Guides
Survival & Recovery
Food, water, rest, and bouncing back from the brink.
Staying alive in Nightmist is about more than winning fights. You need to keep fed and watered, recover between battles, and pick a safe place to wake up when the worst happens.
Hunger & thirst
They tick down slowly
Your hunger and thirst meters drain a little every few minutes as you play. Keep them topped up: if either runs dry you begin taking damage (see below), so a well-provisioned adventurer can stay out in the field far longer than one who forgets to eat and drink.
Do not let them hit zero
If either meter reaches empty you begin taking steady damage from starvation or dehydration — and it will eventually kill you. You will get clear warnings as they run low, so top up before it becomes a crisis.
Eating & drinking
The simplest fix is to carry provisions: food items restore hunger and drink items restore thirst — just use them from your inventory. Beyond your backpack, a few places serve you directly:
- Churches — offer free food and drink, and the Priestess will heal your wounds at no charge.
- Restaurants — sit down to a proper menu, from a steak dinner to a glass of red wine.
- Taverns — a full rest restores food and water along with everything else (see below).
Resting at a tavern
A tavern is your recovery hub. The Rest button (/rest) costs 100 gold and instantly restores your HP, MP, hunger, and thirst to full — the fastest way back to fighting shape. You cannot rest mid-combat.
Two more tavern options: Get Drunk (/getdrunk) is a free bit of fun — though you may stumble in random directions for a while — and Make Local (/respawn) sets that tavern as your home, the place you wake up if you die.
Restoring HP & MP
HP and mana do not come back on their own — there is no passive healing, so you cannot simply out-wait a wound. You restore them deliberately: potions for an instant top-up anywhere, a healer's spells, the free Priestess at a church, or a full tavern rest.
Stamina is the exception — it refills on its own, in large chunks, about ten seconds after your last action.
When you fall
Death is not the end — but it stings. The killer takes any gold you were carrying and you lose a little experience, though you wake at your home tavern fully restored to full HP and MP. Keep your gold banked and your home tavern set nearby, and a death becomes a setback rather than a disaster. The full details are in the Combat Basics guide.
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