Healing

[PsychoBlonde]

Definitely not instant quaffing of heal potions while still in combat. Everything should take some time to work. Wounds should not magically close because of a potion.

 

What makes you think that HP represent "wounds"? This is an abstraction, after all. It is not necessarily true that 1 hp = a paper cut while 10 hp = a big gash. Maybe you don't even get "wounded" until you hit zero--it's not like any hits prior to that reduce your combat effectiveness, whereas even a small gash can do that. But what about the animated blood sprays, you say? I dunno, but non-lethal injuries shouldn't spray like that anyway. Call it artistic license. I'm just saying that complaining that you shouldn't be able to restore your HP in 2 seconds because a slash takes weeks to fully heal (although, depending on the injury it may not interfere with your activities much--or it may cause you to be crippled for life) has nothing to do with realism and everything to do with your mental assignment of what the abstract concept of HP "really" represent--when, in fact, there are no "real world" parallels here.

 

I prefer not to have instant post-combat restoration simply because I like having to consider the effects of resource attrition over the course of several fights. Consuming health potions or using up healing spells is attrition too, whereas if you squeak through a fight with 1 party member still standing then everybody instantly gets up and restores all health/mana/stamina (apart from some totally insignificant "injuries"), that's not really attrition. It's as boring and degenerate a system as resting after every fight.

 

So the question here isn't about some hypothetical realism vs. some other hypothetical non-realism. The question is:

 

Do you want attrition of resources to play a major overall strategic role? or

Do you want a system where resource conservation is unimportant and you're free to go "all in" at all times?

 

I prefer the first, not least because when you have extended attrition, those little pointless fights (for which we will NOT BE GETTING XP, remember) can still be important even if the mobs have NO CHANCE of DEFEATING you--because dealing with them depletes resources you may want further down the road.

Edited September 24, 2012 by PsychoBlonde

[Jarmo]

Easy healing for me thank you.

 

Bandages, kits and whatever that allows non-healers to make it to the next battle without sleeping in some corridor.

Healing spells aplenty, regeneration as a feat for combat types, rejuvenating songs for bards.

 

You can put all this on "easy" difficulty.

 

On "normal" or "hard" what them grognards want, on "realistic" a wound should take half a year to heal,

deep wounds will never heal completely leaving you a permanently weakened cripple.

 

Hey what? "Realistic", how many guys you know who've taken a couple of swings from an axe and healed just fine?

[Fooine]

In a world of magic, taking a few axe swings and healing just fine is perfectly realistic. As long as you get the proper help.

 

It's a bad idea to think too much about applying real-world realism in a fantasy world.

Edited September 24, 2012 by Fooine

[dlux]

Health regeneration is lame. You should only be able to heal yourself with potions or items... or with that extremely rare ring of healing.

[Piccolo]

In a world of magic, taking a few axe swings and healing just fine is perfectly realistic. As long as you get the proper help.

 

It's a bad idea to think too much about applying real-world realism in a fantasy world.

The idea of drinking a healing potion or casting a spell to heal yourself being unrealistic by real world standards isn't the issue I think.

 

The issue, at least for me, is excessive convenience for the player. Potions shouldn't be so common or so conveniently placed that the player-character never really faces the possibility of death.

[True_Spike]

Instant regeneration after battles is lame, it has to go. I understand why it is used in the first place - people abuse any slow regeneration or rest-based healing systems by waiting / resting for however long is necessary after each fight to fully recover HP. This breaks the flow of the game and gets boring quite fast (but many players do it anyway, because they can - and so would I). However, instant regeneration completely breaks my immersion (a word that appears in every single of my posts, I know). What's worse, NPCs are often raised from death after battles automatically if at least a single group member survived - that mechanic is an abomination.

