No more health bars?

ArchivedUser

I'm interested on everyone's thoughts on not showing health bars for mobs OR other players. Ashes checks off 99/100 things I've been looking for over the years from an mmorpg but one of the things I've always hated is seeing health bars everywhere. As an in game character why can I see the health of everything around me??? It clutters up the UI, and takes away some of that 'edge of your seat' feel during a close battle and you don't know which of you will fall first.

You could always add it in as a skill or item, to be able to see all mobs/players health in a certain radius for a limited amount of time and then it would explain why there are bars floating over everyone's heads, and even then it could just be an estimation no numbers just a general status or something.

Think of how much more communication would play a part in the success of a battle when everyone's health is not universally known. Players and healers would need to better communicate, some stealthy rouge like characters may sneak around just to gather intel on the current stats of other players for their guild before a battle. It would make a lot more of the actions we take in game more satisfying when we can't just crunch numbers for everything. How awesome would it be seeing a giant dragon spawn and not knowing immediately what it's really going to take to kill it and have to attempt it many times to get a feel for what it's capable of.

I think that health bars have just been such a staple in rpg's over the years that no one has considered how awesome it would be if we got rid of them all and introduced new mechanics to improve gameplay and reduce the visual clutter.

Edit: I tried posting this in anther page but it doesn't seem to show up

ArchivedUser

I see what you're saying and I support it to a point. If there is some way of showing through the character animations the health of a character I'd be much more for it, but in a mass scale that'd be something that's way too small to notice and by far too much of a pain to work that it'd make no one want to play healer as healers would be throwing heals near blindly.

If the Devs find it something worthwhile then hopefully they can add an option to remove visual health and have your judgement purely based off of the characters stance/breathing pattern. You can see a system like that used in the Dark Souls games where the character actually starts to pant and hang themselves lower than they would if they were at full health.

ArchivedUser

The problem is that the health bar actually provides you with a good deal of information. In raids it can tell you when a mechanic is going to change so that players can pop certain cooldowns or prepare to move. It can also tell you which ability you need to use, I wouldn't want to use a powerful and resource intensive ability when the target is at 1% health. So there is a trade off, remove health bars and you lose key information about your target. Is there some other way of displaying that information to the player? Visual cues and multiple animation states might do this, however now they significantly increase the demand on your animators and character artists.

An option to turn them off and have a 'immersive RPG' mode seems perfectly reasonable, however I get the feeling that you may want more information about your target's health state. I certainly would want more information than to randomly smack a target repeatedly until it falls over.

ArchivedUser

There are some games out there where you can choose to show health bars or not. You also have the choice of how these health bars will show up like just numbers, only when injured (mobs), only yourself, only your group. I am hoping that the UI will give us these same kind of options. Personally, I like health bars, but I also like choices.

ArchivedUser

All valid points, I agree that the information health bars provide is great but in game why as a level 1 character do I have the ability to immediately sum up the vitality, status, constitution , etc.. of another person or monster. Seems like another route to explore would be that visibility into these stats is a skill that you level up over time. Kill 10 goblins, ok now you have a better idea of what they are capable of and can see more info when they come into view if you so choose. Also maybe it's a skill with a certain range, you have to get x distance in order to see more details, or use a device that lets you see further if you want to scout out an enemy.

Thoughts?

ArchivedUser

I agree with you. having a skill or item that detects statistics for personal viewing would be much more immersive than health bars. and with the stunning look of the game i think that's the route i would choose. make players work for the information and it will cause more and more thought provoking behavior out of the players and the game devs. it would also get Mmorpg's out of its current niche where players MUST rely upon looking at a creatures exact statistics to fight it instead of using intuition or skill like a real adventurer would have to in those situations. a boss uses a health and timers in most games to depict their movements and actions... that's boring and mechanical, asking little of the players intelligence skill or ability but more of their capability in repetition and memorization. a dragon isn't always going to use its fire when a 30 second timer beeps. it would use it where and when it would think it would be most effective not on a single man that has run away from his group but on the larger group. Im getting off topic. the point is that i think players would benefit off of a different system of monitoring their opponents that is far less mechanical more ascetically pleasing and more lore/immersion friendly

