What are health, stamina, and dead eye cores?

You have three gauges to maintain on your character: Health, Stamina, and Dead Eye. Each gauge has a Core that affects the automatic refill rate. Once the gauge is depleted, cores also act as extensions, which will allow you to survive long enough to use an item to refill the core and its respected gauge. It’s strongly recommended to keep your core up by using the necessary provisions. Some provisions can also fortify your cores for a certain amount of time, preventing them from draining.

The weather can affect your health core too. When exposed to extreme temperatures, your health core will drain quickly. To combat extreme heat and cold, make sure to wear appropriate clothing for the surroundings. You can change your outfit in your tent in your gang’s camp and keep a spare outfits clothing in your horse’s satchel. Snake bites can also poison you, leading to a consistent drain of your health core until healed. You can check these conditions in the Player menu.

As a general rule, always keep a wide variety of remedies that you can use during combat or when camping. Items that you can use in combat can be accessed from your weapon wheel while normal provisions can be used by opening your satchel or camping.