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« on: June 21, 2012, 03:14:33 AM »
I'd like to exchange some ideas about designing a health system not based on the HP abstraction, and furthermore not reliant on a continual supply of healing magic to keep adventuring viable. The HP mechanic is so widespread, I think it has become a conceptual crutch; certainly its popularity is not due to being a perfect solution.
HP has (have?) just never rung true for me. In how many great adventure stories does the intrepid protagonist chug away at red potions every 20 minutes, just to stay topped up? How anticlimactic would it be to read a dramatic fight scene in which the hero is gravely wounded and all seems lost, and then suddenly he pops a potion and stands up for round 2 (of n, presumably)? Heroes seem brave to us because they stand tall even knowing that they are vulnerable, that they possess human frailty,* can hurt and fail and die. Why can't a roguelike tell us that story?
* (or elven frailty, or dwarven frailty, or goblin frailty, or what have you. Just don't tell the dwarves I called them "frail.")
There are other problems. Being down to 1 HP means you're at death's door, sure; but in how many games does this affect your prowess? I anticipate an objection: "it wouldn't be fun that way." Well, I'm not sure; I haven't seen it done,** though I imagine it's at least been attempted. I suspect there's a way to do it right, but we may need to peel away some conceptual layers to figure out what kind of system it would make sense in.
** (the closest thing that occurs to me is the ability to throw your sword in The Legend of Zelda, which you lose as soon as you're injured. This shows how a "penalty for being hurt" is also a "bonus for staying healthy".)
Okay, so if we take away their healing magic, we need to make sure they still have a chance. Survival can't continue to be about "making sure the bar doesn't get too low." Every goblin has a dagger that can cut your throat, and you'd better not forget it: that's peril, friends. That's how you make level 1 interesting.
So how do heroes do it? With amazing skill, naturally! Picture a barbarian wading into a roomful of rabble, tearing them apart by the dozens. In an HP system, if you balance an encounter like this to be challenging, the barbarian will be near death by the end -- his toughness is represented by the width of that bar. But how does he do it in your mind? He throws tables, he smashes enemies' heads together, he ducks a blade by a hair's breadth and then breaks the wielder's wrist for his trouble. He wears armor that deflects blows and keeps damage away from his vital areas. He doesn't suffer just few enough injuries not to kill him and then magically recover; he does apply his skill and resources to his survival at every moment. To me, that's a lot more interesting than playing a "tank."
Alright, here's the part where I talk about the system I'm actually working on, to save myself the trouble of wording things too abstractly.
Firstly, attacker and defender skills of different kinds (strike, dodge, strength, toughness, etc.) play into multiple rolls, any of which can influence the severity of injury. The attacker first rolls and determines how good the strike is, on a qualitative scale including e.g. "Excellent," "Terrible," and "Mediocre." The defender makes a similar roll to dodge, which if not successful outright may turn the blow somewhat less effective. Assuming the blow still makes contact, there's a roll against armor based on strength and weapon power. Whatever number on that qualitative scale makes it through is converted onto a scale for wound levels and applied to the character.
Individual wounds are kept track of in buckets by severity. In order for lesser wounds to be meaningful, it must be possible to "die the death of a thousand cuts;" the cumulative effect should eventually prove overwhelming. My first idea here is to simply promote injuries when a bucket gets too full. You get a too many "minor" cuts, maybe you convert the next one into a "not so minor" cut. Another way to go, which I'm also considering, is to penalize toughness rolls based on degree of injury (measured by high water mark, I guess -- when you're bleeding out your guts, nobody cares how many papercuts you have).
I don't think healing should be done away with altogether, just made less effective and readily accessible. Wounds heal naturally over time, especially minor ones. There's no reason the system can't track all that. First aid should matter, and I'm not against some healing magic that's not dramatically more potent than first aid. Some injuries would be too severe and require the player to retire to town for the attention of, say, a surgeon. I see no reason for any injury to be ultimately incurable, though -- that would be anti-fun.
Well, that's about it. I have some more thoughts on how this system would impact the game overall, how it would affect balance and pacing and so on, but I think it's time for me to shut up and see what anyone else has to say. So, do you? Love it? Hate it? Commentary, suggestions, or alternate models? Know of games I should check out where things like this have been tried (and succeeded/failed)? Let's hear it.
P.S. I know there was another thread today about health systems, but my point is really not about wound locations at all, so I wanted to start a fresh discussion.
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