I thought of a flaw, though. If you HAVE to short rest to get to night, then you would not have anymore short rests left to go longer during night adventuring.
I just think they need a Time Progression button to transition from day to night, if they aren't going to do true realtime clock. I would want the ability to short rest during night adventuring.
That said, I'd settle for no short rests if they did just implement your idea. I want night travel just that much.
I don't see it as a flaw at all.
The idea is to give a sense of time, to change the ambiances and eventually a bit the gameplay.
Not to play only at night if you wish.
Explore, talk with NPCs and so on... Even players using a short rest after every combat could have interresting game sessions at "night".
A real day/night cycle would be better but way more complicated. It would require a real time routine for many NPCs. It would also be very hard with lights that seems to be handcrafted most of the time.
With such a system they could handcraft 3 ambiances and rework what has to be reworked for each cycle... and CHOOSE what they rework (Lights definitely but in exemple NPCs positions may not be "necessary").
It's probably a lot of job, but I guess it's easier than reworking whole parts of the engine.
1M$ for a real D/N cycle in DoS1. I guess it should be possible to add an easy D/N cycle in BG3.