 

That said, you really can't make healing too complicated. It is a game, after all. Any mechanic that is easy to abuse or tedious enough to promote reloads instead is a bad one. I am completely fine with spells / potions / abilities used to recover HP. What I want is for them not to be abundant - to make the player feel like having a few spare healing potions around is of utmost importance, that they should be used only when absolutely necessary.

[True_Spike]

People who want any tiime consuming healing mechanics only want them because they think they're original and cool, but fail to see the big picture. Repeat this original mechanic a few hundred times over the course of the game and it will soon become obvious it's nothing more than a frustrating chore, completely breaking the flow of the game and worsening your overall gaming experience.

Edited September 24, 2012 by True_Spike

[ogrezilla]

In a world of magic, taking a few axe swings and healing just fine is perfectly realistic. As long as you get the proper help.

 

It's a bad idea to think too much about applying real-world realism in a fantasy world.

The idea of drinking a healing potion or casting a spell to heal yourself being unrealistic by real world standards isn't the issue I think.

 

The issue, at least for me, is excessive convenience for the player. Potions shouldn't be so common or so conveniently placed that the player-character never really faces the possibility of death.

 

This I agree with. I enjoy having to be careful with my resources. But the resources I do have available should be relatively convenient.

Edited September 24, 2012 by ogrezilla

[HangedMan]

If Hit Points instead represent some kind of abstract "Hero Mojo," however, any manner of regeneration systems can then be employed. Potions may not make the most sense, but some other "gamey" device can be employed to make the use of consumables and magical abilities (whether the regeneration they grant is immediate or gradual) in the midst of combat into an interesting tactical decision.

Nothing makes me feel like a hero more than a big hunk of good chocolate! Can chocolate be a healing item in this game? I jest, of coufse.

I know you guys have trouble suspending your sense of disbelief but there's a very important factor here. No injury should be more troublesome than reloading the save before the battle started. If you make combat challenging and resources limited then save scumming becomes a necessary strategy.

I don't agree with the non-quoted parts of this post here, but, this bit I did quote? I like this. I support this. I don't want a game that makes me want to save scum, and I don't want a game that stops me from saving whenever I want, either (save points could discourage save scumming).

I don't mind potions so much, but I think it would be nice if they couldn't be used in combat the way they are in so many RPGs. Make them usable after combat or only if the character can step back and not be attacked... and then healing probably shouldn't be instant. As far as the regenerating health bar, please, no! If there's a REASON for it (magic, etc.) that's just a temporary effect, fine, but just as the default game system? Incredibly annoying.

What if a potion was a slow healing item? For instance, let's say it regenerates 30% of my health over half an hour. That sort of mild healing would make more sense; you could say that the alchemical ingredients are a mixture of herbs and things that promote accelerated natural healing. This also means it's fairly pointless to use in the middle of a battle, since it's not instant. Of course, I guess you could quaff one beforehand, but still.

Definitely not instant quaffing of heal potions while still in combat. Everything should take some time to work. Wounds should not magically close because of a potion.

 

What makes you think that HP represent "wounds"? This is an abstraction, after all. It is not necessarily true that 1 hp = a paper cut while 10 hp = a big gash. Maybe you don't even get "wounded" until you hit zero--it's not like any hits prior to that reduce your combat effectiveness, whereas even a small gash can do that. But what about the animated blood sprays, you say? I dunno, but non-lethal injuries shouldn't spray like that anyway. Call it artistic license. I'm just saying that complaining that you shouldn't be able to restore your HP in 2 seconds because a slash takes weeks to fully heal (although, depending on the injury it may not interfere with your activities much--or it may cause you to be crippled for life) has nothing to do with realism and everything to do with your mental assignment of what the abstract concept of HP "really" represent--when, in fact, there are no "real world" parallels here.

 

I prefer not to have instant post-combat restoration simply because I like having to consider the effects of resource attrition over the course of several fights. Consuming health potions or using up healing spells is attrition too, whereas if you squeak through a fight with 1 party member still standing then everybody instantly gets up and restores all health/mana/stamina (apart from some totally insignificant "injuries"), that's not really attrition. It's as boring and degenerate a system as resting after every fight.

