Target player health indicator?
George_Black
Member, Intrepid Pack
Target player healthbars dont belong in an open world mmo specially in AoC which uses the flagging/PK system to facilitate open world progress and conflict of interest based PvP.
Knowing a target players health can lead to gameplay that's not fun for the defender. If a player battles mobs and an attacker notices his low HP he could lower it to the point where the mobs can deal the final blow and the attacker can claim the dropped items and the area.
This is why AoC went with health indicators. The current ones we saw on the latest stream were not good. They will be further worked on since we are still in development. But what is the aim of them?
I would argue that there is 0 usage for health indicators as well as health bars for target players.
Besides the fact that they are a visual clutter and offer (rightly) unclear target player survivability, a low health indicator makes a target the priority for nuking in organized PvP.
We dont need them. A basic nameplay with a "current target" icon to signify that this player is rdy to be hit by your abilities is all it takes in OWpvp.
You dont need to know more info. It's not a battleground, nor any other instanced PvP like in other mmos.
You either choose to fight an enemy in the open world for gains, or you compromise and move along. If you choose to fight you fight and you either touch the dirt or he does.
No health bars. Health indicators? What for? No health indicators.
Knowing a target players health can lead to gameplay that's not fun for the defender. If a player battles mobs and an attacker notices his low HP he could lower it to the point where the mobs can deal the final blow and the attacker can claim the dropped items and the area.
This is why AoC went with health indicators. The current ones we saw on the latest stream were not good. They will be further worked on since we are still in development. But what is the aim of them?
I would argue that there is 0 usage for health indicators as well as health bars for target players.
Besides the fact that they are a visual clutter and offer (rightly) unclear target player survivability, a low health indicator makes a target the priority for nuking in organized PvP.
We dont need them. A basic nameplay with a "current target" icon to signify that this player is rdy to be hit by your abilities is all it takes in OWpvp.
You dont need to know more info. It's not a battleground, nor any other instanced PvP like in other mmos.
You either choose to fight an enemy in the open world for gains, or you compromise and move along. If you choose to fight you fight and you either touch the dirt or he does.
No health bars. Health indicators? What for? No health indicators.
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Comments
It would be cool if they turned them off just for a little while in A2 to see what it's like. It would radically change decision making and enhance the sense of risk.
The decision making is simple - hit the target till it's dead.
id prefer no info on the target. no health, no level, no class, nothing maybe just the name.
An MMO being open world or not have literally no relavence at all in this discussion.
Open world refers to the world being non-linear, where players can go in which ever direction they wish at which ever time they wish.
WoW, ESO, BDO, EQ, EQ2, Rift, DDO, GW, GW2 etc are all open world MMORPG's. Showing health bars in those games is perfectly fine - they absolutely belong.
So, your opening statement of this thread is just incorrect.
As to your statement about the flagging system, since Archeage (also an open world game) has a similar system, and also shows health bars, I fail to see how you can say it doesn't belong.
It wasn't present in L2, and so people wanting Ashes to be L2 version 2 may not like it - but those people are the only ones.
Everyone else will expect it to be present in some form.
Not seeing any info is really not an option. Hiding basic information out of fear of ganks is insane.
Not sure what you are on about with all the "no place" talk. It's in every MMO place.
Chivalry 2 had something like this, and it was very easy to gauge someone's health just by looking at their animations, even in the middle of a huge battle. I suspect the same would be true in AoC.
Its a really cool idea. But probably very hard to do. Tons of models - different armors, races etc.
I know, I know, probably a weak argument for this crowd of fierce PVPers, but some of us still have reflexes for acts of heroism rather than what glints in other players' bags. (Oh nice pun)
You are right, no way to know if anyone not from your group needs heal, but it's the other groups healer's job + in huge battles most of the time you don't concentrate on single target heals - you mainly use mass heals, aoe shields, party member's HP balancing skills and so on. If someone dies, you react fast and ress him/her and he's/she's back on feet. + in 500 people battles believe me you won't have time to look at birds on the castle wall or heal anyone apart from your group, most probably even people from your own group will die a lot even with your focused heals. This is not WoW, this is not Lineage2, but more Lineage 2 than WoW (especially pvp) or any other casual mmorpg.
