Healing Points

[Stapleton]

I agree with setting a base difficulty setting initially in game. As I played ksjp17's game The Tale of a Common Man he implented this perfectly. Going into a difficulty choice especially only allowing it prior to starting a game has to be defined specifically what will be more difficult. Such as which monsters will be stronger, if all by how much? That is the way to do it.

I also agree with allowing it in game. But with a penalty. If you do not penalize it then it will be abused. Such penalty could be a cooldown on switching the difficulty or simply by having an achievement system that allows you to complete the achievement only if you stay in that difficulty throughout the whole game and do not make it easier.

Back to the Healing springs, I believe it to be a good implementation in my games because I like to have all battle be fair and not have your characters be half hp or have status debuffs to begin the battle.

 

[Milennin]

It really depends on the game, although I'm generally fine with such a feature in a game, unless it's too easily abusable (like, if next to an efficient grinding spot) or if they're found too frequently. They're nice to have to right before boss fights, because the developer can always balance their bosses to go up against a full health party.


Though in my game I want party health+magic management to be an important aspect of combat. Healing outside of combat is limited, so a lot of the time the player will want to make sure their characters stay up at reasonable health levels during combat itself. While I do have full restore points, they are outside or only at the start of dungeons, so if the player really wants to use them they'll have to walk back (though it never should be needed to do so if the player uses its skills correctly). Also, my boss fights aren't designed around a full health party... more around a like a 2/3rd health party.

 

[Stapleton]

Milennin, I do agree with your post if you make a dungeon completely linear. But I believe if you want to make a dungeon more dynamic and encourage exploration in your dungeons then always fighting with resources such as potions or mana and having to run back to the beginning to get restored is very tiresome and makes people just want to hurry and get to the end. I respect the challenge it gives but really does get old and doesnt encourage exploration.

 

[kerbonklin]

It really depends on the game, although I'm generally fine with such a feature in a game, unless it's too easily abusable (like, if next to an efficient grinding spot)

This is a hard thing to find an answer to, save-points in dungeons next to efficient grinding spots. If the save-spot fully heals the party and 1 battle doesn't use any healing resources (like items) then they can just battle-save-battle-save-battle-save and so on. It's not something you should really endorse as a dev since it lessens the dungeon challenge of resource management.

Like for example I was recently playing through Final Fantasy X and I abused the save-spot in the Zanarkand Dome before the boss to grind lots of S-levels (sphere grid movements) and Lv2 and Lv3 Key Spheres.

 

[Haydeos]

Get the player to become addicted to healing pools...then throw in some poisoned pools just to mess with their heads!

*evil laugh*

 

[wallacethepig]

What, nobody is gonna bring up Pokemon?

Seriously, the Pokemon Center is the most abusable of abusable healing spots. And yet very few people ever complain about Pokemon Centers. They're free, reusable, and relatively frequent throughout the world. Heck, you could go back to one after fighting a single trainer, heal up, and rinse and repeat forever to save the potions you find for gym battles. Not only that, but you can save literally anywhere. Come on, how many of you have saved before fighting a legendary Pokemon only to restart if you accidentally kill it before you can catch it?

Of course, Pokemon isn't exactly a traditional RPG game. But one time-honored tradition is the inn. It's inn (pun intended) almost every town, and usually costs pittance to stay at. However, there are very few inns inn (yes, every time) a dungeon.

So here's the problem. You've got a dungeon, which will wear down HP, MP, and the like. It'll also wear down your players - an important thing to keep in mind. So if you have a tough dungeon with no save or healing points before the boss, then your players are inn for a world of hurt. If they win, which is unlikely given their situation, then everything's fine and dandy, but if they lose, not only do they have to slog through the dungeon again, but they have to fight the boss and re-watch whatever cutscene you've placed beforehand. Most players don't want to do that.

I would say either have around 3 non-reusable healing points in the dungeon, at least one at the end, and a save point nearby the boss. If you're eschewing save points inn favor of a "save whenever you want to," I would go for 1 or 2 non-reuseable heal points. Always have a heal point near the end of the dungeon, and if it's particularly long, put one inn the middle.

To be honest, the more worrisome feature is saving. If you can save whenever, healing points aren't as important (but still appreciated). If you can't save whenever, healing points are almost necessary.

-Wallace

 

[Wavelength]

What, nobody is gonna bring up Pokemon?

