Hi Chris, and welcome.
Being fairly new to CP's myself (not quite a year yet) I understand all your questions. Let me see if I can help with some very basic information.
There are two general catagories Neps fall into, Lowland (warm days, warm nights) and Highland (warmish days, cool nights). This is why it is helpful to know what kind of Neps you have. There are of course variants within these catagories but that gets a little more complicated and you'll pick it up as you go along.
This is a really good webpage giving you a rundown on the basics as well
http://www.sarracenia.com/faq/faq6010e.html and will answer alot of your questions.
Unfortunately I can't comment on your lighting questions as I grow my neps (and all other CP) outside.
As for your other questions...
No, nepenthes don't have a slowed down growth period at all, they are tropical plants.
As for the heater, assuming you have lowland neps, or those that can be grown as lowland, room tempurature is usualy just fine for them, and they can adapt rather quickly to a wide range of tempuratures (Mine do wonderfully in tempuratures fluctuating between low 50's F and upper 90's)
For most lowland and intermediate Nepenthes, more important than tempurature in my experience is humidity. In which case the higher the better, esspecially since I noticed on another post that you have them in with sundews.
One more bit of advice one newbie to another, go out and buy "The Savage Garden" by Peter D'Amato. This book will help not only in answering most of your questions regarding what will live where and how, but also in identifying your plants and addapting your growing conditions to them. It really is one of the best investments you can make.
If you have any more questions, please don't hesitate to ask, there are many very knowledgable people here and they all like to help.
Welcome again to the forums and best of luck with your plants.