Monster/NPC Health Bars/Names

Here's a thought: Should they be visible?

This sort of carries on from the realistic loot thing (I agree monsters and NPCs should only drop appropriate loot). The bars and names provide useful information obviously, but if the aim is to retain verisimilitude, should they even by visible? Why would would you even know that a certain creature is "a harpy"? Why would you know how many hitpoints it has left? (same is true of "buffs" and such)

Would not making them visible make combat more interesting? I personally think it would but I was wondering what other people's thoughts were.

Other games don't provide that information and play perfectly well.

On a side note you could tie certain skills in to provide that information if your skill is high enough (if your medicine/anatomy skill is good enough, maybe you can tell how injured something is).

By the way. the same can be asked of player health bars (names for for players should be visible though for convenience).

What do the rest of you think?

 

Wow that is a hard one...

Here is my opinion - I personally would like it if player health bars in group would show, I would kind of like it if player health bars would not show to people outside of group.

Now for PvE creatures it is hard for me... I guess it would be fun and add another level of danger and excitement like if a certain creature was hitting very hard but maybe it didn't have much total health it could still cause me to run away in fear after hitting it a few times - and until you had killed a specific creature you would never be too sure about how much health that creature had.

Other then FPS I have never played a game without a health bar...

But I think it may be a refreshing change and would add a level of fear and complexity to gameplay.

Just my couple cents.

 

Ok, i'll vote yes...reminds me of my Bard's Tale / Wizardry / Wasteland days. When all you saw was the damage you dealt, without knowing your opponents status/

Even in a shooter I play, its cool when you don't know how much health your opponent has. If he's low you smash him, if your low and he's high...you'll find out lol.

Adds more unpredictability to battles...i like !!

This would set SotA apart from most of the games of today and give it that old school feel.

Wow Ashlynn, a good post from you for a change

 

Gotta say, I like the conversations and topics which are arising out of PAX.

I just made a compliment.... *pukesinownmouthalittlebit*

Now that that's over with. I like the OPs view, I would like to see two things ideally:
1. No bars of any kind for pve or pvp no matter group or not. Force player to keep track and have situational awareness
2. An optional bar which averages health of the enemy type according to all previous of the same type directly defeated by the player.

Option 2 would be interesting as it wouldn't always be accurate, assuming monster health is not static. "Boss monster" types would be hidden, and you would only know them by their advanced hp and damage delivery to you.

As for initial identification of an unknown enemy, a skill should be used to both identify it in the first place and then narrow down its physical attributes.

Don't know though, many players these dAys need the health bars for instant gratification purposes.

 

If you don't like them, turn them off. It's nice knowing you're actually wounding something.

I understand the desire for realistic loot. But I also know what it's like to have bags full of vendor trash. Having looting slow down gameplay is always a little annoying, is really annoying if it's not easy break off combat for a few minutes, and is just plain awful in any group setting. If the game is going to have diverse loot, then give us a very forging bag full of unidentified junk to look through. (e.g. RIFT stored a lot of loot outside bags which could be claimed whenever)

 

Arg.. I have to like Insane's idea too

P.S. Pax Rules !

 

Nice idea but i would have to vote against it. I like having health bars and seeing what i am doing, also tend to do different moves at different health amounts so there is a strategic side to it as well. Maybe if it was an option to remove health bars for those who would want it?

 

monster health bars are a solution to an area where the technology cant GIVE realism. If the game was realistic then you would see the damage your causing in real time, the enemy would be stumbling holding a sucking chest wound when you shot them. This doesn't work in a game so they give health bars to try to solve the issue.

Removing them so you have no ability to destermin how hurt they are would be LESS realistic

 

Like Sir Asguard said, in real life you have ways of telling how injured a person is. The game can't reasonably simulate all of these, so they give you a health bar instead. The basic idea is that that your character saw their injuries, posture, etc, and the heath bar is their estimation of how close the enemy is to death.

 

See what I'm saying about the instagraturbation which is needed by people via health bars?

@Primerib - you hit it, you wound it.

@Netty - you mean different macros based on your / current target health. I hear you, and I love to pwn via good macro as much as any other good PK however I'm willing to let my totally awesome micro skills go if I could get good things like this added into the game.

@Sir Asguard - You actually have a -- whatever.

@Rydel - That is a huge stretch, and if I used a spell to pinch shut somone's blood flow it would not be visible except for them to fall to the ground.

Keep in mind, it is a game and you aren't dealing with reality, but who is to say that some things can't be added to make certain aspects of it more realistic?

Oh that is right, all of you instagraturbators who need the health bar so you can see realtime win progress. Doh.

