Healing

Healing in RPGs is a tricky beast. On the one hand, there's a desire for it to be 'realistic' - characters shouldn't be beaten to within an inch of their lives and then, moments later, be back at full health and fighting fit, barring the intervention of magic, advanced tech, or similar.

At the same time, it's a major pain if the PCs are effectively crippled for several weeks after a single tough fight, and neither do you want to drop those tough fights from the game because that's where so much of the excitement lies.

D&D, of course, gets around this through extensive use of magical healing. (4e introduces "healing surges" as well, but these are widely derided.) However, I found last night, during the Star Wars Saga Game, that that game, despite sharing the vast majority of the system, really suffers for this lack of healing.

I think I'm inclined just to let PCs heal a quarter of their hit points after each encounter (representing that part of HP that is exhaustion/luck/general Skywalkeriness), and increase the once-per-day healing available through Treat Injury from the current minimal level to another quarter of hit points. (Oh, and a further quarter for a full night's rest.) That's a hefty chunk of hit points, and probably a bit more than I would ideally prefer, but it's probably better than having the PCs constantly having to rest up for several days while their wounds close.

(Oh yes, and note to self: I'll need to have their superiors assign a medical droid to their crew, as well as a new astromech.)