Player health recharge

[SeymourGore]

I think if health drops were to be implemented, I wouldn't be a fan of making them 'killer specific' for a short duration. While it may seem unfair if another player were to steal this health from the player who made the kill (whether it be teammate or foe), you've got to think about how a smart player would use this to their advantage and wait until the enemy tries to pick up the health drop, then blast them good. Hohohoho!

Anyhow, some interesting ideas in this thread, personally I think so far, my favourite idea would still be a combination of health regeneration (segmented style, ala Serket's earlier suggestion) and health drops.

I like the forgiveness that segmentated health regeneration gives to new players that are trying to learn to ski (or for veterans who get the odd bump or scratch on their way to their destination), but having it segmentated (ie: regenerating up to set intervals on their health bar), minimizes the effectiveness of running and hiding (even though this suits Seymour's method of play).

And, while it may seem segmentated regeneration is less helpful for new players versus a full regeneration, I disagree. Experienced players would have an easier time to kill new players for a longer period of time because they can always nest themselves away from the battle, heal up to full life, then begin again. With a segmented heal, they can only regenerate up to so much, then have to rely on health drops to regenerate further. This allows new players to better anticipate the veteran player's next move (he's going to try to go for that health drop).

Whereas the health regeneration is more of a passive heal (because you have to not be consuming energy and on the ground) suited more towards between battles, I like the inclusion of health drops to complement this passive heal. Health drops are very much more an active heal, they only need to be grabbed to begin restoring life, and are helpful for everyone (and not skewered for offense or defense.)

One thing that I'm unsure about is how to deal with health drops when it comes to suicides. I don't know if I necessarily want to see teammates suiciding themselves to leave a health drop for a capper (or HoF), nor do I want to see situations where players are suiciding themselves before dying to avoid dropping a health drop (if suicides were made to not drop health).

Anyhow, all stuff to ponder about and discuss. Seymour's here all night, so keep me occupied.

 

[sugardemon]

What if a the old tribes style health pack/drop rules were used (1 per player, only drops if they have NOT used it when they die) were left intact, but make it a Heal-over-Time effect. If balance is still an issue, maybe set it up so that you can't fire while the regen is active? Just a thought.

 

[NightHawk043]

One thing that I'm unsure about is how to deal with health drops when it comes to suicides. I don't know if I necessarily want to see teammates suiciding themselves to leave a health drop for a capper (or HoF), nor do I want to see situations where players are suiciding themselves before dying to avoid dropping a health drop (if suicides were made to not drop health).

I have to agree with Seymour about the segmented health plus health kits. ( I think I might have mentioned my support earlier)

What I'd suggest Seymour, is since the game already has detection for "scared to death by", you could make suicides when the player isn't scared to death by someone Not drop anything, and make a player who suicides as a "scared to death by" drop the health packs. This still wouldn't be perfect, as players could deliberately let themselves get shot by the enemy once then respawn in front of the person they want to give the health pack to, but it would make it much harder to do so.

Also, not many players would suicide when faced by an enemy who hasn't even started to do damage to them yet.

 

[SeymourGore]

What I'd suggest Seymour, is since the game already has detection for "scared to death by", you could make suicides when the player isn't scared to death by someone Not drop anything, and make a player who suicides as a "scared to death by" drop the health packs. This still wouldn't be perfect, as players could deliberately let themselves get shot by the enemy once then respawn in front of the person they want to give the health pack to, but it would make it much harder to do so.

Yar, that's an idea. Another one that I was thinking of would be that health kits dropped by the opposing team would be a more substantial health boost (say, 20%*), and health kits dropped by teammates would be substantially less (say, 10%). So, in reference to that earlier HoF scenario, a player can still suicide to drop his health kit, but it's going to be so minimal it wouldn't be worth it as a valid strategy.

How to visually separate the two health kits could be done via a 'God of War'-style health icon. Say, a little red orb indicates a teammates health drop and a larger red orb indicates an enemy's health drop.

*Note: Seymour's terrible with numbers, which is why I avoid them. I put them there just to give a feeling on what kind of difference.

Also, not many players would suicide when faced by an enemy who hasn't even started to do damage to them yet.

That's true, I would see them more doing this after a fierce battle. The defenders suiciding to respawn near the hof, so the defenders are at full health and the HoF receives a substantial health increase.

