An alternative Idea to model fatigue and resting

[Ninjamestari]

I like the idea that characters require resting every now and then, but both the power-charge system and vancian magic seem somehow unnatural, unintuitive and forced. What I would suggest is to go back to the roots of the concept in reality.

 

The proposal is simply to have a rapidly regenerating (both in and out of combat) Stamina-Resource that is drained whenever your character does something exerting, like attacking, sprinting, performing special moves, casting spells etc. The regeneration speed would be relative to the maximum amount of stamina you have, something like 5% per second. Now the fatigue mechanism in this would be that for every 100 points of stamina spent, your maximum stamina is temporarily reduced by 1, so spending full bar's worth of stamina would reduce your maximum stamina pool by 1%. In time this would add up and force the character to rest in order to be able to function again.

 

Now how this would work in PoE2, I'm not sure, but I think a simple system that has far reaching consequences is better than a complicated system of wounds and power charges that don't really achieve anything else besides necessitating rest. Potions, poisons and spells could be made to play around with this mechanic; for example there could be a poison that slowly adds fatigue to your character, a character might catch a disease that affects his/her fatigue rate etc. The stamina resource itself would allow for a multitude of more interesting and fluid ways of managing special moves for fighters rather than an arbitrary and unnatural "per encounter". This game is a computer game after all, so certain restrictions that force these mechanisms on PnP simply do not apply.

 

I just felt like putting this out there. Thoughts, ideas?

[Gairnulf]

I think the system being "game-y" and non-simulationist is a core concept in PoE's design, but your idea is interesting.

[Osvir]

Just a few cents...

 

I think an "only Endurance" system could work, but then there'd have to be some "Injury" system like Obs has hinted at.

 

0 Injuries = Regen 100%

1 Injury = Regen 75%

2 Injuries = Regen 50%

3 Injuries = Regen 25%

4 Injuries = Dead

 

In some ways it'd be like 4 hit points

[Ninjamestari]

The problem with that approach is that it encourages you to rest every time you suffer an injury, which leads to rest-spamming, which kinda breaks the whole immersion thing.

[Orillion]

The problem with that approach is that it encourages you to rest every time you suffer an injury, which leads to rest-spamming, which kinda breaks the whole immersion thing.

 

That's why you also implement medical kits, for taking care of a single injury without needing to rest. Makes sense that you would patch up the serious wounds before moving on anyway, no? As I said in another topic, Dragon Age figured this out in 2009, and I don't remember people having any serious complaints about that system; you just need to balance fights around "player needs to ensure one character remains standing at the end of combat, but ideally keep all of them up" rather than "player needs to minimize injuries entirely, or at least keep them in line with daily resource expenditure."

[Ninjamestari]

Dragon age didn't have resting at all, and a system that can be countered simply by carrying certain items with you isn't very meaningful. I'm not opposed to having injuries, far from it, I think injuries, medical kits and perhaps even a first aid skill could enrich the game a ton; I just don't think that injuries are the proper way to facilitate the need for resting, and both the resting mechanic and the nature of the injuries suffer from that approach I think. Either way, I think in order to recover from injuries you should both treat them AND rest.

[IndiraLightfoot]

Perhaps I'm alone in thinking this:

Injuries is a pretty boring mechanic. It's usually nothing more than annoying. I rarely checked what the injury was in PoE, and now I risk facing like four injuries per character, which also will clutter the char portrait UI even more with tiny icons.

Wishful thinking, perhaps, but I'd like to see some other mechanic being used.