 

So the question here isn't about some hypothetical realism vs. some other hypothetical non-realism. The question is:

 

Do you want attrition of resources to play a major overall strategic role? or

Do you want a system where resource conservation is unimportant and you're free to go "all in" at all times?

 

I prefer the first, not least because when you have extended attrition, those little pointless fights (for which we will NOT BE GETTING XP, remember) can still be important even if the mobs have NO CHANCE of DEFEATING you--because dealing with them depletes resources you may want further down the road.

I would prefer resource attrition. I like this idea a lot.

 

Additionally, let's not be reliant on every enemy running around with healing potions, either. After all, if you incinerated them, then the potion has probably been broken and spilled all over the place; or maybe you smashed the glass vial to bits with your sword, or when they fell over dead from taking an arrow to the throat, the impact with the ground shattered the vial.

[Fooine]

In a world of magic, taking a few axe swings and healing just fine is perfectly realistic. As long as you get the proper help.

 

It's a bad idea to think too much about applying real-world realism in a fantasy world.

The idea of drinking a healing potion or casting a spell to heal yourself being unrealistic by real world standards isn't the issue I think.

 

The issue, at least for me, is excessive convenience for the player. Potions shouldn't be so common or so conveniently placed that the player-character never really faces the possibility of death.

 

True, I was mostly responding to the guy just above my other post. But rereading him, I now realize he was also mocking the idea of ultrarealism.

Edited September 24, 2012 by Fooine

[1varangian]

I would prefer some kind of a stamina system where getting hit for X damage doesn't necessarily mean getting injured. Hence you would get less actual injuries from combat and require less healing.

 

Definitely don't want combat that revolves around drinking potions in melee. Healing potions should be for curing disease and poison only, and be more like medicine instead of instant magical cures. If potions absolutely must heal wounds, it should be done by speeding up regeneration instead of instant effects.

[Rabain]

In my opinion, it is preferable if the pains of combat do not disappear as easily as it does in, say, Dragon Age. When you must resort to healing kits or Magic for healing, things may be more interesting. But only if said resources are limited. If you're swimming in gold to buy items, or if you can buy and carry items indefinitely, of if Magic is something easily acessible (if, say, the magic system is a mana bar that can be or is easily restored) then there's no point to not restoring hitpoints as soon as battle ends.

 

I thought Dragon Age handled damage very well. Your health bar regened very fast out of combat but you still had other injuries like Cracked Skull, Gaping Wound, Bleeding eye, Broken Arm etc that you had to either rest at your Camp to be rid of or use an Injury Kit or high level spell. This at least meant that Herbalism was a really useful skill to have. In combat your health regen was rubbish without spells or potions. It meant you could move through an area fairly fast with little downtime, considering there was no rest option and it was awkward to return to your camp with no fast travel.

 

Baldur's Gate actually made you use potions a lot but how people found themselves sleeping for 8hrs after combat rather than wasting potions? Wouldn't if have been better for your health to just regen so you could continue questing? It might be realistic to rest but 8 hours really isn't going to fix every injury.

[Lucas]

Healing has two different strategic layers connected to combat. One during the fight itself, and one after the battle.

 

IMO, me, as a player, should be concerned about the health of my party during the fight, because one less party member could alter my combat strategy. I think it's one of the potentially fun factors of a party-based combat.

 

What about after the fight? Well, I guess it also depends on the non-combat abilities at our disposal (see Tim Cain's post) and the magic system. You can ASSUME the wounded party member gets bandaged or bandages himself, so that health regenerate slowly over time, or you can explicit that through the use of a "heal" ability or a "cure light wounds" spell, if we want to use a D&D example.

