HP stat growth alternatives

[whitesphere]

This always bothered me, to some extent.  I understand from a gameplay perspective, why we like seeing our fighter rise from, say, 400 to 6000 HP by endgame.    I could see growing from 400 to, say, 600 HP as increased durability.  And we certainly DO gain in other attributes as we train. 

Now, I can totally see an experienced Fighter gaining, say, higher innate EVAsion (better dodging blows), or even arguably higher innate DEFense (going with the blow, learning how to turn blows aside to an extent like in Aikido).  And of course ATK and MAT would rise, and maybe MDF.

But I never understood what the 5000% growth in HP meant.  What does that mean, to you?  How could even a highly experienced fighter suddenly absorb 5000% more damage, without any armor?

In essence, I'm thinking of making my next game with dramatically alternate ways of growth than straight HP growth.  So the characters become more survivable but not through drastic increases to their HP.

What approaches would work best here?  Obviously they'd find better armor and such to improve survivability, and increased DEFense and such.   In combat, the party really would need to work together and effectively to survive.

 

[EternalShadow]

What you could do is base it off armour and skills, but have the HP growth curve be very low.

 

[bgillisp]

Betrayal at Krondor did it where you *might* gain 5 HP by the end of the game (from say 42 to 47), but your armor also blocked x% of all damage taken. So instead of focusing on increasing your HP, you wanted to find better armor as it meant you could block more damage from the good weapons (especially as the good weapons could do 100+ HP to an unarmored character).

 

[Oddball]

I like this idea, because it would mean more strategic gameplay. The first thing that comes to my mind really is stats all having there own level up when you get enough experience. or maybe gaining DEF from taking/surviving physical blows, or gaining more attack EXP from taking down an enemy quickly and efficiently, or maybe from not doing enough damage?

I don't know. Maybe you could take a page out of zelda's book and have HP (and possibly other stats) grow at certain points of the game

I hope this helps. If i have any more idea's I'll post them

 

[Eschaton]

Here are some ideas:

-Finding health upgrades after defeating bosses, like on The Legend of Zelda, Metroidvania Castlevanias, or Kingdom Hearts II.

-A lot of Western RPGs increase hit points based on the score of one of your stats.

-Actors' hit points don't increase.  They stay the same amount while defense and attack become more meaningful than ever.

 

[whitesphere]

I like this idea, because it would mean more strategic gameplay. The first thing that comes to my mind really is stats all having there own level up when you get enough experience. or maybe gaining DEF from taking/surviving physical blows, or gaining more attack EXP from taking down an enemy quickly and efficiently, or maybe from not doing enough damage?

I don't know. Maybe you could take a page out of zelda's book and have HP (and possibly other stats) grow at certain points of the game

Hmmm.  I like the idea the other posters have.  A very modest HP growth curve (flat for one character, a cyborg) but armor and skills make a huge difference.  This also makes the buffs far more important --- a 25% boost to DEF, or even a short-term 50% boost to HP (say 5 turns or so) can make or break a party.

I like the idea of ATK and DEF becoming far more crucial, because a higher DEF explicitly reduces the amount of damage the Actor takes.  And it makes character's EVA far more crucial.

In battle healing becomes far more crucial, even for random encounters, let alone boss fights --- the latter of which will basically require buffs to survive.

 

[bgillisp]

I like this idea, because it would mean more strategic gameplay. The first thing that comes to my mind really is stats all having there own level up when you get enough experience. or maybe gaining DEF from taking/surviving physical blows, or gaining more attack EXP from taking down an enemy quickly and efficiently, or maybe from not doing enough damage?

I don't know. Maybe you could take a page out of zelda's book and have HP (and possibly other stats) grow at certain points of the game

I hope this helps. If i have any more idea's I'll post them

FF2 tried this, and it did lead to players fighting themselves to grind stats. Now, I know in RPGMaker we can't attack ourselves (without a script that is) so that won't be a problem, but you will have to deal with the players who decide to just guard 100 turns against a rat to buff up that DEF stat to insane levels.

 

[omen613]

I can see evasion, accuracy, and maybe even defense increase as a person becomes a more experienced fighter. 

but HP...even attack seem super human.

equally leveled opponents shouldn't have trouble landing a hit on each other.

but pitting a novice against an expert....its gonna be child's play..."try and hit me boy! "<whiff> <whiff> "Ahahaha"

small but gradual increases in Evasion, Acc, and Def could be a good away to show growth.