 

[Deskari]

While you guys are brainstorming methods of regenerating health, I think keep a few things in mind.
-Intuitive: Healing should be easy to figure out.
-Expoloitation: Be aware of possible ways to exploit the system
-Sensible & Consistent: Healing should be applied in an equal manner that makes sense

Alot of people have been suggesting that healing should favor defense, but that shouldn't rely on health regeneration, but positional advantage. I feel that having a base heal is a bit overboard and specialized stations would be a more reasonable. Defense already has every advantage over the Offense in the manner of combat, just not in effectiveness in their role. This LO problem you guys seem to be addressing only seemed to be prominent in pub play, which a game should not be balanced around. The problems that people have are not soley because of the current health regen, but because of the way the gametype of CTF is played and the poor map/base designs.

While sharkbite thinks a healing tool method would be a bad idea because it's like having two healthbars, if he is referring to my hybridized idea then he is interpreting it wrong. It would be more like having one healthbar that doesn't regen and a permanant healthkit that is limited in use based on time. However, I have to say it isn't the most intuitive system and the segmented health regen probably offers the best compromise that is familiar in other games. People are suggesting that health kit drops and possible respawning for exploitation. How about players just didn't spawn with a health kit; a simple solution to a simple problem. Perhaps, dying could also have a greater consequence instead of babying your emotionally fragile minds from the shock of defeat. While people argue it's for the pace of gameplay, but that has more to do with how often you are actively controlling your character rather than the actual pace of the action.

Given the suggested systems, we also need to reconsider the reasoning behind these health kits. If we have a segmented health regen and base heals, then why not just use those rather than a kit? Are the kits then ultimately for the survivability of the Offense?

 

[Ucantry2run]

I would think that health packs would play a better part in TDM than CTF. I think that it would be pretty useless in CTF. The only time it would be usefull is after defence-kills or possibly LO kills. Cappers and chasers don't have any use for it. TDM on the other hand could reward a player after every kill. However, I'm still not sure. If the player is getting a lot of kills it might be impossible to kill him. Maybe a one-drop-per-life would be better. All in all, I like the idea, but I wouldn't think it would be right for a game like legions.

I like the health pack idea though, gives the game a Tribes-y sorta feel. It also gives cappers like me moar rocket jumps, teehee

 

[Gheist]

[...] Cappers [...] don't have any use for it. [...] It also gives cappers like me moar rocket jumps, teehee

What now?

 

[Deskari]

I would think that health packs would play a better part in TDM than CTF. I think that it would be pretty useless in CTF. The only time it would be usefull is after defence-kills or possibly LO kills. Cappers and chasers don't have any use for it. TDM on the other hand could reward a player after every kill. However, I'm still not sure. If the player is getting a lot of kills it might be impossible to kill him. Maybe a one-drop-per-life would be better. All in all, I like the idea, but I wouldn't think it would be right for a game like legions.

I like the health pack idea though, gives the game a Tribes-y sorta feel. It also gives cappers like me moar rocket jumps, teehee

It wouldn't be useless in CTF at all and you're assuming that health kits will only be from drops and will be available for every kill. We also have to think that perhaps the way CTF currently plays is wrong. The assumption that Legions should stay like old Legions is a bit short-sighted. The whole discussion of health has to both encompass the way Legions currently plays, but also a view that allows for growth and expansion of further game elements. Also, I see no reason someone shouldn't be rewarded with health packs if they are able to continuously kill the enemy.

 

[mausgang]

Now that Seymour has better described the pros of a segmented passive regen, I can see that working. I also think that it should be coupled not with a health drop upon death, but with an instant-use health pack picked up at a reload station. Seymour, since you are interested in seeing what more advanced and tactically minded players do with health packs that drop from dead people, suicides are how that would be implemented. The point of having a health drop in CTF would be to do an MA suicide in front of the capper to give them more health. I, however, would think that if this other person is going faster, in a PUG or clan game, which is where this would happen, the flag should be passed to the faster player. If you could enlighten us with some potential uses of health drops apart from healing yourself or a teammate after a kill is made, that would be great because I'm not coming up with anything. I myself am adverse to health drops in any case, but I was adverse to segmented passive regen, so I can be persuaded. Anyways, I've already covered the two systems I could see working with an instant-use heal-over-time health pack from a reload station, but I haven't gotten any feedback on it.
Also, sharkbite, if health packs could be knocked around by everybody's rockets, it would be a lot like the flag. Its an effective tactic to kill a wounded opponent. As annoying as it is, it would happen, but you can always repay them in kind. Again, this is only if health drops happen.