 

But would the explicit use of a "heal" ability or "cure light wounds" spell alter the gameplay flow, would it be a useless stop of it? And how would the use of those ablities (spell or not) connect to a "resting" system? (which we'll know more about in the future?). By the way, I like post-fight permanent injuries/states (disease, crippling, etc.) that you have to fix with more complex (and possibly costly) methods...See also Arcanum, for example, and the dreaded "scarred" state

[TCJ]

I don't mind potions so much, but I think it would be nice if they couldn't be used in combat the way they are in so many RPGs. Make them usable after combat or only if the character can step back and not be attacked... and then healing probably shouldn't be instant. As far as the regenerating health bar, please, no! If there's a REASON for it (magic, etc.) that's just a temporary effect, fine, but just as the default game system? Incredibly annoying.

 

What if a potion was a slow healing item? For instance, let's say it regenerates 30% of my health over half an hour. That sort of mild healing would make more sense; you could say that the alchemical ingredients are a mixture of herbs and things that promote accelerated natural healing. This also means it's fairly pointless to use in the middle of a battle, since it's not instant. Of course, I guess you could quaff one beforehand, but still.

 

I'd have no problem with potions of regeneration as you've mentioned, though I don't know about going with percentages of health as opposed to a certain static amount of HP (although I'm sure this game won't call it HP). That would depend on the system. Taking those potions before battle would actually make sense in that you're preparing for something. Nothing wrong with taking a little time to do some strategy. Also, for those who hate wasting anything, they'd likely not want to do it for fear of losing out on 2 HP worth of health or something like that.

[Volourn]

Heal potions, scrolls, and spells are fine as they are useable resources but natural health regeneration (as well as mana rengeration) is lame.

[Klaleara]

I don't mind if healing is as easy as most modern RPG's, however I don't want healing to be a chore. I really don't want to spend a decent amount of my game time avoiding confrontation because we are too hurt to fight.

[duskwind]

My suggestion is having fatigue and wounds instead of hitpoints. Fatigue would increase slowly during combat, and drop quickly afterwards; the more fatigued you are, the more likely enemy attacks are to strike home and wound you. Using special abilities would increase fatigue, as would enemy attacks. Wearing armour would increase your fatigue faster, but reduce the severity of wounds (negating minor wounds entirely). Being wounded would apply penalties; moderately serious wounds would put you out of action temporarily, but your fatigue would drop slowly while down and you'd be able to rejoin the fight after some number of "rounds". Only the most serious wounds would keep you down permanently, requiring treatment at the end of combat to prevent death.

[Lady Evenstar]

I don't want to pop back to full health as soon as combat it over, but I don't want "draconian" healing options either. I want spells, potions, etc., usable both in and out of combat on normal difficulty, making injuries roughly as significant/insignificant as they were in the infinity engine games. On the other hand, I've no problem with there being a difficulty level where the game is what I would consider to be an excruciating grind. I don't like AI differences between normal and hard because I don't want to fight idiots, but I wouldn't at all mind if healing, money, magical gear, etc. were less available on harder settings. I also wouldn't mind if, sort of like the score sheets that popped up at the end of Might and Magic games, the game congratulated folks who completed the game on a difficulty where healing and good equipment were rarer.

Edited September 25, 2012 by Lady Evenstar

[KhaineGB]

No regen and no instant healing after combat.

 

I would LOVE to see some kind of "Non Magical" healing that can be applied after combat. During combat, you should have to use potions, wands or scrolls... and unplugging a potion if there's something next to you beating your face in should have consequences. After combat, the party should be able to sit down, get out all of the various healing supplies (bandages, herbs, etc) and patch each other up.

 

Relying on magical healing is the way it's done. I'd love another alternative for after the fight.

[Umberlin]

Would these herbs/bandages as you mention them require a skill to use them, that you need to improve over time, that perhaps somehow alters their effectiveness? Obviously still keeping with the, 'it takes time to use them' and, since you mention out of combat, I assume 'gets interrupted by anything making combat actions.'