Level 1 Hero and Monster

• accuracy = 100
• evasion = 0

Level 10 Hero and Monster

• Accuracy = 125
• Evasion = 25

so you only see a difference in results when fighting someone who is a much different level than yourself.

 

[whitesphere]

I agree the stats wouldn't change night and day, but I think armor and weapons WOULD make the biggest difference.   There's a reason people use them after all. 

An expert vs a novice in gameplay terms would probably mean the expert has, effectively a much higher ATK.  ATK represents how much damage you can do with a weapon.  If I had a sword, I'd do a lot less damage than a master swordsman with the same sword, because I'm not skilled with one.

As for DEF, I think the expert would have an effectively much higher DEF, because he'd know how to turn aside blows and reduce the damage taken.  By "much higher" I agree it shouldn't be 600% or something silly, maybe 50% is more than sufficient.

I'm sure it'll take a lot of tweaking to make it work right in battle.

 

[Kes]

There is a similar case to be made for some HP gain. Another difference between the novice and the expert is that the expert has built up a larger, more dense body mass with the constant exercise of fighting (and walking /climbing that the average rpg requires). So would be able to absorb more damage than a weedy beginner. That larger body mass translates out as more HP - not, imo, the 1000s that one sometimes sees, but a modest increase is justifiable I believe.

 

[Oddball]

FF2 tried this, and it did lead to players fighting themselves to grind stats. Now, I know in RPGMaker we can't attack ourselves (without a script that is) so that won't be a problem, but you will have to deal with the players who decide to just guard 100 turns against a rat to buff up that DEF stat to insane levels.

good point. Although I wasn't thinking about Gaurd. You could also go the other way with it too (which would make more sense now that i think about it) were the MORE damage the player takes, the more there defense EXP increases. Also, you could put a cap on it for each level the charecter is at

 

[Scott_C]

HP isn't just pure durability, it's your character overall ability to survive taking damage.

So a 1000% increase in HP doesn't necessarily mean your character is now stronger than steel, but that he has learned how to better protect his vital organs, roll with blows, maintain consciousness even when severely wounded and so on.

So a high level fighter can survive a fireball even without armor because he's learned to close his eyes to avoid blindness and hold his breath to avoid inhaling superheated gases. He has also learned that jumping away from the fireball gives him the highest chance of getting away with a couple large burns to his back instead of getting crippling burns to his hands and face. A rookie doesn't know any of that and will probably wind up dead even when wearing armor.

In a lot of ways I think HP growth is a tradition from Dungeons and Dragons where there was no DEF stat to lower incoming damage (armor made you harder to hit, not resistant to damage). Raising your HP was the only way to represent that your character was learning how to take a hit.

Of course, in RPG Maker we do have a DEF stat to represent skill at taking damage so it can seem strange to also have an HP stat that represents skill at taking damage. I can definitely see the logic in a game where HP is more or less static and raising defense is the main way to survive longer.

Such a system wouldn't even require strange rules to build. You'd just have to set the HP curve very low (or to zero) and then lower the effectiveness of the game's default monster attacks. If your heroes only have 500 hit points for the whole game you need to make sure that level appropriate monsters only do 50-200 points of damage per attack, and you would want this range to stay constant throughout the game. This is a big change from the default game where growing HP means that level appropriate monsters are expected to do more damage as the game goes on.

So basically getting rid of HP growth would just mean a lot more time carefully comparing the player's expected DEF from levels and armor against the expected attack score of the monsters in the next dungeon. Might have to adjust attack formulas to have slightly lower base attack values and multipliers too. An attack like Spark II that does 500 points of base damage is obviously going to be overkill if the heroes never get high HP.

 

[Wavelength]

Scott C's explanation is very good, but personally, I actually like to think of HP as exactly what you said it is - your ability to stay alive after taking X and Y damage.  If you look at a 150-damage hit as a sword through the torso, then a 200HP character is going to die from a couple of those hits, whereas a 2500HP character is going to survive ten of those seemingly fatal hits because s/he's just that awesome after all the hard work spent leveling.  It's overly simplistic, it's completely unrealistic, and I love it.

In several games I've made, though, where stat progression doesn't follow the normal rules, I have a tendency to permanently fix all characters' (and human enemies') Health at 100 and represent it as the percentage of their current health.  Their DEF/MDF stats can be used to add endurance.  This usually requires playing with the formulae to prevent curb-stomp battles, but it allows for deep, strategic battles and also makes the idea of Health (and low health!) much easier to conceptualize for the player, I think.