Stamina Regeneration POLL (Merge?)

[PrimeJunta]

So if I use an attack or an ability that costs 4% Stamina I'd take 1% Health damage from it because I... acted?

I did not know that attacks or abilities use stamina. Could you provide a reference for this?

 

And no, I don't fully understand Obsidians Health/Stamina system, I've only caught up on some things about it. Didn't quite understand it back then either to be honest and left the discussion alone because I felt "I'll let others discuss this matter, it'll probably come out great in the end". Which it probably will.

 

But you can always make it more difficult

Yes. And you should only introduce new mechanics for that purpose if they add meaningful dimensions to the gameplay, like the hardcore mode in FO:NV. Yours doesn't. A resource cost for resting would, for example. Why not advocate for that?

[Osvir]

 

So if I use an attack or an ability that costs 4% Stamina I'd take 1% Health damage from it because I... acted?

I did not know that attacks or abilities use stamina. Could you provide a reference for this?

 

And no, I don't fully understand Obsidians Health/Stamina system, I've only caught up on some things about it. Didn't quite understand it back then either to be honest and left the discussion alone because I felt "I'll let others discuss this matter, it'll probably come out great in the end". Which it probably will.

 

But you can always make it more difficult

Yes. And you should only introduce new mechanics for that purpose if they add meaningful dimensions to the gameplay, like the hardcore mode in FO:NV. Yours doesn't. A resource cost for resting would, for example. Why not advocate for that?

 

1. I did not say or state that attacks cost Stamina, I was asking you.

 

2. I have advocated for Rest Resources (a long time ago now). I also think that adding a Stamina that degenerates post-encounters and with time adds a meaningful dimension. Fragility, a sense of weakness and a sense of immersion. Not to mention that it'd be more difficult too.

Edited December 24, 2013 by Osvir

[Lephys]

I don't think what Osvir's proposing (with the diminishment of character performance at low stamina) is useless or silly, or overcomplicated (in its essence), but I DO think that you'd have to be pretty particular with exactly what occurs and the extent to which it occurs, for the sake of "balance" (for lack of a better word) to not sort of cancel out the role of Stamina.

 

I dunno if making low Stamina cause you to become easier to hit is the way to go, for instance, because that's an awful blurry form of simply reducing your stamina. It's akin to just giving enemies a damage bonus because you're low on Stamina.

 

I do think there might be room for SOMEthing to happen, though, when you get low on stamina. Such as, off the top of my head, You suffer a 5% Accuracy penalty when below 25% Stamina or something. OR, you suffer a movement speed penalty? Granted, I understand that would make you "easier to hit," but not really to hit as much as to catch up to. In other words, yeah, a melee foe would have an easier time of reaching you to gain the opportunity to attack, but he could still have a terrible chance of actually hitting you when he swings his weapon.

 

Also, you can react a lot more readily and tactically to a shift in your character's capabilities than you can to a shift in your character's mechanical defensive rolls and such.

 

*shrug*. Just my two cents. You could even have passive traits/abilities along the lines of "Character suffers 20% movement speed but gains 15% Accuracy with Ranged Weapons when below 25% Stamina." Or, you could apply that affect with Health.

 

But, yeah, I wouldn't tie the potential for you to take more damage (in a directly mechanical fashion) to the amount of stuff-that-measures-how-alive-you-are you have left. And I wouldn't have it on a staggered scale like that (90%, 80%, 70%), because then, when your character has 100 Stamina instead of 70, he still starts sucking worse just from losing a small amount of it.

 

Ooooh! More ideas:

 

Maybe you get an increased chance to get knocked down, or staggered or something, when you're low on Stamina? Like... pretty low (again, 25%ish?). OR, you could even have traits/passive-abilities that do something like provide a chance for a blow that would normally take you to 0 Stamina to instead take you to 1 Stamina and knock you down for 5 seconds. But, it could only happen once per encounter. Maybe you even take half damage from it or something. *Shrug*.

 

I definitely see potential for stamina-based factors and such. I just don't think a direct scale that's almost a "the less stamina you have, the more you suck" scale is a very good idea, as the main point of Stamina is supposed to be that every point lost takes you that much closer to 0, and thus, unconsciousness. Not, every point lost is the probability that you'll get to 0 more and more quickly. If that makes sense, Osvir.

[PrimeJunta]

1. I did not say or state that attacks cost Stamina, I was asking you.

Since neither of us knows whether this is the case, I figure it's best we dropped that subject.

 

2. I have advocated for Rest Resources (a long time ago now). I also think that adding a Stamina that degenerates post-encounters and with time adds a meaningful dimension. Fragility, a sense of weakness and a sense of immersion. Not to mention that it'd be more difficult too.

I think resource cost for resting is a potentially good idea.

 

I don't have anything to add to what I've said about your degenerating stamina idea, though; if anything, I dislike it more now than at the beginning of the discussion. Perhaps that means we're done with the topic, no?

[Cubiq]

1. I did not say or state that attacks cost Stamina, I was asking you.

Since neither of us knows whether this is the case, I figure it's best we dropped that subject.