[Gecimen]

This so called realism discussion is getting out of hand. First off, you have played many cRPGs that have instant healing after combat and I'm sure it wasn't this particular "flaw" that bothered you.

 

What bothered me is the system in Icewind Dale: You fight with a goblin pack and you rest for 2 days in the middle of nowhere and continue your adventure like nothing happened. It kills the atmosphere like mad. It's like all the evil forces you fight are there waiting for you all the time.

 

I really don't get this realism concept... If I can throw a fireball from my hands, or raise skeletons, why not heal all my party with a spell? You know what? I'd rather face extremely tough opponents that I can barely beat with a few members of my party dead and rest at 10% health and afterwards heal/res up in a minute, then face stupid minions that do minor damages to my party and force me to go back to towns to fill my health bars every few hours.

 

What you guys are trying to suggest is more like an adventure simulation. You want to carry your wounds till the end of the game? You want to stop to eat and drink for half an hour? Fine, shall we add no spells or magical creatures since they're not realistic? Hey I've got a game for you called Operation: flashpoint. And no I haven't played it cause I hate realistic games.

[Jarmo]

What you guys are trying to suggest is more like an adventure simulation. You want to carry your wounds till the end of the game? You want to stop to eat and drink for half an hour? Fine, shall we add no spells or magical creatures since they're not realistic? Hey I've got a game for you called Operation: flashpoint. And no I haven't played it cause I hate realistic games.

 

I could go for an adventure simulation. A more open world sandbox game with random missions and dungeons.

Where you'd need to worry of all that stuff, wounded party members might die of infections or stay crippled.

 

Don't want that stuff in a game with a strong storyline, but basically that'd be a new kind of game I'd like to see.*

Flashpoint was awesome, btw, somehow I don't like Arma (or arma2) as much.

 

*Mount & Blade is awesome as well, but not the same thing.

[Gecimen]

What you guys are trying to suggest is more like an adventure simulation. You want to carry your wounds till the end of the game? You want to stop to eat and drink for half an hour? Fine, shall we add no spells or magical creatures since they're not realistic? Hey I've got a game for you called Operation: flashpoint. And no I haven't played it cause I hate realistic games.

 

I could go for an adventure simulation. A more open world sandbox game with random missions and dungeons.

Where you'd need to worry of all that stuff, wounded party members might die of infections or stay crippled.

 

Don't want that stuff in a game with a strong storyline, but basically that'd be a new kind of game I'd like to see.*

Flashpoint was awesome, btw, somehow I don't like Arma (or arma2) as much.

 

*Mount & Blade is awesome as well, but not the same thing.

 

I mean yes I respect your tastes but Obsidian's (or former Black Isle's) strong side is storyline. It causes so many things to be scripted which already leaves so little space for any kind of sandbox mechanics. While at it, why not just heal our party with the super-mega-but-somehow-only-usable-out-of-combat-5-sec-healing-spell?

[Jarmo]

I mean yes I respect your tastes but Obsidian's (or former Black Isle's) strong side is storyline.

 

In complete agreement here, as you can see from my last page answer,

which is why I added the "Don't want that stuff in a game with a strong storyline."

 

But then I got carried away in a tangent. Which is something I do. Because I'm old and strange.

[Nonek]

Forgot I made this. But anyway, yes the being chewed up by a high dragon and spat on the floor only to miraculously pop back up after combat, with a negligeble wound as a penalty did bother me in a lot of games. It's not really about realism it's internal consistency, that and strategical planning where we can derive a more satisfying experience because we have been challenged and not found wanting. If combat is just trivialised immediately afterwards, then what challenge is there, you're left with grinding through a repetitive series of combats where you have full access to all your skills and magics rather than emerging limping and wounded, on the knife edge of defeat but victorious because of your own superior tactics and strategy.

 

Ultimately I find the action rpgs that do hand hold the player in this fashion trivial and boring, I like to be challenged, not confronted by endless waves of easily dispatched opponents.