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HP-less RPG combat

DraQ

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Most of the people here seem to agree that level dependent HPs are bad and that HPs,if at all present, should be tied to character's physical attributes such as constitution.

The question here is different:
How would you design a HP less RPG/cRPG or cRPG exclusive (for solutions unfeasible for PnP RPGsm butwell within capabilities of modern gaming rigs) combat and damage system, so that it wouldn't be an epic fail?
 

OSK

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Health represented by a percentage (100% = fully healthy, 0% = dead). Damage dealt can be affected by other attributes such as skills and equipment.

And I want dismemberment! But preferably in a setting where limbs can be replaced to return some functionality (pirates with peg legs/hooks or or futuristic robotic limbs).
 

adron

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dwarf fortress uses an emulation of working anatomy instead of HP.. damage to vital organs can result in death,bleeding, limbs and digits can be removed, eyes gouged out, etc..
 

Jasede

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I wouldn't because I grew up with HP and can't imagine an RPG without. They seem so convenient and wonderful. Nobody I ever met had problems with HP. They're easy to understand and visualize, they make for easy character progress (they grow as your character does); they have no drawbacks at all! Except maybe if you want to complain about them being unrealistic.

But then, why are you playing RPGs? Some degree of abstraction is necessary.

And health by percentage is HP in disguise.
 

1eyedking

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What the hell is wrong with the HP system? For fuck's sake people, you're reading the first two letters of the RPG acronym and forgetting about the more important third.
 
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I'm not quite sure you understand what hit points really represent. They're not simply 'health'; they're a character's ability to take hits and damage and still be healthy enough to function. High level fighters are better able to roll with a punch, so to speak, than a low level one, as they have more experience dealing with that sort of thing.

Personally, I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with hit points. They're simple to use and understand. If they're positive, you're good. If not, you're not so good. However, I do feel the way they are distributed in D&D could be adjusted a bit. For instance, 1st level characters should probably start with something like 10 + their current hit die, but gain only half, a third, or maybe even less of what they gain now per level. Skills and feats could be used to help absorb additional damage, if desired by the player.

Besides, a highly realistic damage system is not without its pitfalls. Low level characters are more likely to sustain serious maiming. At the same, they also don't have the resources to recover from them, like spells, items, and gold. This will also likely increase the amount of saving and reloading the player is going to perform, as they will save often in order to prevent their characters from receiving serious harm in battle. Finally, this would seem to seriously complicate things (not necessarily in a good way) the combat oriented characters, without having any affect on other character archetypes.
 

Hory

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Well, any RPG will more or less and at least in the engine, use numbers to track player health.

One of the issues is whether the variables should be presented as they are (numerical), or translated to a more narrative description.

Another issue is whether a unidimensional scale is enough to track the health. I think in reality, there are several aspects that determine it, and a biologist might be the best man to say which aspect has what importance and effects.

That's why developing RPGs is interesting - you're trying to remake reality by breaking down complex processes into mathematical equations.

As for the issue of level-dependent HPs, most are grossly unrealistic, but for combat-heavy RPGs they make sense, system-wise.

Jasede said:
Some degree of abstraction is necessary.
Visual numeric HPs on linear scales aren't just "some degree" of abstraction, they're at a high degree of abstraction.
 

MetalCraze

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OldSkoolKamikaze said:
And I want dismemberment! But preferably in a setting where limbs can be replaced to return some functionality (pirates with peg legs/hooks or or futuristic robotic limbs).

Then look no further. Chris Taylor just got the thing you want
 

Hory

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Flux Capacitator said:
I'm not quite sure you understand what hit points really represent. They're not simply 'health'; they're a character's ability to take hits and damage and still be healthy enough to function.
Maybe they should increase much slower (tho this wouldn't make them very relevant any more) because it's unrealistic that a "Level 10" human character can survive dozens of hits from a short sword, for example, even if naked and standing still.
 

Raapys

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I'd like to see a system where two characters engage in combat, and every now and then one of the characters will, based on his own and the opponent's skill, get in a blow. This blow will randomly hit one of several body parts. You would have 'states' for every body part; Healthy, slightly wounded, severly wounded, crippled, etc., and the blows would, again depending on all sorts of stats, reduce that body part to a certain state; or, if the body part hit is protected by strong enough armor, simply be deflected. The higher the skill, the higher chance to avoid armor-protected body parts, etc.

Anyway, these wounds would then affect the charater's performance. The character could die from the crippling of a very important body part; stomach/chest/head, but other wounds would primarily just lower his fighting ability.

The character wouldn't need to 'get more hp' when leveling up, since the same effect would be achived by simply increasing his skill at defending himself.

If I recall correctly, Deus Ex uses a very similar system for the player character, although the penalities for getting wounded in specific body parts aren't always visible, and instead of states they use hitpoints for each body part.
 