Seriously, the Pokemon Center is the most abusable of abusable healing spots. And yet very few people ever complain about Pokemon Centers. They're free, reusable, and relatively frequent throughout the world. Heck, you could go back to one after fighting a single trainer, heal up, and rinse and repeat forever to save the potions you find for gym battles. Not only that, but you can save literally anywhere. Come on, how many of you have saved before fighting a legendary Pokemon only to restart if you accidentally kill it before you can catch it?

This brings us back to what kind of goal and challenge the game wants to set forth, though.  Progression is not supposed to be a challenge in Pokemon, except for very specific points like the Gym Leaders (and even there, the designers wisely bring you back to a very nearby Pokemon Center so you can try again).  Survival is not supposed to be a challenge.  And I think they expected you (at least in Gen 2 and on, if not in Gen 1) to look up where to catch the rarest Pokemon and to save scum if you missed a missable.  They intentionally made it really easy to level your Pokemon, heal, save, and level them some more until they can one-shot the random enemies you come across.  None of this is designed as part of the challenge of the game; it's designed to feel rewarding, with the real challenges coming when you duel friends and other human opponents (and to some extent when you battle the gym leaders or partake in other scheduled contests in Gen 3+).

All of this would spell disaster in most RPGs (and in a majority of games in general), but it works brilliantly in Pokemon.  The ridiculous ease and abusability of some of the adventure mechanics actually make it into a better game.  It all speaks to the situationality of mechanics like Healing and Save Points - any solution can be a gem or an anvil based on how well it plays with your other dynamics.

 

[bgillisp]

In my game what I've been doing is putting heal points near the start of dungeons if the party is trapped in the dungeon (that way they can always heal back to full somehow and not be stuck in a dungeon with no exit and no chance to heal), and before the end of Chapter boss (due to how difficult those battles are). My optional dungeons though have no heal points, as those are supposed to be about endurance and knowing your limits, and if you manage that well, you get some awesome equipment.

@Wavelength: You may remember playing my game...adding the healing crystal to the start of the dungeon is a change I've made since then (there's now one at the start of the sewers for instance).

 

[Eschaton]

There's nothing distinct about a Pokemon Center.  It's a healing point and a checkpoint, and these are both used commonly in many games.

If you want to consider healing points, first consider how hard you want your game to be.  Consider how many resources you want your player to manage.  Understand, that a lot of tension and suspense can be created if you leave it to the player to manage their actors' health.  If the actors are healed after combat or frequently by save points dotting the area, then that tension is mitigated; you know when the players will die and it won't be any time soon.

Heal points are also going to render useless your healing items and skills.  There are many players who would rather backtrack to a healing point or grind near one rather than "waste" their money on healing items and their MP on healing skills.

 

[whitesphere]

What Wavelength said is an excellent point to keep in mind.

How you want your game to play is the KEY determiner for how often healing spots should exist.  In Pokemon, the challenge is all about collecting every Pokemon and knowing intelligent strategies to use against other Pokemon such as "Plants are weak against Ice"

In your RPG, how do you want to challenge the player?  If your RPG gets its challenge primarily from tactical challenge in combat, then it might be perfectly reasonable to have ready access to healing points.  After all, the challenge is NOT "survive" as much as "find the right technique to win each battle." 

This is what Pokemon is doing --- the challenge is always having the right Pokemon and to use the right techniques to win.  And when you battle other human players, you get into complex meta-game strategies such as Pokemon A is immune to these arena status effects and I think my opponent will use Pokemon B which can cause them.

In a classic JRPG, I agree, Save Anywhere and Easy Ready Access to Healing would be game breakers.  That's because your classic JRPG gets its challenge from the party being at the right level, with the right equipment and surviving the dungeons.  So, the big challenge to reach most Bosses is almost always "Survive the dungeon to reach the Boss."   While the Boss battle itself is always more challenging, said Boss doesn't always require clever combat techniques.

In FFIV, for example, there are some techniques involved (i.e. don't attack Mist Dragon when it turns to Mist, have Rosa cast Wall on Asura to prevent her healing herself every round), but the main challenge is to survive to REACH said bosses.  You can see this most dramatically if you use the DS version and get a powerful Augment which turns random encounters off.  If you do this, the game suddenly becomes a LOT easier.

 

[encapturer]

When Pokemon was mentioned, I was expecting talk about the doctors/nurses that were present in the Black/White versions.  Basically, they sat in dungeon-like areas, and they would fight you like any other trainer.  After you beat them, however, they acted like a healing point, restoring your HP.  It... wasn't really needed in Pokemon, but it might find some use in other types of games as a mid-dungeon event or something.