History TabletopGame / DontRestYourHead

* ToHellAndBack: The whole point of the Orpheus power from Don't Lose Your Mind.
* TyrannosaurusRex: The Dino power from ''Don't Lose Your Mind'' can summon it, and -- should the summoned ''T. rex'' eat you -- become it.

** Exhaustion: if a player gets tired, they gets a minimal amount of successes when he acts on his Exhaustion talent.

* SurrealHorror: The whole setting, from the nature of the Mad City and the Nightmares to the own powers of the Awaken.

* HumanoidAbomination: All the nightmares are human-like, except for some characteristics that makes the impression that they all came from a surrealistic painting.

%%* PowerBornOfMadness: Madness Talents.

* NeverSleepAgain: A rule the player characters should really follow.

* TheHiddenHour: the Thirteenth Hour, which exists only in the Mad City. For those in the City Slumbering, it seems that the Mad City has gone forward by an hour. For those in the Mad City, it has been an hour where [[OhCrap they couldn't escape back to reality]] and every Nightmare takes advantage of this. Somebody actually managed to [[HopeSpot pry a door open during this period]]. That's when '''[[TheGrimReaper Mother When]]''' entered the Mad City.

%%* NeverSleepAgain: The player characters.

* TyrannosaurusRex: The Dino power from Don't Lose Your Mind can summon it, and - should the summoned T-Rex eat you - become it.

* InverseNinjaLaw: Another sample Madness Talent described in Don't Lose Your Mind plays with this. You can summon a legion of ninjas to do your bidding, but being a ''legion'' of ninjas, they are all MadeOfPlasticine -- their usefulness is mainly in their ability to ZergRush anything. Playing the trope a bit straighter, you can instead summon a single, highly competent ninja specializing in anything from explosives to [[WhatKindOfLamePowerIsHeartAnyway dancing.]]

* OneWingedAngel: Officer Tock is normally a medium-high difficulty opponent. Well, ''normally'' because he has three situational modifiers that increase the difficulty of facing him. If all three modifiers are active simultaneously, Tock is tied with Mother When as the most powerful Nightmare in Mad City.
** Namely: having a warrant against the players (the manual suggests it can be obtained either by [[MagicallyBindingContract making the player themselves sign it]] in exchange for some favour, or by the player making a ''real'' mess in Mad City); being in the 13th District; and the 13th hour activating.

The premise of the game is that the Protagonists are people who, for various reasons, have been unable to sleep for a long time, and they begin to see the extra doors and windows that lead to the Mad City. The Mad City is a strange twisted place where Nightmares walk in the ever present night and lost things end up. The Protagonists must deal with these Nightmares, most of whom would love to taste their Awakened flesh and souls, to complete their personal journeys.

* TheDreaded: Don't Lose Your Mind notes that if you've recovered from Permanent Madness, many Nightmares will be terrified by you. It mean you have seen abyss and come back whole, which is exactly what they failed and become Nightmares.
* EarnYourHappyEnding: It is possible for one of the Awake to defeat their inner demons and external foes, accomplish their goals, and return to City Slumbering without the constant threat of death or worse than the Awake always face. '''Possible''' and '''easy''' are not the same thing, however -- and the Mad City is full of people that failed or gave up. Worse, it's BitterSweetEnding at best. Once ones become the Awake, they will find the City Slumbering has become ''dulled'' and as strange as Mad City was, it's hard to enjoy their normal life afterward.

* ExtremeOmnivore: One of the perks of the Innards power from Don't Lose Your Mind is that you can live on ''anything'' small enough to swallow, regardless of how harmful it would be to anyone else.

* TheHiddenHour: the Thirteenth Hour, which exists only in the Mad City. For those in the City Slumbering, it seems that the Mad City has gone forward by an hour. For those in the Mad City, it has been an hour where [[OhCrap they couldn't escape back to reality]] and every Nightmare takes advantage of this.
** Somebody actually managed to [[HopeSpot pry a door open during it]]. That's when '''[[TheGrimReaper Mother When]]''' entered Mad City.

* MindControl: The Yes power from Don't Lose Your Mind means that you can make people say yes to you and mean it.

* OneManArmy: Any one of the Awake can easily bring a terrifying amount of destruction to the table with their Madness Talent. Even a ''failed'' roll can have game-changing results. Furthermore, a fully maxed-out (and possibly suicidal) Awakened brings ''15 dice'' to the table: this is enough to overpower the strongest Nightmares described in the book by a fair margin.
** Of course, bringing all 15 dice to the table is [[BlessedWithSuck just]] [[HeroicRROD as]] [[WithGreatPowerComesGreatInsanity bad]] for the player as for any enemy...

* RealityWarper: Madness Talents can take this form, such as a sample one that lets you alter reality by speaking the language God used to create the universe. The Nightmare for this one is a mindless disembodied voice that warps and perverts things by describing them, known as the Omnipotent Third Person.

* ShockAndAwe: The Zap sample power from Don't Lose Your Mind.