Hory

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Flux Capacitator said:
Besides, a highly realistic damage system is not without its pitfalls. Low level characters are more likely to sustain serious maiming.
If the "endurance improvement" wouldn't be so radical with level ups, then powerful characters would be at a similar risk as well, and wouldn't be invincible to level 1 characters.
At the same, they also don't have the resources to recover from them, like spells, items, and gold.
If the character is poor, he should feel it somehow other than "not being able to buy +3 weapons". Maybe then, it will make sense if not everyone will take "Gifted" or "Skilled" traits, but perhaps something like "Wealthy" or "Resourceful". In a civilized world, survival and power don't depend only on combat effectiveness.
 

OSK

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Zomg

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HP tends to make combat attritive and abstract. I like body simulation systems for video games, since they leverage a computer's bookkeeping power. It's not about realism, exactly - it's just that HP are pretty fucking uninteresting at this point even as pure gameplay.

My favorite example of something that's eventually going to be possible in Dwarf Fortress is grabbing an opponent's arm, grappling him and then using a dagger to cut off his ring finger (and the magic ring on it). I'd be amused to see that kind of functionality grafted onto an HP system with sidebar rules.
 
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I remember leading a short campaign with some odd old system (I can't recall it's name, but I remember that it was low-fantasy with only humans, no magic and it had whole pages devoted to useless stuff like wind currents), it had something like determining the severity of the hit from your to hit roll, the location that was hit, armour and some other factors. I can't remember the details, but any hit to, say, your head could instantly spell your doom no matter how experienced or good your character was. Does that sound familiar to anyone?

Anyway, I'd want a similar combat system for any game. Brutality is fun. Invulnerability is boring.
 

vrok

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Indeed, sloppy D&D style HPs is just lazy. For a P&P RPG that may be fine but for a cRPG? No way.

Give me one of those anatomy simulation systems with relevant use of doctor skill to fix injuries and a combination of science/repair/doctor to replace body parts and repair them. Robotic body part replacements could have something similar to HPs though like number of functional redundancy systems, the loss of each providing lesser and lesser functionality. Or something.

Either way locational damage should be the standard in any cRPG. D&D can go fuck itself, and fantasy too.
 

Raapys

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Agreed Jasede, but only if that's the only option available to the player. Potential insta-kills aren't that bad as long as the character knows what he's getting into and had options to avoid the risk.
 

Jasede

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But that's still a hitpoint system, isnt' it? At least in a way, except that instead of having one hitpoint value, you have many. So it's hardly HP-less!

edit: Raap, that's why I deleted my post. I was finding that I am forgetting about insta-kills in D&D. Then I thought - but they're always fair. You could always just avoid monsters that do that, or sacrifice someone, or get magical protection. And then I made this connection: but you could do the same in a HP-less system, which rendered my point moot.
 

Zomg

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The attritive, HP-driven side of combat in current Roguelikes (meaning ADOM, Angband, Nethack) is usually meaningless by the early midgame. I'd bet that less than like 1% of Nethack characters die after Sokoban because they just couldn't handle the HP damage something was dishing out. Instead, you die because something puts you to sleep or destroys a key piece of equipment or whatever. You can make a combat system without much attrition that isn't random-ass saving throws or instantly fatal criticals.
 

Hory

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Raapys said:
Agreed Jasede, but only if that's the only option available to the player. Potential insta-kills aren't that bad as long as the character knows what he's getting into and had options to avoid the risk.
The player having no chance to anticipate death is just a major design error... in any game.
 

Norfleet

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OldSkoolKamikaze said:
Health represented by a percentage (100% = fully healthy, 0% = dead). Damage dealt can be affected by other attributes such as skills and equipment.
That's still hitpoints. DOOM did that, but you can't argue that it wasn't hitpoints!
 

1eyedking

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You're against Bethesda removing role-playing stats from Fallout 3, yet you are for eliminating the HP system?

I seriously don't understand you, folks.
 

adron

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You're against Bethesda removing role-playing stats from Fallout 3, yet you are for eliminating the HP system?

I seriously don't understand you, folks.

replacing the HP system with a more complex, realistic system seems logical to me.. doesn't it mean moving closer to role playing, as apposed to the bethesda model of simplifyng and moving away from roleplaying?
 

Saxon1974

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adron said:
You're against Bethesda removing role-playing stats from Fallout 3, yet you are for eliminating the HP system?

I seriously don't understand you, folks.

replacing the HP system with a more complex, realistic system seems logical to me.. doesn't it mean moving closer to role playing, as apposed to the bethesda model of simplifyng and moving away from roleplaying?

I don't want total realism in a game. I want a fantasy. I play games to escape the real world, so the more a game is like reality the less I like it in a manner of speaking.
 

Raapys

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The HP system has never been exclusive to the RPG genre, thus removing it wont take away any of the RPGness.
 

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