The “rest and recovery” feature of tabletop role playing games is one of my favorites because of the many life lessons it teaches.
In my games, I have three ways to recover - sleep, relaxation and conversation. I have also included 3 point systems to measure overall health.
Health Points - measures your body’s ability to stand upright. Sojourners lose health by getting attacked by monsters and evil cultist.
Energia Points - energia is my magic system in the game and sojourners lose these either by casting spells or suffering an attack on their willpower. Ghosts, for example, don’t attack your body, but rather your soul, therefore lowering energia. When health or energia reach 0, then your character is as risk of dying and therefore, retiring from the game.
Trauma points is a system I created in order to capture the stress and pain of adventuring life. A sojourner begins at 0 trauma and suffers points when encountering … traumatic… encounters. If the trauma points get all the way to 6, the character is shell-shocked and out of the game. Sojourners suffer trauma by witnessing a terrible monster for the first time, or encountering their fear, or by watching their ally fall in battle, or even being seduced by a monster to do something terrible against your will.
By resting, recovering and conversing your character restores all points.
See what I did there?
So, rest and recover this Thanksgiving! Remember to take a break from your adventures, enjoying the company that surrounds you. For we are all sojourners…
And as always, may your story continue!