Not giving players feedback in a pvp setting for some silly "hardcore" notion is rediculous.
"Just push buttons until they fall down" is not an enjoyable interactive experience.
The singular greifing example you guys always use, is just a fall back excuse you guys use in order to get to play Lineage 3. There are surely other ways to prevent that one exploit without cheepening the experience of the enitre game.
Hardcore stubborness is a big factor in a lot of older mmos dying off.
So firstly if you refer to Lineage 2 and somehow still think that people for 20 years play with a "what am I really doing here vibe" + saying that you know that "people playing video game want a clear visual representation of what is happening" when you simply say what YOU want then by definition you are not right and I have to disappoint you my friend. Of course, you are right in a context, especially if you played PVE game like WoW while other people were playing PvP games like Lineage2, because I really wouldn't take the health bars of your enemies in WoW - the game would not work. But just the same as AoC, which by the way takes the exact pvp flagging system from Lineage 2, wouldn't work with health bars. No, sorry, it would "work", but it would be trash. And people who don't want health bars don't want it because they played L2 or because they are hardcore as you said. They don't want health bars because they already tried the same system for over than 20 years which works perfectly without health bars and they know what they are getting into because they not only know how it works, but they know why it works. If I would have played WoW for 20 years and someone would come to me saying that there won't be health bars then my balls would drop too just as yours, because you never got to try to play for years in a specific system. It's not "cheapening" experience of the entire game, it's enriching it. It's not that having no health bars has one layer. It is much more deeper system which revolves around so many aspects of pvp and the world itself. And you got me right there, yes, I am a hardcore Lineage2 player and yes, sometimes my answers and posts will be purely emotional and not rational at all because I have such a connection to the game, but when talking about flagging system , pvp, pk, anything player versus players..oh man.. this would and will work and will reach it's potential only without health bars.
Right, so you want Lineage 3. I get it.
The question is, do you understand the argument against this type of thing?
Can you not see how this affects things from a standpoint of gameplay experience?
Can you not see how things like this gatekeep the game from a wider audience?
I don't want Lineage 3 - Lineage 2 is perfectly fine as it is, but yes if someone who enjoyed L2 makes a game with it's pvp system then I am all arms.
I do understand the argument against this perfectly, just the same as I understand other arguments like "why is the open world pvp? let's make it only consensual pvp game", "why 80% of content is open world? let's make it all a bunch of instanced mini games", "why do you lose exp and might even drop your items when you die? let's make it that you don't lose anything when you die and there are no consequences to dying". Yes, I understand all these arguments, because after I played L2 for 15 years I came to see what was WoW during all those years and got to check out the Classic WoW and it's player base mentality. When in L2 you need 8 months of 6h per day constant grind to get to max level and WoW's player base calls vanilla wow hardcore because you needed /played 3 days to get to max level. Believe me, I understand the arguments perfectly.
Yes, I can see that "this affects things from a standpoint of gameplay experience" and I want "this to affect things from a standpoint of gameplay experience".
I absolutely see how "a thing like this gate keeps the game from a wider audience" and I am so proud of how it would be as you say. Most of the things in life and therefore games that licks arses to bring a wider audience are simply pop trash. I don't want this game to become as big as WoW did, Steven doesn't want this game to become as big as WoW did. It's unrealistic to produce a quality product with a soul that would reach "wide audience". Anything that is "wide audience" oriented gives me icks. 90% of that wide touristic audience will leave the game after 5th death when they will realise that they just lost progress of 2 hours grind, 90% of that wide touristic audience will leave the game after they will be ganked for 3 h straight because a stronger team will come to their farming spot. As a developer you should never look what is for "wider audience" or you will make changes in the game after every complaint in the forum after the game launches and your game will lose it's identity and you won't even know what game is it. Steven most probably has enough money to live 10 comfortable lifes - he doesn't care about making money or at least it's not why he'd doing this MMO. He doesn't care about "wider audience" and neither should you.
You are too slanted in your arguements. No one is talking about WoW, but if you can generalize other people's specific arguements into the mmo culture war using WoW as the straw man, then all the better.
I want to play an enjoyable video game, not hop into your culture war.
If it's an MMO RPG - Health Bars are needed.
Explain the difference. They serve the same important function is both use cases. It's literally the same thing.
