Does Beacon of Hope cast during the last minute of a short rest maximize the healing received from rolling hit dice?

Question

The spell Beacon of Hope lasts for one minute and states:

For the duration, each target [...] regains the maximum number of hit points possible from any healing.

If a party takes a short rest, can the party's Cleric cast this spell during the last minute of the rest to ensure that the party regains the maximum possible hit points on their hit dice rolls?

If casting the spell interrupts the rest for the Cleric, can they still use Beacon of Hope to maximize the hit dice healing for the rest of the party?

Answer 1

It can be used to maximise healing from resting, if your characters can coordinate it.

Hit Points (PHB 196, bolded for emphasis):

Hit points represent a combination of physical and mental durability, the will to live, and luck.[...] This number changes frequently as a creature takes damage or receives healing.

Receiving hit points is healing.

Resting (PHB 186):

If the rest is interrupted by a period of strenuous activity—at least 1 hour of walking, fighting, casting spells, or similar adventuring activity— the characters must begin the rest again to gain any benefit from it. At the end

[..] The character regains hit points equal to the total.

So resting is healing, and Beacon of Hope does not interrupt the long resting of the party.

For the duration, each target [..] regains the maximum number of hit points possible from any healing.

So Beacon of Hope can be used to maximize the hit dice healing for the resting of the party during a long rest for all members.

For the Short Rest only the other party members can benefit from the maximised healing. As the cleric would be casting a spell, and a single spell is strenuous enough (compare to the 1-hour leeway of Long Rests):

a character does nothing more strenuous than eating, drinking, reading, and tending to wounds.

Confirmed in the SAC V. 2.5 P. 10:

Does casting a spell while taking a short rest in-terrupt the rest? Yes. Spellcasting is more strenuous than the activities listed on page 186 of the Player’s Handbook: “eating, drinking, reading, and tending to wounds.”

Do mind, though, that this takes a form of coordination of time that not every DM would rule as feasible or plausible due to the necessarily required understanding from a character point of view and their knowledge about the (mechanics of the) world.

Answer 2

RAW, this works.

A strict rules as written ruling here is easy enough. A short rest allows you to regain hit points at the end 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).

"Regains hit points" is the way the rules usually describe "healing". See the description of cure wounds:

A creature you touch regains a number of hit points equal to 1d8 + your spellcasting ability modifier.

So RAW, being under the effect of beacon of hope at the end of your short rest will maximize the gain from your hit dice.

This is metagaming, and everyone knows this is metagaming.

This is so very obviously metagaming. To be clear, I am not saying this is a bad thing. Different tables tolerate, even encourage, different levels and flavors of metagaming. If you're DM and/or table are okay with this kind of use of metaknowledge of the rules, then go for it.

But this is still textbook metagaming, and probably isn't a faithful in-universe representation of a short rest. This sort of rules application has some pretty odd in-universe implications. That was a pretty tough fight, now you're down 40 hit points. You sit down for an hour. You feel terrible for that whole hour then the moment the hour is up, you instantly go from feeling terrible, to feeling fantastic. And then, we take this understanding and apply it beacon of hope so we can maximize that instantaneous healing we received and feeling terrible for an entire hour. This is not the knowledge or experience in-universe characters would have. This is not how the world works in-universe, at least, not the worlds I DM.

Beacon of hope is, in my estimation, intended for discrete, observable instances of healing, rather than short rest healing, which is in-universe a continuous, unobservable healing process. For these reasons, I would not allow beacon of hope to apply to short rest healing in my games.

But again, if you want to allow it, go for it. It's your game, do it your way - RAW agrees with you.