ArchivedUser

[quote quote=7454]All valid points, I agree that the information health bars provide is great but in game why as a level 1 character do I have the ability to immediately sum up the vitality, status, constitution , etc.. of another person or monster. Seems like another route to explore would be that visibility into these stats is a skill that you level up over time. Kill 10 goblins, ok now you have a better idea of what they are capable of and can see more info when they come into view if you so choose. Also maybe it’s a skill with a certain range, you have to get x distance in order to see more details, or use a device that lets you see further if you want to scout out an enemy.

Thoughts?

[/quote]

Black Desert Online has a knowledge system for enemies, where once you have knowledge on them you can see their health bar go down. A similar system but improved in my opinion would be to see no health bars on new enemies, but once you have killed 1 of them maybe you can see a health bar now but nothing exact, just the color of their health, maybe even status conditions, and after like 10 or so, you can see the bar actually go down. Idk, just my thoughts. I also agree that if possible I would love a way to play effectively without them, but that's pretty hard for the dev team to figure out and implement I bet.

ArchivedUser

bleeinc said:

Think of how much more communication would play a part in the success of a battle when everyone's health is not universally known. Players and healers would need to better communicate, some stealthy rouge like characters may sneak around just to gather intel on the current stats of other players for their guild before a battle. It would make a lot more of the actions we take in game more satisfying when we can't just crunch numbers for everything. How awesome would it be seeing a giant dragon spawn and not knowing immediately what it's really going to take to kill it and have to attempt it many times to get a feel for what it's capable of.

I think that health bars have just been such a staple in rpg's over the years that no one has considered how awesome it would be if we got rid of them all and introduced new mechanics to improve gameplay and reduce the visual clutter.

Edit: I tried posting this in anther page but it doesn't seem to show up

Neat. definitely a good idea.

ArchivedUser

Maybe health should be displayed in physical form, for example more blood on their body over time depending how close they are to death, staggering, fatigued body language or even the ability to fight. 

ArchivedUser

BDO has something similar, new mobs won't show a health bar, until you've killed enough of them, and gain knowledge of that particular mob, you also do more damage on them the more knowledge you gain.

ArchivedUser

this is a high fantasy mmorpg, not a survival game.  health bars should be a thing, although i would not mind not showing the bar for a mob until you had knowledge of it.

ArchivedUser

From a healer perspective health bars are great..
They don't just tell you how much health a player starts with compared to his companion, but they also make it simple to visualise how quickly people are taking damage...

If you make only the actual damage visible...i.e. have five stages of wounds on a character, you would be taking away a sizeable proportion of their effectiveness as it wouldn't be as easy to see.

Ok, so easy isn't what you want? You want me to learn your individual playstyle and remember it...
Um, not going to happen. You have to remember that every individual character here is going to have the option of 64 choices of build, not including additions via nodes, religion armor etc.

Communication?
Haha hahaha , oh but in my experience it's always the person of least importance to the survival of a group who shouts the loudest. Sorry that the tank died and the raid wiped, I had to heal that dps who couldn't take advice and manage his aggro, but who whined the loudest when anyone even breathed in him.
You've got to remember a good tank doesn't ask for healing, ever, even if they're almost dead, they trust their healer 

Ok, so having a skill that shows you health bars... that'd be fine by me, attaching it automatically as an optional skill (opt out for those who desire it) to anyone who's got any cleric skills would work....

In a non healing role though... meh I'm not too fussed

ArchivedUser

I think it would be cool to only see the health bar of what youre targeting

ArchivedUser

Megs said:

From a healer perspective health bars are great..
They don't just tell you how much health a player starts with compared to his companion, but they also make it simple to visualise how quickly people are taking damage...

If you make only the actual damage visible...i.e. have five stages of wounds on a character, you would be taking away a sizeable proportion of their effectiveness as it wouldn't be as easy to see.

