Hit points as luck

[GMMichael]

hit points (and by this I mean escalating hit points, not static ones like in BRP) are like a good soup or stew:

Wow. All this time, and I never realized HPS stands for Hit Point Stew. That's a tasty idea, but still a little weird in terms of "armor prevents you from spilling your stew."

So, if your HP are mostly luck, could you spend them in other ways? Could you spend your HP to improve your rolls, especially for saving throws?

So, Modos RPG doesn't have hit points. Instead, characters collect damage, which don't seem like a resource that PCs should be able to spend. In my game, would PCs take on damage to "spend" hit points, or is there another way to achieve the Effort effect of Cypher?