 

[sh4rkb1t3]

Segmented health regeneration wouldn't have an impact on the game at all, compared to having no health regeneration. Assuming your healthbar was split into 5 segments, what's the difference between having 10% health or 20% health? You still die by a single blast, so there's no point. It's a fancy visual effect with basically no gameplay impact.

Yes, limits on health regeneration would help the new players kill the injured pros. But the tradeoff is just going to be more CTRL + K. I'm not going to get into a fight with 50% health left - I'm just going to commit suicide and be forced to spend a minute or so skiing back to where I was - thats why I say health regen keeps you in the action. Health stations at the base wouldn't help - you just end up at the base when you suicide anyway, except suicide is faster.

Removing the full health regen would be taking a step backwards. It's replacing a perfectly good system with a more antiquated one, for no good reason.

 

[SeymourGore]

Removing the full health regen would be taking a step backwards. It's replacing a perfectly good system with a more antiquated one, for no good reason.

Yar, one thing to remember though is that this game is far from complete and is pretty devoid of content. While a full regeneration system works well enough in its current state, I don't know if it will cause issues further along as more content is added. (ie: if more robust base structures are added, say deployable turrets, perm. turrets, etc. All of a sudden turtling becomes popular again, these strengthened assets combined with full health regeneration might be a bit too much in favour of defense.)

So, while segmented regeneration might seem unneccessary at this point, perhaps it would be a better choice going forward. Basically, at this point, there's a lot of 'theorycrafting' going on, so it's hard to come to agreement on the best direction for healing.

Now, sorry for going off topic here, but I would like to make a comment on suiciding. I would like to see more penalty to suiciding, but am against a lengthened respawn time, or vanilla crappy spawn loadout (ala Tribes series). One idea that I liked was placing an importance on equippable items (ie: hand grenades, mines, turrets, etc). These items would not respawn with you, and you would need to visit a ammo station to restock them. So, when you respawn, you still have your selected armour + weapons, but lose your Items.

The reason that I liked this idea was that you're not completely useless (ala Tribes vanilla loadout), but it's still ideal for your role and effectiveness to visit an ammo station to restock. Make ammo stations destructible and you further question the effectiveness of suiciding (do I risk not having items due to my ammo stations being destroyed?).

Bleh, anyhow, have to go make supper, bbiab.

 

[Whitewhale]

i like seymours combination of segmenteted health with a power up for more health

good balance

 

[mausgang]

Seymour, on the subject of suiciding, chasers, in order to be effective, often need to ctrl+k in order to get back to the base on time. I would think that the suicide issue should remain as it is. Also, at sharkbite, ammo reload stations aren't just at the base, they are at any sniper tower and other ruins around the larger maps, so you can actually push forward and still regen health at stations. Also, destroying ammo stations is a great way to wreck defense. If the defense runs out of ammo, then they would need to suicide or aim at rockets, but if the LO was smart, they'd just leave the defense crippled, so they'd have no choice but to suicide. The Ammo stations either need to remain indestructible, or they need to be repairable. If a player needs to repair, then that will have to be a new weapon, or it could just come back over a period of time, but I don't see the ammo station being destroyable ever being a good idea. Ammunition keeps the game moving, as it does with any shooter, so it needs to be readily available. Health regen will probably evolve as the game evolves and other features come into effect.

 

[Ucantry2run]

What now?

I meant cappers didn't have any use for the health packs that drop after a kill, unless they can be ninja and pick it up. My bad for not stating that.

 

[SeymourGore]

Seymour, on the subject of suiciding, chasers, in order to be effective, often need to ctrl+k in order to get back to the base on time. I would think that the suicide issue should remain as it is.

And that's fine. That's why in the system that I detailed that weapon, respawn timer, and armour selection stay the same. A chaser can still be effective in his position, in fact, nothing would've changed in the way suicide-ing is now (there's no noteworthy items in the game, excluding the lovely flag). Chasing would still be as effective as ever, where suicide-ing becomes more of a hindrance is to the other roles (defenders, LO, HoF, etc). These guys, who would probably rely more on Items, would be more hesitant to suicide.

ie: A defender just barely defends his base from an attack. He still has some mines, and a deployable turret, but he's somewhat short on health. Before, it would be a simple choice to just suicide, he'd be at full health and relatively close to his original position. But, now he has to think about his equipped Items. Does he take the risk of suicide-ing and possibly being unable to retrieve his Items?