 

Imagine people keeping track of which monsters they killed or hunted and then creating a bestiary.

"Hey Insane, you boasted last night, after having a few pints, about slaying a frost troll." "Were u able to defeat it single-handedly or did you require the assistance of Ashylnn?" "How difficult was it to kill?"

It opens up unknowns which can further enhance the gaming experience.

 

I was thinking something along those lines also Gunga. IF, and I say IF, there was a way to collect a history for display of all your feats of killing monsters including taking their heads for display in your home/area of living......I could actually...PvE! Omg what did I just say.

Only thing is, you could not trade any of the wares you are able to craft/taxidermy from the things you kill, that way one knows you actually accomplished the kill and then the task of creation after. Maybe you could use that with uncommon and rare creatures, but could trade the commons if need be or something.

 

They could always add visible wounds on a monster the more damaged it is, and perhaps have them stagger around more if severely injured. So that you actually have to pay attention to the game world and the visual cues given by opponents, rather than just looking at a status bar.

So I'm not suggesting they just remove the enemy health bars and leave it at that. I'd like combat to be more interesting in general and I would also like there to be more uncertainty, especially in PvE which is often described as being easy.

On the otherhand they could just retain the health bars and have NPCs just mindlessly run up to you like in many other online games and hit you over and over until you kill it or it kills you - not that you'd ever have to bother looking at either your avatar or your opponent really. Just need to watch your bars and hit the right keys in the right order. It's pretty much just a numbers game.

Some people might prefer that but I personally find it boring.

 

@Ashlynn exactly, a little bit of combat awareness would be nice. Yeah that is why I don't PvE if I can help it. I need a total of no skill and one mouse button to PvE.

Maybe you could leave all the health bars to the PvP area or something.

 

Although I understand the good points of this idea I am also willing to bet my dollars to doughnuts that (if only possible) very soon after launch there would be an add on introducing health bars just out of sheer coveniance.

You want interesting combat? Make it engrossing. Enforce players to think and react accordingly to situation in all fights. Give monsters proper AI and tactics. It will also result in players talking about fighting monsters and teaming up but will not be as easy "fixed" as lack of health bars.

Most players would probably just consider it a nuisance if they couldn't tell how much HP their opponent has left anyway.

 

Agree with you both on the ease of PvP. Hope this idea gets attention

 

I personally don't like seeing Health or descriptive names of NPC or Monsters. NWN handled health well. It had categories of health like Uninjured, Barely Injured, Injured, Badly Wounded, Near Death, Dead.

So you could tell if something was hurt, which realistically you would be able to tell, but gave you no idea about how many hit points it had. As you got to know creatures, you knew that Near Death might still be a lengthy fight, but if not you got a nice surprise. That uncertainty adds caution and mystery to encounters. If you see exactly how much heath something or someone has it just becomes a math exercise. I think a visual representation of the health or some category system like NWN used would be fine.

As for names, I - personally - would like creatures or NPCs to not have names. Maybe something obvious or generic like Human or Beast. You might know more about a monster or npc based on an observation or lore skill, or if the creature or npc gets identified by reading a book or them introducing themselves. I think it would be great it you always saw an NPC as Merchant unless you walked up and said:

"Hello, my name is Umbrae. Nice to meet you!"

And the NPC responded.

"Hello Umbrae! I am Frank. How can I help you?"

From then on, you would see that NPC as Frank instead of Merchant. That would be something completely new in the game world which would give a great atmosphere to NPC interactions. The Devs have talked about doing spoken word and keyword conversations, so something like this should not be far off.

 

I like Umbrae's suggestion, would make a beast of a job finding some npc as part of a quest. Also the injuries being maybe in the combat log,meh, I don't like reading during battles though, a colored name or bar that changes based on health, but only for the persons that have caused it damage to see.

 

So this topic was mentioned in Today's Dev Chat:

http://www.youtube.com/user/Portalarium?v=qzItblcUuiY&t=48m24s

LB posed the idea of not showing Health Bars or states and instead add animations where your arrows or maybe cuts stay until the creature dies. I personally love this idea. Would be nice to have creatures slow down or stumble as they approach death or even loose morale and run away. LB describes it wonderfully in the Dev Chat, and I recommend you watch it if you missed it.

I think this should also slow combat down, so that creatures don't die quickly and allow time for these triggers. Regenerating creatures will be wonderful to watch.

 

Show your friends (like regular Ultima games), and show the enemies if spells or abilities have been activated.

Maybe an anatomy skill, or a "know your enemies' current status" spell.

I don't want to know how close I am to wacking something in the face to death.