Damn, this is exactly why i came to this thread to find out.

So it's still unknown whether or not attacks cost stamina?

[Osvir]

Yes. I only presume it would, but reading up on Vitality on the PE Wiki (again, btw, to jog my memory) it seems it doesn't. And it also dawns on me that Stamina (<- click me, I'm part of the [Endurance] link) is more akin to Endurance*. I always presumed that Stamina was a sort of "Swinging a blade around takes energy, just as it takes energy to get hit by a blade". But it seems that in Eternity you don't spend energy by running around, you only seem to spend energy when you get hit by an enemy or a source "other than you".

This is my misunderstanding:
Stamina = An internal & external form of how much punishment you can take (How many hits you can do to a source "other than you" or how many hits you can take from a source "other than you" before passing out).

- Swinging a hit at an enemy = -2 Stamina

- Taking a hit from an enemy = -5 Stamina
Health = An external form of how much punishment you can take (How many hits you can take from a source "other than you" before dying).

* Endurance (also related to sufferance and resilience) is the ability of an organism to exert itself and remain active for a long period of time, as well as its ability to resist, withstand, recover from, and have immunity to trauma, wounds, or fatigue.

 

Strike-through cus that's not part of Eternity's design.

Edited December 25, 2013 by Osvir

[Osvir]

Again, from the Endurance wiki page, link is above:

"Endurance may also refer to an ability to keep going through a tough situation involving hardship, stress, etc. (see patience)"

The latter part, "(see patience)", is also part of the idea I am proposing for a Hardcore difficulty (regarding Stamina), as you'd require more patience to make the "right" decisions in combat or in the world (I.E. lose as little Stamina during encounters and during general gameplay). You'd have to plan and prepare, probably pause a lot more as well as be careful how you position yourself.

Now, I've tweaked the idea somewhat during the course of this thread. But originally I did think about it something like this:

For every 10% Stamina lost in combat, -3% of your current Stamina would regenerate.
- Lose 30% Stamina in one fight, you'd regenerate to 91%
- Lose 50% Stamina in one fight, you'd regenerate to 85%
etc. etc.
- Let's say you have 91% after one fight.
- You make a bad move in the second fight, losing 50%. Stamina only regenerates to 76%.

 

Numbers are, as always, only conceptual. But what this would do would make Stamina as a resource way more important, as you would really want to lose as little as possible over the course of a day. With more levels, you'd have to worry less about Stamina though, as you'd be able to stay up for longer periods of time, but instead start to worry more about the actual Hardcore difficulty encounters.

Regardless, I will be looking into the files of Eternity after I've felt the rules first-hand (one or two playthroughs) and see if I am capable of tweaking/modding the rules (and if it is even necessary to do so) for a harder difficulty. In another thread (or was it this one? Too lazy to look) I say that some of these ideas I am discussing here nowadays are also somewhat a curiosity for post-release fan content that I want to attempt to take on or create.

I am getting loads of inspiration and being confronted by you, PrimeJunta or others, helps me improve & think through the concept (admittedly for my own preferences, but it also spurrs me on in a "Challenge Accepted" kind of way to provide for others)

Edited December 25, 2013 by Osvir

[PrimeJunta]

-- deleted, never mind --

Edited December 25, 2013 by PrimeJunta

[Adhin]

Yeah instant-regen since thats the role it plays. I wouldn't mind no-regen or slow regen if your characters have all been up for 48+ hours. But there have been studies in relation to that kinda thing, people getting little sleep while on a mountain climb... it becomes more of a mental thing then a physical thing after awhile. Body is more then capable after 30 min to an hours worth of sleep, that 7+ extra hours all for the brain so being 'tired', makes a bit more sense for it to just effect other stats then making stamina not function.

 

So yeah, fast, and some kind of fatigued mechanic would be nice, though don't think that should effect stamina regen much, if at all.

 

-edit-

@Osvir: That's what Health is for and would make limiting stamina based off dmg taken a redundancy. Your suggested 30% is actually close to there 25% (or 4:1 ratio) or stamina to health loss. Hell if anything losing stamina would almost act as a safeguard against your health in extreme cases. Say you lose 50% stamina, for 4 battles straight yeah? In 4 battles you'd of lost half your health at that point, and of lost 60% of your total max stamina. You'd only have 40% max stamina in a fight, but still have half your health. You'd be incapable of losing 50% stamina so lets say the 5th fights all 40% and your knocked out flat, that comes out to 10% more life gone, now your 'capped' at 28% stamina and your at 40% total life. Next fight your knocked out even 'faster' lose even more max stamina and your health is barely touched.

 

I think we're better off letting stamina do what they designed it to do, and let health be the limiting long-term factor as its intended to be. Otherwise you just get some weird redundancies that act against each other.

Edited December 26, 2013 by Adhin

[Lephys]

Damn, this is exactly why i came to this thread to find out.

So it's still unknown whether or not attacks cost stamina?

