being attacked, as they were about three days from teh nearest town.

Heh i've had bandits take everything from the players before only leaving what the players had on. But yea thats how i set it up in my DM Sessions let the players set up their watches and if there are none. Then i get to have some real fun

[Oneiros]

I only worry about lack of sleep if the party camps for less than 8 hours, and kind of ignore the fact that they're not sleeping while on watch. They're still "resting". If they do get into combat in the middle of the night, I only penalize them if there's a lot of post-combat activity (questioning prisoners, decoding documents, identifying items, building elaborate spike pits, having sex, ect.)

If they get less than this amount, I use the rules for Forced March. The increased DC for the Forced March check would carry over night to night until the characters get 8 hours rest (and probably go up another increment if they travelled all day.) The Endurance Feat applies to these checks.

If they don't have a watch, well, sleeping characters get a -10 on Listen checks ...

As a player, my group usually tries to have 4 watches of 2 hours each. Sometimes this means only a single character is awake on watch. We've been attacked enough during the night under the current DM that the Endurance feat is worthwhile for the ability to sleep in armor. We also have paid a lot of cash to inns over the years to repair the damage caused by our midnight melees. Occaisonally a captured villian will have the coin to cover it, but it normally comes out of our own pockets.

For worlds with days longer/shorter than 24 hours, I'd say that the characters sleep cycles are adjusted to match. A "full night's rest" is equal to 1/3 of the day. A normal day's travel (before having to make Forced March checks) is also 1/3 of the day. You might allow bonuses/penalties to other activities (like Craft checks) for shorter/longer days to reflect the altered level of productivity. Also note that a longer day increases the time between recharges of "x/day" abilities and spells.

[Ssri-Tel-Quessir Hitokiri]

Like most of the other DMs on that have replied so far, I just leave things up to the party to deicde. They can sleep for as long as they want to and travel for as long as they want to. It is entirely their decision. They know the rules well enough to know what happens if you don't get enough sleep.

[Holy Deg]

I'm new to the whole DnD and DMing things. I see that I'm pretty generous. I've granted my players that their characters are intelligent enough to always set up a watch (unless they decide not to, or are in an inn). I just kind of figure that there are some things there characters would just feel was routine that they might not think of themselves. But then again, all my players are as new to the game as I am.

As far as the length of rest and sleep, I just assume that they stop adventuring after 8 hours of exploring/traveling, unless they volunteer to push themselves.

[super sorcerer]

Quote

I'm new to the whole DnD and DMing things. I see that I'm pretty generous. I've granted my players that their characters are intelligent enough to always set up a watch (unless they decide not to, or are in an inn). I just kind of figure that there are some things there characters would just feel was routine that they might not think of themselves. But then again, all my players are as new to the game as I am.

Acualy it is realy up to the group and the DM.
Now I am in the army so I don't have enough time to play, but in the last group I played (and they where experienced players) we assumed that the characters are assumed to sleep with watches and if it is important the DM ask at what order, but in this style we know what are we expected to do, and things that our characters would oviously do are assumed to be done. In my first group that I played in we assumed that everything that the character do must be said by the player and nothing is ever obvious, we even had to mention that our characters are looking back once in a while and not only the front. Both ways are playble and it depend on you to decide which way do you prefer (by you I mean you and your party). you should decide whether the game is about the characters (you assume that the characters would think of setting a watch) or the players (doing only what the player say). In the first style we often decide arguments by diplomacy checks and in the second the players just argue themselves. Both ways are equaly good for my opinion but it is only up to you and I must say that it mostly depend on how much conection you want between the character's personality and the player's personality.

When the party travel long distances it is assumed to walk only 8 hours each day what do they do at the rest of the day? probably eating ,drinking ,resting and sleeping. In so much time it is natural to assume that they always set watches becouse otherwise they could walk at least one more hour every day. In the army we sleep 6 hours and watch half an hour each night and we can walk 14 hours each day at the base speed of a human so when we march it is much faster than a dnd party.

[ToySoldier]

The group I play with now are all in the military with me, so we're a very concious group regarding security. As a DM, I don't remind them, no hints, it's the responsibility of the players to remember that they are in a possibly unsafe area and may need guards. If they forget...well, waking up to a ring of fire because you posted no guard (and no one to watch the fire), makes for an interesting sight.

I'm less concerned with how much sleep the players get, unless they try to go more than two days without sleep, in which case I'll add negatives towards certain skills, movement, and spellcasting.

[Greg Swifthands]

You know what is kinda funny about sleep in D&D? If you're sleeping out in the wilderness without a tent and only a bedroll... you still need to remove your armor for fear of fatigue. So if you get into a fight in the middle of the night, you're pretty much screwed. Well maybe that is why people buy tents. Sorry that was really random.

Sleep always confused me in D&D to be honest.

[ToySoldier]

Greg Swifthands, on Dec 18 2006, 07:37 PM, said:

You know what is kinda funny about sleep in D&D? If you're sleeping out in the wilderness without a tent and only a bedroll... you still need to remove your armor for fear of fatigue. So if you get into a fight in the middle of the night, you're pretty much screwed. Well maybe that is why people buy tents. Sorry that was really random.

Sleep always confused me in D&D to be honest.

I don't know about that, I know D&D is fantasy based, but I'm in the military and have had to wear my gear while asleep on several occassions, I slept decently.

I guess it's all up to the DM though, if the adventurer is a seasoned one he may be used to all of his gear and sleeping in uncomfortable places, if this is the character is brand new starting out on the adventuring...well maybe not.

I find it to be a bit in the micro-managing department to worry about who takes off their armor before bed, etc...

[Greg Swifthands]

That makes sense, but I was kicking around the idea of creating an "Armor Training" type feat, where the person has been trained to sleep in armor... it would be extra fluff... it would of course be split up in to Light, Medium, and Heavy or maybe just a singular one... would that be splitting hairs, or be over powered?