Ok, so easy isn't what you want? You want me to learn your individual playstyle and remember it...
Um, not going to happen. You have to remember that every individual character here is going to have the option of 64 choices of build, not including additions via nodes, religion armor etc.

Communication?
Haha hahaha , oh but in my experience it's always the person of least importance to the survival of a group who shouts the loudest. Sorry that the tank died and the raid wiped, I had to heal that dps who couldn't take advice and manage his aggro, but who whined the loudest when anyone even breathed in him.
You've got to remember a good tank doesn't ask for healing, ever, even if they're almost dead, they trust their healer 

Ok, so having a skill that shows you health bars... that'd be fine by me, attaching it automatically as an optional skill (opt out for those who desire it) to anyone who's got any cleric skills would work....

In a non healing role though... meh I'm not too fussed

Cannot reiterate this enough. I know, we all think "Oh, this'd be cool!" But if you're in a dungeon with me, and I'm healing your happy li'l arse ... trust me. You want me to be able to easily see when you need more propping up!

ArchivedUser

Ziz said:

I think it would be cool to only see the health bar of what youre targeting

Apparently your not a healer or need one.

ArchivedUser

Health bars can be very annoying when some fool won't get out of the ground aoe and starts yelling to be healed but they do save many a fool. 
I say let them die if they don't want  health bars.  

ArchivedUser

In the last MMO i played ... i think I've gotten to the point to where i don't like being
 " babied " by the Healer - mainly as a DPS.  DPS always boast about how strong they are, but can never last long enough to inflict that damage.

The first MMO i played - each player had to be Self-Sufficient with their own HP. Sure they had Recovery HP Potions - but it made each be mindful about their own HP

Which is why I'm hoping all Classes can have a Basic-Healing-Spell ... but still needing other ways of sustaining their own HP 

(Hence: " Proving their worth " ... or at least that's how i viewed it  )

ArchivedUser

What if 'healer' classes have some passive skills that help with health visibility? Again make it something that needs to be learned not just given by default. Then even healers with the same builds may have an advantage over others based upon how well they have leveled up their passive medical/healing/vision skills.

Also, a bit of on a tangent but, every game on the shelf just gives you a 'heal x hp' spell. What if health mechanics were a little more sophisticated like other aspects of the game seem to be. Instead of 'heal x' have spells that mend broken bones, stop bleeding, etc. spells that aren't as simple as (just add x hp over y time to target z). I guess those would just be status removal spells but you get the point, make healing, if it's something you want to level in, be more involved than just watching health bars and timing your heal x spells accordingly.

ArchivedUser

I'm not a big fan of health bars in games. The games without them seem to be more immersive to me. Never knowing exactly how much health something has seems to add to the challenge.

I recommend watching this video if you want to know where I'm coming from.

ArchivedUser

Obscuring information can go terribly wrong.
Not knowing how much HP an enemy has can be a challange, but imagine fighting a bugged npc that behaves normally but takes no dmg. If you never encountered this enemy before, you could 1) think this enemy is just too tough for you, or 2) fight this thing for ages.
I personally consider health bars to be helpful. But there should be an option to turn them off and to just turn them on in combat.

ArchivedUser

I like having health bars especially when it comes to PvP. They should have health bars enabled automatically or activated when you select a NPC or a player and have an ability to disable it for those who don't like hp bars. 

ArchivedUser

Of course no health gauge adds to the challenge because it would be completely unrealistic to be fighting something and not be able to recognize how healthy it is and/or when it is dying from your attacks.

ArchivedUser

@TwelfthFlare
Sure. There should be a toggle for the HUD.

ArchivedUser

Dygz said:

Of course no health gauge adds to the challenge because it would be completely unrealistic to be fighting something and not be able to recognize how healthy it is and/or when it is dying from your attacks.

"Unrealistic"?! Ever fought anything in real life with a health bar? Combat in real life often hinges on not letting your enemy know your health status.

