Your rules for sleeping?

[Sociotard]

I was looking throught the book, and noticed that it listed the effects of not eating and not drinking, but not the effects of not sleeping. (I'm still mystified by how cheap "LS: does not sleep" is)

 

What are your rules? Do you have rules for the effects of not sleeping well?

[Captain Obvious]

Re: Your rules for sleeping?

 

I generally just hack the rules from the old D&D supplement, The Wilderness Survival Guide. It's a pretty easy fit to the Hero System, overall.

[Sociotard]

Re: Your rules for sleeping?

 

I do not know these rules. *evil*Feel like sharing?*evil*

[Captain Obvious]

Re: Your rules for sleeping?

 

A real quick overview for you, then:

 

Characters must get at least five hours of sleep a night. The first night with insufficient sleep is free. The character can function normally. After the second night, the character suffers penalties until he gets a full night's rest. The penalties are based on how much sleep he averages:

 

Less than five hours -- -1 DEX

 

Less than four hours -- -2 DEX

-1 STR

 

Less than three hours -- -3 DEX

-2 STR

-1 EGO

-1" Running

 

Less than two hours -- -4 DEX

-3 STR

-2 EGO

-1 CON

-2" Running

 

Less than one hour -- -5 DEX

-4 STR

-3 EGO

-2 CON

-3" Running

 

There are also some rules about determining how well a character sleeps, ie a character sleeping in a featherbed in a warm manor will be better rested than a character sleeping in platemail in freezing rain. These are basically just penalties to the number of hours the character sleeps that night.

[Vanguard00]

Re: Your rules for sleeping?

 

I don't know that it's come up in recent years, but I know in the past we proposed DEX, INT, CON and CV limits after a certain time. Also our GM imposed a permanent END drain on our characters (I think that's what it was), so that we could never recover full END until we slept. Might've applied to STUN, too, but I can't remember the details.

[Sociotard]

Re: Your rules for sleeping?

 

I was considering ego rolls to stay awake. The other penalties are a good idea too.

[Dust Raven]

Re: Your rules for sleeping?

 

I run it as a dramatic effect, rather than a hard and fast rule. Then again, most of my characters in my game get enough sleep (missing one night won't cause much problems).

 

More often than not, I'll use a modified version of the Long Term END rules, making it difficult for character to recover their END unless they get enough sleep. Other effects can include minuses to INT and PER rolls and minor penalties to CV. Is a character is deliberately trying to stay awake, I'll have them make CON and EGO rolls. Early on, they only have to make one. Latter, they have to make both, and somewhere along the lines I'll start imposing penalties.

[ghost-angel]

Re: Your rules for sleeping?

 

sleep deprivation is amusing to say the least ... Dahli used to paint that way.

 

first physical effects .. dexterity is affected for sure, clumsiness is one thing. Your ability to run isn't really hindered that much honestly, especially if adrenaline enters the system so I wouldn't impose a - to Running. Con.. well, you see after about 50 hours most people get a "second" wind" and react normally in that regards, though metabolism tends to slow down.

 

Another effect isn't physical but mental .. sleep helps regulate certain chemicals, removing them from the system, etc.. After a good dose of time on Sleep Dep (4-5 days) most people will start to hallucinate, have mood swings or simply enter a 'walking dead' kind of stupor. Smart people fall over and sleep at this point as the body is so exhausted it's running on anything it can get and the mind's chemical balance is so far off after 4 days you'll have serious problems with even simply tasks. Also memory is affected, sleep dep can cause long term memory blackouts, while short term memory may be left untouched, or possibly get shorter.

 

I'd say a combination of EGO and CON rolls to keep functioning after 2-3 days of no sleep at all. Though at a point you actually stop being tired at all. You need sleep but whatever it is that tells you to go to sleep has stepped out for a drink. Once you do go down there's no coming up.

 

Another bit I'd put on is once a character that has been awake for more than 2 days enters GM Optionland for unonciousness once they do fall asleep. And I'd put it from anywhere around 12-36 hours or depending on how long the character was awake.

 

Personally, when my insomnia hits me is a harsh way I don't get more than 10-15 minutes of down time a day for up to 3 days on average, I've gone 9 like that and while you can function it's not a pretty sight and I have no idea what really happened in that period beyond the fact I must've gone to work because I still collected a paycheck.

[Armitage]

Re: Your rules for sleeping?

 

From "Death in the Great Outdoors" by Greg Porter. Adventurer's Club #13.

A character needs 24/REC hours of sleep each night. I don't agree with this, since a lot of superhumans would then need little or no sleep.

-1 EGO, INT, and PRE per night without enough sleep.

EGO roll to avoid distraction during boring or repetitive tasks. Fall asleep if the roll is missed by 2 or more.

Sleeping for twice as long as needed negates all accumulated penalties.

[PhilFleischmann]

Re: Your rules for sleeping?

 

Sleep deprivation is a commonly used brainwashing technique. Cults often use it. Former cult members have told stories ofhow they were amazed at how much they were still able to do, despite having only 2-4 hours of sleep a night. The cult leaders would tell them, "When your soul is full of purpose, your body will always have enough energy." The truth of the matter is, your body can save energy by shutting down higher brain functions like critical thinking. That's true of any life support problem. When your body doesn't get all that it needs (sleep, nutrition, etc.) certain "non-essential" functions start to shut down.

 

Therefore, I'd say penalties to INT, EGO, and PRE are quite appropriate. I would probably allow the penalties to change based on the circumstances - the activities the character engages in. Something's got to give. If the character does a lot of physical activity, he might retain his full STR, DEX, CON, etc. but lose lots of EGO and INT. If he engages in lots of mental activity, he might retain his INT and EGO, but lose STR, END, and DEX. LTE and REC are also good candidates for penalties.

[Dust Raven]

Re: Your rules for sleeping?

 

Reading this thread has reminded me of the movie, Insomnia staring Robim Williams and Al Pacino.

 

If you want some good (cinematically dramatic) examples on the effects of sleep deprivation, watch it.

[Teflon Billy]

Re: Your rules for sleeping?

 

Sleep deprivation is a commonly used brainwashing technique. Cults often use it. Former cult members have told stories ofhow they were amazed at how much they were still able to do' date=' despite having only 2-4 hours of sleep a night.[/quote']The key here being that they still got some sleep. Which is probably what permitted them to function as well as they did. I've read that as little as 1 hour of actual sleep will stave off the worst aspects (organ damage, total mental breakdown, etc...) of chronic sleep deprivation. You will still be working under a significant deficit of certain abilities, but you will be able to keep going. This is the level of sleep that special operations troops (SEALS, SF, Rangers,...) work under for certain part of their training. Which can be for week or more at a time.

 

TB

[Jarekk]

Re: Your rules for sleeping?

 

In the last session of my DnD game, my character was running on low sleep...

 

There weren't any stigma attatched to my rolls, I was told to "role play it out."

 

It was lots of fun. Nobody knew what I was talking about. Except the cleric, who got kinda testy after three days with no sleep.

 

I didn't go into combat or anything--I'd hate to have seen what would have happened if I did... But lack of sleep is a fun twist.

[Sociotard]

Re: Your rules for sleeping?

 

I notice the effects of sleeplesness are similar to those for being inebriated. Maybe I'll use those modifiers too.