I think it's going to be the exception, rather than the rule. In other words, Stamina, in PoE, seems to pretty much just represent your capability to withstand all the external things that contribute to your collapsing into a heap on the ground, rather than the internal (I'm really tired from swinging my sword and jogging around a lot) ones. However, I dare say there COULD be instances of abilities/talents/what-have-you "burning" stamina as an activation cost.

 

I mean, health, in almost any game, doesn't represent fatigue from your own actions, and yet plenty of games include a handful of abilities that "spend" that in order to function.

[Lephys]

Yeah instant-regen since thats the role it plays. I wouldn't mind no-regen or slow regen if your characters have all been up for 48+ hours. But there have been studies in relation to that kinda thing, people getting little sleep while on a mountain climb... it becomes more of a mental thing then a physical thing after awhile. Body is more then capable after 30 min to an hours worth of sleep, that 7+ extra hours all for the brain so being 'tired', makes a bit more sense for it to just effect other stats then making stamina not function.

That just got me thinking... what if time-based fatigue (aka "It's been so long since you've rested" effects) just detrimented your skill/stat checks rather than your raw combat factors? So, if you're tired as crap, and you push your party onward, you can fight okay, but you're going to have a HELL of a time navigating that Corridor O' Traps, because your Super Perceptive person is so groggy? I know it's abstract, but, like you said, your body's going to compensate in a situation in which some sentient entity is actively engaging you in combat, by using adrenaline, etc. It's immediate survivability. But, "Hey, there might be deadly traps in this hallway and we should totally focus really hard to make sure there aren't" is a lot less immediate survivability, and would probably suffer a lot more, amongst other skill/stat checks.

 

*shrug*

 

Maybe that needs its own thread, if it's worth anything.

[Osvir]

Well, there is a fatigue system in the IE games. If you go along to long without resting you'll get some penalties. I guess what I am proposing is a system which gets you to that stage quicker and also limits how much you can rest at the same time.

[Adhin]

@Lephys: Yup that's kinda what I was thinking. Skills that don't have you hyped up on adrenaline and muscle memory are going to be a lot more difficult when your tired then the 'omg im going to die' stuff. Generally speaking Adrenaline will keep you extremely active and aware regardless of how groggy you where 5 seconds ago. Your not about to complete some complex math puzzle anytime soon but... yeah. Adrenaline's pretty awesome stuff when you need it.

 

-edit-

@Osvir: It got you there after 48 hours I think in IE games. Which is about in the realm of 'realistic-ish'. I've stayed up longer then that and didn't start 'really' feeling it (where it hampered my ability to do stuff) till the third day at which point I was basically incapable of functioning worth a damn and promptly passed out. You spatter that with actual rest of 1-2 hours and it becomes a lot easier.

 

In either case 'stamina stamina' like folks are thinking of it is something that comes back quickly and outside of being sick or having some kind of massive injury it shouldn't be a permanent loss. Maybe a penalty to how quicky it comes back after a fight when your fatigued from lack of rest but... that's about it.

 

As far as the decreasing max-cap on stamina, besides what I said in my earlier post, it would actually cause people to rest more often and ignore there health totals. I mean if I only have half my total 'stamina' for a fight - im resting, period. I'm not going to go into that fight with half my stamina with no way to get it back outside of resting. Could also be items or something to 'fix it' but then your in the realm of just back to old IE days of pure HP and chugging potions. That's what this whole system is trying to avoid.

 

Split up health so you rest, ideally, about 4-times as less often (that is, kind of like having x4 the hp as any given IE game). But still limiting how much you have available per-fight so you don't feel invincible in the process. It already keeps us from resting constantly awhile keeping each fight meaningful. I don't see a major down side to what they're doing already or a need to apply more penalties that counter act what its already doing.

Edited December 30, 2013 by Adhin

[Lephys]

Piggybacking on what Adhin said, Osvir, I'll point out that I think your ideas here are excellent in isolation (as a potential implementation for a given RPG), but I think they tend to inadvertently clash with PoE's health system a bit.

[Adhin]

Yeah I agree with ya on that Lephys. I do like the idea of the max-limiter over a fight and all that but think it would fit best with a pure HP approach. On a side note, Dragon's Dogma does that and I love it in that game. Though they make items to abundant and easy to get so while the system 'can' provide a lot of danger and adds to the atmosphere of things you ultimately spend waaay to much time in your inventory heh. Kinda hope they address that in future titles, if they even make another game.

[Lephys]

Along the same lines as Stamina's role in this game dealing with short-term (basically per-encounter) capacities to withstand trauma/non-permanent-damage wounds (the Health lost represents any permanent damage that's taken, along-side the non-permanent Stamina-represented trauma, basically), I'd say that some kind of injury system might work, if the injuries were short-term things that mainly just affected Stamina, and went away at the end of an encounter. You know, like Winded, or Dislocations or something. *shrug*

 

I mean, at the very least, it would be pretty cool to have SOME amount of effects to your Stamina that don't actually affect your Health, simply because they're related to your immediate ability to remain conscious and fight, and not your actual injury/lack of physiological long-term well-being.