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War Hospitalis the kind of game where you’re always working from behind. Just when you start to get a handle on the situation, a new batch of patients will be brought in. Saving them all will often require all available hands, and while your staff are certainly willing, they need to rest at some point or they’ll collapse.
A character who passes out can’t work for at least a day; at best, you’ll have to deal with a less efficient hospital. At worst, other staffers will have to pick up the slack, causing them to risk collapse as well! Here’s how to keep that from happening.
Research Shift Work Immediately
At the beginning of Chapter One, thevery first Improvement you should buildis the Shift Clock. It’s an extension to the Casualty Clearing Station, and can be foundnear the bottom of the Healing tech tree.Once it’s completed, you’ll be able toassign a twelve-hour shift systemto each building from theAssignmentscreen.
Until you switch to twelve-hour shifts, every worker assigned to a building willcontinue to work 24/7until you manually send them back to Staff Lodgingfor a break. It’s very easy to miss when a character is on the brink of collapse when you’re doing things this way, so a shift system makes your staffautomatically take breaks.
Characters can still tire and collapse working on a shift if they’re hungry, tired, or demoralized. You still need to keep an eye on your staff’s well-being, sodon’t be afraid to rotate your staff earlyif a critical position is running on fumes.
When there’s a large influx of patients - usually after an enemy attack on the trenches - you canswitch buildings like the Casualty Clearing Stationback to 24-hour shifts to get everyone out of bed and working. Just remember to change it back once things are under control!
Later in the game, when you have enough staff to cover a larger rotation, you canresearch 8-hour shiftsto spread the workload around further and reduce the risk of collapse even more.
Schedule Breaks For Doctors
Doctors don’t work in shifts; instead, they’ll automatically rest if they have no patients in their queue. That rarely happens, so you’ll need towork rest periods into each doctor’s individual queueto make sure they stay awake and alert.
Pinned to each doctor’s portrait is aSet Restmarker that can be dragged along their queue. When they reach it, they’ll stop treating patients and go to take a break. If you need a doctor to come back from break early,simply move the Rest Markerso that it isn’t blocking the next patient to be seen.
The game provides a handy marker showing at what point in their queue the doctor will reach different stages of exhaustion. Don’t let them get too tired, or they might make mistakes!
Long, difficult operations aremuch more taxingon a doctor’s stamina, so committing to a patient who’s in really bad shape will often require the doctor to rest afterward. Consider this when determining the order in which patients are seen! On the other hand, it’s best to give high-risk patients to a well-rested doctor who will be more likely to administer a successful treatment.
A doctor can collapse mid-operation if their stamina drops low enough. This almost always results in the death of the patient, in addition to the doctor being unable to work for a long time.
Keep Morale And Food High
The staff’s Morale ranges from 0 to 100, and starts each chapter right in the middle at 50. Morale can be raised by completing events and making choices during operations; it’s also raised whenever a patient isreleased from military serviceorNutritious Rationsare served in the Canteen.
Some characters have work preferences - meeting them will cause a steady increase in Morale each day. Hover over the character before assigning them to see where they’d like to be sent.
Conversely, Morale can fall if things go poorly - usually when patients die. The staff don’t expect to save everyone, but needless losses or several all at once can quickly degrade Morale. Morale also drops if you make a ruthless decision as part of an event, or if the staff is reduced to Half Rations for an extended period.
The lower Morale goes,the faster characters will tire out.They’ll also work less efficiently; compounded with the penalties from exhaustion, this can snowball if you don’t correct the situation. If Morale hits zero, the staff abandon the hospital, resulting in a game over.
By the same token, a high Morale makes the staffwork harderandlost stamina more slowly.It can be tough to keep Morale high, but take advantage of it when you can!
