Quote Originally Posted by Porkslope View Post
I've been tinkering with 5e homebrew since the game came out and I've mainly tried to stick to duplicating or altering mechanics present in the core rulebook, with only a few outliers here and there (like imitating 3.5's psionic focus mechanic), but a 1-minute cooldown is something I can't remember ever seeing in a game. I think it could have a place for features that are too strong for at-will use, but not strong enough to justify a refresh on a short rest.

What I wanted to discuss are the implications of that mechanic and how it could change the use of an ability. With a 1 minute cooldown, that feature could be used once a battle, and players are encouraged to use it as soon as they see an opportunity, rather than save it for when they think they need it. This way, there won't be a feeling of "I held back too much with my short rest features, now we're more worn down than we should be" when the party takes a short rest. You could even apply it to a point-based resource if you wanted to get more granular and let them spend the resource on more than one feature.

Do you think a mechanic like the 1-minute cooldown could fit in to D&D 5e? Is it too video gamey? Is it not video gamey enough? What would you like to see it applied to, or do you think it should go in the trash?
It seems fine to me if you want to go for a very high level setting where the PCs are inherently powerful and heroic. Short Rest is replaced by 1/minute and Long Rest by 1/hour means the party can fight more or less continuously if battle is kept to small groups. It becomes more like Diablo with HP refreshing constantly and magic refreshing at longish intervals.

I'm not sure if 5E has combat interesting enough to justify that kind of game, but if you really enjoy grindy dungeon crawls where every room has monsters and death traps or you like doing wars it seems fine.