Hit points are your health. When you run out of hit points, you are "beaten all to hell" and will need to heal before you can adventure again.
Your maximum hit points are equal to 20 + min(Strength, Will). See also use your highest Attribute to calculate Hit Points and Empowered for ways to alter your max hit points.
If you have 0 hp but but gain enough experience to boost the lower of your strength or will (and therefore your hitpoints), you get the message "You drag yourself back to your feet with a newfound strength." This can occur after combat (e.g. a draw), or anytime you can get XP while at 0 hp (e.g. crafting with Good Worker).
Regaining Hit Points
Everyday at "rollover", when you regain Energy, Hunger, and Body, you will be healed up to your maximum hit points. There are many other ways to heal yourself after taking damage.
Healing in combat:
- Winning a combat with First Aid active
- Winning a combat with ancient timepiece equipped
- Using Pouring Blood, under some circumstances
- Using Take Root, then winning the combat
Healing by using items:
- Using most Medicine, biomonitor kits, first aid kits, or stained bandages (with diminishing returns until you rest)
- Watching Killers 3
- Reading Quantum Mechanics
Skills that help you heal:
Encounters (this is not a comprehensive list):
* Being Tracked: "Throw him off" (with no signal analysis circuit in inventory): 11-15? hp
* Below the Charnel House: Calm Section: "Take a nap": 40? hp
* Below the Charnel House: Fairy Spring: "Ask for healing": 8-11? hp
* Below the Charnel House: Fairy Spring: "Ask for nothing": 4? hp
* Below the Charnel House: Lower Calm Section: "Take a nap": 40? hp
* Dockside Sewers: Bat Colony: "Watch them": 15? hp
* Dockside Sewers: Mushroom Grove: "Investigate here": "Plant the white ones": 23-30? hp
* Ghost Ship: Treasure Chests: "Hide and nap": <chance> at 30? hp
* Midgard Bioresearch: Empty Breakroom: "Take a nap" (with no red alert): 25? hp
* Midgard Bioresearch: biotech-locker-room: "Take a nap" (with no red alert): 20-25 hp
* Midgard Laboratory: Lab Locker Room: "Take a nap": 35-40? hp
* Midgard Warehouse: Stacks of Crates: "Hide and nap": 32-34? hp
* Southside Park: Dumpster Diving: "Hide in it" (after park quest is complete): 24-30? hp
* Tainted Shoreline: Andrea the Grad Student (while supposed to be helping her): "Walk up to chat": "I'm from Dr. Myers": "I'll go": fight 2 writhing masses, heal 37? hp if successful, 26? hp if not
* Tainted Shoreline: Faerie at the Nest: "Destroy the egg": 20-29? hp
* Waterfront: Fishing Tales: "Pass the thermos" (with thermos of Joe in inventory): 16-17? hp
Losing Hit Points
You can lose hit points by:
- being attacked by opponents
- being hurt by something else via a noncombat or choice encounter
- This can happen all over the place, but it's worth noting that misteps in the black book and related areas will always bring you down to 0 hp
- popping Atlas capsules, snorting hound dust, mucking about with gritty ointment, replacing your kidney, improperly handling an eternal sparkler or SDnano memory stick, chewing sabotaged Halloween treats, messing with powdered glass, or trying to slot a shielded emitter into a wired chamber (fool!).