* BroughtDownToNormal: If you survive falling asleep despite having turned into a Nightmare magnet, you're Brought Down To Normal when you wake up. And '''still''' a Nightmare magnet until you regain your powers. Have fun.
** The rulebook actually suggests you might want to have your character KilledOffForReal instead of falling asleep when they crash, because it's [[FateWorseThanDeath not as bad.]]

* BodyHorror: Fill up your Madness quota, and *whoosh* -- Nightmare. They are invariably extremely bizarre fusions of Victorian citizenry and the art of Salvador Dali. It doesn't help that they're suffering as much as everyone else.

* ThirteenIsUnlucky: Every 12 hours, there is a 13th hour. Where you cannot escape from Mad City. And every Nightmare is out for hunting. Good luck.
** ''Two'' [[VideoGame/Persona3 Dark Hours]] a day? OhCrap.

* WeirdnessCensor: Anything related to the Mad City has this effect on normal people. If someone enters the Mad City through one of its many strange doors in full view of a normal person, that person will remember them leaving by some other mundane means. When an ''entire district'' was pulled into the city, everyone remembered the district being destroyed by a freak fire.
** It's implied to be an actual defense against the Nightmare, making it an [[AchievementsInIgnorance Achievement in Ignorance]]. Just not foolproof.
* WithGreatPowerComesGreatInsanity: Possibly the other way around.
** The more the Awake use their Madness talents, the more they risk falling deeper into madness. Whether their [[PowerBornOfMadness power comes from madness]], or their [[WithGreatPowerComesGreatInsanity madness comes from power]], ''using'' their power definitely makes the madness worse.

As of yet one supplement to the game exists: Don't Lose Your Mind, which describes in more depth how to use Madness powers and a great deal of examples to use. It also has some suggestions and alternate rules to crank it UpToEleven.

* AlienAbduction: The Xenophile power from Don't Lose Your Mind causes these to happen to you.

[[http://www.evilhat.com/home/dryh/ Don't Rest Your Head]] is a UrbanFantasy and Horror TabletopRPG created by Fred Hicks and produced by Evil Hat Productions.

** ''Two'' [[{{Persona 3}} Dark Hours]] a day? OhCrap.

* AnachronismStew

* BodyHorror: Fill up your Madness quota, and *whoosh*-Nightmare. They are invariably extremely bizarre fusions of Victorian citizenry and the art of Salvador Dali. It doesn't help that they're suffering as much as everyone else.

* TheBlank: The Smothered Folk

* TheDreaded[=/=]TerrorHero: Don't Lose Your Mind notes that if you've recovered from Permanent Madness, many Nightmares will be terrified by you. It mean you have seen abyss and come back whole, which is exactly what they failed and become Nightmares.

* ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin: Don't Rest Your Head. If you rest, you die. [[FateWorseThanDeath Or worse...]]

* InverseNinjaLaw: Another sample Madness Talent described in Don't Lose Your Mind plays with this. You can summon a legion of ninjas to do your bidding, but being a ''legion'' of ninjas, they are all MadeOfPlasticine - their usefulness is mainly in their ability to ZergRush anything. Playing the trope a bit straighter, you can instead summon a single, highly competent ninja specializing in anything from explosives to [[WhatKindOfLamePowerIsHeartAnyway dancing.]]

* NeverSleepAgain: The player characters.

* PowerBornOfMadness: Madness Talents

* RealityWarper: Madness Talents can take this form -- such as a sample one that lets you alter reality by speaking the language God used to create the universe. The Nightmare for this one is a mindless disembodied voice that warps and perverts things by describing them, known as the Omnipotent Third Person.

* SemanticSuperpower: See RealityWarper above.

http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/dont_rest_your_head_cover_3682.jpg

** To a degree, ''any'' Madness Power is an example of this, even ones that don't obviously seem like it, since they work on dream logic. Someone with SuperStrength can lift cars, smash concrete, and bend steel bars like anyone else with such powers, sure... but they can probably also lift someone's spirits, smash injustice, and bend the truth.

** Madness: as a player goes insane, its Discipline gets converted into Permanent Madness, which ''don't'' count for the "6 Madness dice" limit. Since the amount of Madness required is proportional to the effect you want, Peranent Madness can push your talent BeyondTheImpossible.

* DarkFantasy

While often compared to an extremely creepy ''Literature/AliceInWonderland'', the specifics of the game, particularly some of its Nightmares, are probably closer to a deranged version of ''ThePhantomTollbooth''. The author himself notes strong influences from and similarities to ''{{Neverwhere}}'' and ''Film/DarkCity''.

[[http://www.evilhat.com/home/dryh/ Don't Rest Your Head]] is a UrbanFantasy and Horror TabletopGame created by Fred Hicks and produced by Evil Hat Productions.

!'''This TableTopGame includes examples of:'''

* TheDread: Don't Lose Your Mind note that if you've recovered from Permanent Madness, many Nightmares will be terrified by you. It mean you have seen abyss and come back whole, which is exactly what they failed and become Nightmares.

* TheDread: Don't Lose Your Mind note that if you've recovered from Permanent Madness, many Nightmares will be terrified of you.