Daily powers that don't encourage 5 minute workdays

[codeGlaze]

Why not just tie spells and recovery to some sort of fatigue system and have power mitigated by time-to-cast? I'm guessing that's been answered by The Den somewere, but that seems to be the most natural way to think about it.

MAKING CAMP in a dungeon has never sat well with me. 3e type characters being limited in their 'cool stuff to do' because there's no way to have lunch and recoup a bit bothers me, too. 4e's will/encounter/daily system felt like a nice step in the right direction of changing that problem, but ultimately wasn't the solution. I even like their focus on getting people to take breaks for benefits.

I feel that something like Instant/delayed/channeled/ritual would be better distinctions. With your upper power limit slowly dwindling as the day goes on. You don't even necessarily have to use a straight-up points system. Your fatigue could affect what spell LEVEL you can cast up to, and maybe even determine a spells effectiveness.

[Blasted]

Why would that remove a 5 minute workday?
I'm fatigued, I can't cast level 5 any more, let's rest.

My preferred solution is a resource which can be considered automatically refreshed after combat. Along the lines of, you can cast 2x level 5, 3xlevel 4, etc. and after combat, (or ten minutes or something) you're good to go again.

It has issues with drawn out combat, and the power of spells should be reduced, but that's the way I'd go.