GeorgeBlack: If you choose to fight you fight and you either touch the dirt or he does.
NiKr: The decision making is simple - hit the target till it's dead.
An MMO RPG should be designed such that players have tools that allow them to analyze the battle and strategize and synergize tactics with their group mates. And should reflect enough of the real world that players are using some representation of their senses to evaluate the Health of their targets.
MMO PvP can have less focus on immersion and story. It can mostly be focused on combat and killing.
An MMO RPG is going to have a great deal of focus on world/story immersion and... should, ideally, also offer opportunities for battles to end before a target dies.
Gw2 AA and other such examples dont have all the elements that AoC has (and L2 did) which require hidden target player health.
Oh well nothing new.
The game will look much cleaner and snipping be a gamble and will bring more honest fights, only targets of interest will have some information and that's it
Friendly duel practice numerous times against all types of opponents. Frequently. Actual gameplay experience as opposed to yet another UI (which due to AoCs designs/features can be "exploited" and lead to not fun gameplay for targeted players in the open world).
Back in L2 I spent a lot of time learning how to use my MP and cooldowns so that not a single dmg skill was missused.
I have 0 problems doing this with HPbars. It's so much easier as was the case for me in Olympiad L2, where my victims HP was visible.
I do not lack skill. Those who yet again require another clutch do (a clutch they got used to from wow eso etc etc).
HP bars will have implications in AoC.
HP indicators are non useful clutter.
You will remember this when you get slapped a couple of times by an agressive player, lose enough HP to get killed by mobs, with the agressor having 0 risk of dealing a fatal blow ending in him gaining corruption.
Gw2 aa etc etc et did not have the serious corruption system and so there was little reason to warn attackers of how close the passive victim was to death.
Heck.. they didnt even have serious PvP or progression which required the flagging system.
Seems like gamers should be allowed to toggle of Health bars just as players can toggle off Nameplates.
What are you talking about? This is a competitive mmo. Nothing is optional.
that's not basic information. that's like saying u see a complete stranger and you know exactly what he is capable of.
its also not fear of being ganked. what? its the opposite. no health bars make it riskier to fight tppl in the open world. if anything, that's what would case fear. seeing the enemy's health bar would remove that fear, because now you know what level he is, what gear, what build, or at least you have an idea and you can decide wether you can fight him or not.
hmm didn't ppl die in like 3-4 hits in chivalry, plus everyone does the same damage? pretty much. so that kinda works for chivalry but wouldn't work for ashes where people can take many many hits, get heals, etc. probs not. it would be a miss seeing the player mesh changing every second lol
how is that not interactive? you press a button, then I react accordingly and press a button. I'm not gonna press f1f2f3f1f2f3 regardless of what you do, which is pretty much what happens in wow and similar games. you can see their health bar but its irrelevant, since you are just slow dpsing nd baiting a cd, then you do your combo, so f1f2f3 f1f2f3 f1f2f3 oh they used cd ok f7f8f9.
if I'm pressing f1f1 and u press f3, then I press f2, then you do f7 then I do f9, etc. regardless of health bars. so idk how not seeing the enemy hp affects that. if you dash at me and I know big combi is coming, I stun then run, now your dash is on cooldown. health bars don't change that and game is still interactive.
if anything, health bars make things less interactive, because now you know whether you can win or not after 2 seconds of the fight, then people are just gonna run away, dash, disappear into the void lmao. that removes interactivity. you still have an idea whether you gonna win or not based on damage taken and done, but that requires to actually be good at the game and know other peoples build, not just your f1f2f3f1f2f3f7f8f9 combo.
maybe trying to make a game for a wider audience Is not a good idea? if you are making a platformer, add platformer elements to your game. if you are making a puzzle game, add puzzles, etc. don't make a puzzle game then try to attract people who like fps or RPG. make a good puzzle game.
if you try to widen too much, you lose players instead of gaining, because you start adding features that the original group your game was meant for don't like and they wont play. look at new world lol.
Night is dark and so it hides some thing u might see during a day cycle players are less reconisable (aka no name plates) and harder to see if there injured (Hence no HP bars)
This adds a difference between play style during day and night cycles which makes things interesting imo. Easier to ambush at night and easier to evade players at night so it makes night and day feel very different gameplay wise