Another example: An LO is attacking a base, he's taken some damage, and it might be some time before the capper is in position. He's got an ample supply of hand grenades at his disposable and a ammo pack. Normally, he's suicide himself, and quickly return to the enemy base to better coincide with his capper. However, he hears on TS3 that his base structures are destroyed and will need time to repair. If he were to simply suicide himself, he would lose his extra items (hand grenades, ammo pack), which would come in handy for adding some DPS on the HoF, clearing the enemy flagstand.

 

[Serket]

ie: A defender just barely defends his base from an attack. He still has some mines, and a deployable turret, but he's somewhat short on health. Before, it would be a simple choice to just suicide, he'd be at full health and relatively close to his original position. But, now he has to think about his equipped Items. Does he take the risk of suicide-ing and possibly being unable to retrieve his Items?

This is where I think the health packs would be the same as the current system, because the ammo stations within the bases are relatively close to the flag, so if a HoF needs health he can quicly use a pack or just go an ammo station and recover just as well, but most of the time they just suicide.
We need a way to make the defence as well as the offence think a bit more strategically about their actions, like suiciding or using items. I for one would like a bit more time between respawns, because it rewards the offence for being effective at taking out the defenders at the base, whereas in the current system the defence respawns quicly after they've been taken out and with the offence being very likely at very low health.
I don't know about you guys but I think another system we should consider as well is an outer shield that regenerates and health that doesn't without items, pretty much halo or section 8.
About the ammo stations being desctructible it lay be a good idea, but there should be a way to repair them ourselves in my opinion, like in BFBC2 where one of the classes has a tool that repairs the vehicles.

 

[Whitewhale]

About the ammo stations being desctructible it lay be a good idea, but there should be a way to repair them ourselves in my opinion, like in BFBC2 where one of the classes has a tool that repairs the vehicles.

omg thats like TRIBES!!!

haha prob with this is noone wants to be the rep guy...i tend to think dont make them destructable unless u have other base assets that assist in defence or some poor prick spends the whole game repairing stuff

 

[SeymourGore]

Yeah, I'd imagine if ammo stations were made destructible, it'd make sense for them to be repaired as well. Also, with refined map design, ammo stations would not necessarily be placed next to the flag (making a quick run to for the HoF to restore health). In fact, I'd probably advise against placing ammo stations next to the flag stand to map makers.

I don't like long respawn times, I think they add a layer of frustration and high blood pressure. I think it's like 3 seconds right now and it feels like an eternity.

haha prob with this is noone wants to be the rep guy...i tend to think dont make them destructable unless u have other base assets that assist in defence or some poor prick spends the whole game repairing stuff

Personally, I think a Turret Farmer/Repair position would have more love than the poor HoF position.

 

[DeadGuy]

I don't like long respawn times, I think they add a layer of frustration and high blood pressure. I think it's like 3 seconds right now and it feels like an eternity.

Legions had a 4 second respawn by default

 

[mausgang]

The repairing stuff sounds a little like the engineer on TF2, or using the link gun on vehicles and power nodes. The design of repair thing, would it be a beam of magical repair, or would it be an animation of using an impact drill? Anyways, the way that LO could possibly break this suicide thing is to stand still five meters from the flag. Any decent LD or HoF would deal with him in a moment, and since it wasn't a suicide, he'd respawn with his gear and his strategy would have cleared the first condition. Also, on PUBs, there might not be a teamspeak or vent option, so the suicide punishment in PUBs would be drastic, and speaking of high blood pressure... Again, that situation would only occur if the ammo stations were down in the base, and there are always other ammo stations around, but the noobs might not know that. I know it took me two months to figure out what those boxes did. It then took me another while to figure out that they were available in the sniper towers. I guess this could have beneficial effects, but if the LO suicide, the HoF aren't going to complain for the next few seconds while they get a little less pressure on themselves. Also, and this is slightly unrelated, I could see ammo packs being a good piece of equipment if the ammo stations were destroyable, but hand grenades seem a little useless in a game where you can fly away from them. Legions just seems a little too fast for grenades, unless they are stickies.