ArchivedUser

Anything I have fought in real life, I have several ways to gauge its health, the damage it's taking and how that damage affects its performance.
Can't really hide your health status during combat in real life - especially once you're close to death.

ArchivedUser

Dygz said:

Anything I have fought in real life, I have several ways to gauge its health, the damage it's taking and how that damage affects its performance.
Can't really hide your health status during combat in real life - especially once you're close to death.

Dygz I'd love to argue with you about how real life combat revolves around fooling your enemy into thinking you have less or more health/stamina than you actually do. If you are concerned about realism in combat, then you must realize that there are no health bars or gauges in reality. Clearly you have vastly different experiences of combat in real life, so I wouldn't know where to start this conversation  

ArchivedUser

Hi Bleeinc,

I primarily play healers or spell casters (mages) in the games I play.  As a healer, it is critical to see everyone's health and if you were in my group, you would want me to take the time to notice you are almost dead and save you.

That said, quite a few of the games I have played have given one the option to alter their windows on their game.  Plenty of these games allow you to alter your group bar, so that you can make everyone in your group not even show up, or you can have their names show up and not their health. 

In addition to that, for many of these games there are custom UIs that you can use that allow you to completely eliminate the health bars altogether.  I recommend that you search out the custom UIs for the games you play to see if you can find one that works for you.

ArchivedUser

Regardless of personal preferences, I think we can all agree that from a technical standpoint health bars are important for recognizing when an ally is close to falling and thus needs a heal, or when an enemy is close to falling and the time to counter their own heals arises. Not to mention the slew of other uses for data in battle. If IS wanted to take a "realistic" approach, I could see them using aesthetic changes to denote damage and effects (blood splatters on armor, etc). A new issue would arise with this, however, being that more attention would be required for spotting these details over paying attention to the overall fight itself. As mentioned already, options within the UI settings may allow for customization, letting the player have some choice in the matter. Time and the alphas/betas will tell, I suppose.

ArchivedUser

lexmax said:

Dygz said:

Anything I have fought in real life, I have several ways to gauge its health, the damage it's taking and how that damage affects its performance.
Can't really hide your health status during combat in real life - especially once you're close to death.

Dygz I'd love to argue with you about how real life combat revolves around fooling your enemy into thinking you have less or more health/stamina than you actually do. If you are concerned about realism in combat, then you must realize that there are no health bars or gauges in reality. Clearly you have vastly different experiences of combat in real life, so I wouldn't know where to start this conversation  

There is nothing to argue.
You can't hide fatigue, external bleeding, burning flesh and non-functioning, dismembered limbs.
You are the person who mentioned immersion.
Immersion means that we will be aware of the health of our allies and opponents.

Disguising the accuracy of health gauges with stealth or illusion skills is really a separate topic from health gauges existing.

ArchivedUser

In my opinion it should be like this:
Healers can see healthbars of allys at melee range;
Rouges can see healthbars of enemys in melee range while in stealth;
Hunters can mark a enemy which allows everyone to see its healthbar with no range limit;
Summoners can curse one enemy and see its healthbar at all times even when not in visible range;
Bards can mark one ally so every person in the bards group can see the healthbar.
All players and npc's still have a name and show status effects etc. below anyway;

Average percentage of actual health without healthbar is displayed by visual effect that depends on the type of dmg the unit recived:
Physical dmg=Bleed effect that gets more visible the lower the health;
Fire dmg=unit is litteraly burning and flames get bigger the lower the hp;
Frost dmg=Parts of the body is frozen and has a increasing number of blue ice fragments attached;
Arrow dmg from hunters=Arrows sticking inside the victim;
Shadow dmg=Body parts get black with a black glowing effect;
etc.
So if the unit in question has 20% hp left,lost 20% of its hp by a physical warrior attack and 60% by a fireball from a mage, it would be bleeding a little bit and burning alot.
If he then get healed back to 80% the burning and bleeding would reduce but not change in its proportion, so it would still burn 3 times more than bleed..
However the effect shouldnt be tooo huge even at 5% hp, or we would have shiny orbs jumping all over the place during siege fights hehe