Skills that cost HP - thoughts?

[esterk]

Hey everyone,

I was curious as to how everyone feels about games that features skills that cost HP. This is found in numerous RPGs like the Shin Megami Tensei and Persona series (which both have physical type skills cost HP to use). I was thinking of using it as a game mechanic but want to see what some thoughts on it are, as it can be a divisive choice sometimes, adn I know some players that really downplay using these types of skills altogether because of it.

What do you all think about it?

 

[Trihan]

It introduces an interesting alternative choice to the player. In terms of abilities which cost a specific secondary resource, like mana, energy, focus, whatever you want to call it, the only decision the player needs to make is "do I have enough of this secondary resource that the cost of using the ability will leave me with enough to use it again if I need to, or would using an amount of it right now that would leave me with less than it costs be worth it in terms of winning this battle?"

When you give an ability an HP cost, what you're really doing is transforming the decision: consider that your average RPG battle is a numbers game: you're trying to reduce the numbers your enemies have before they can reduce yours, and all of your abilities either reduce your enemy's numbers faster or make the enemy's reduction of yours slower. When you use an ability that costs HP, you need to weigh up whether the ability is going to help you reduce your opponent's numbers faster than you've reduced your own by using the ability in the first place. You're essentially giving the enemy a free attack on the character that uses the ability.

Personally I think it's a good idea to have some skills that have an HP cost, especially if they work with the flavour of the skill e.g. blood magic etc., something where it makes sense for the user to give some of their own life force to power their abilities. You just have to make sure they're actually worth using, or like you said players just won't use them.

 

[Alastor01]

Yep, absolutely cool mechanic. Then again I loved Persona 3 and 4!
It is thought provoking, when you want to use an awesome physical skill to finish off your enemies with a style, which takes a huge chunk of your own life. You have one turn to end a battle - will you deal enough damage having barely enough HP in the end or will you die cause of miscalculation on your part?
Having mental and physical points to use skills is nice. In Persona games, when you character runs out of MP, you can still use his own skills which require HP It adds not only more depth to battle but also makes your characters more usable when they have no MP.

 

[Uzuki]

I think they're great, but they require a lot more work to balance. Hope you don't mind if I throw my few cents in.

Implant quick recovery options for after battles. If it's too much of an hassle to go through menus to heal after battles, then players are less likely to use or rely on these skills. Some game balance this by recovering a percentage of health after battles either by default or through equipment. If I know that HP, a very important resource to keep maintain, is going to be replenished after battles, then I'm more likely to use them rather then ignore. I would recommend mapping a button to a common event that opens up the item menu just for QoL purposes and to encourage skill and item usage.

Another way of handling HP skills is using Second Layer HP Armour mechanics (I don't know if it has an actual name). Persona Q did a great job with this with having Sub-personas. Your maximum HP would increase by the Sub-persona's max HP and after battles, you would recover HP equal to the Sub-Persona's HP. For example: Say a character's max HP is 800 and their current equipped Sub-Persona's max HP is 400. Now the Max HP for the character is 1200 and they can lose up to 400 HP before dipping into their own HP reserves. And knowing that the character will regain 400 HP after every battle, the player has a lot more room to strategize on whether they want to conserve that 400HP stock for armour, use HP attacks to inflict heavy damage/status ailments, or just go crazy with skills. If the player feels like they have multiple options to choose from, then this will make battles feel more challenging and engaging.

 

[esterk]

Thanks for the replies so far, there are some really great insights being brought up here!

@Trihan - Yeah I think the hardest part about implementing the system is making it worthwhile, since like you pointed out most battles are a 'race' to get HP to 0 (typically), and you are speeding up your proverbial clock by using a skill that takes that down. I think the hardest part of balancing it is probably in boss fights, where things can be more drawn out and you will probably be taking more damage per turn.

@Alastor01 - That's what I like about it as well. When I first played SMT games I hated it but as I got accustomed to it, it became more risk/reward, especially because typically Phys attacks end up being some of the more potent moves in those games. And also, since those games usually have a heavy emphasis on MP conservation (especially Persona 5), it's nice to have another resource to dip into, at a cost.

@Uzuki - That's a really interesting mechanic. I didn't player Persona Q so I was not aware of that, but yeah it does definitely give you a 'safety net' so you can weigh your options a bit better. It also probably makes it so that if you are fighting low level enemies, you can use more powerful attacks without having to worry about your resources, which is always nice if you need to grind or try to farm items drops, etc.

 

[SOC]

As long as it feels appropriately rewarding and you can efficiently replace it while allowing for clever risk, it's a great mechanic. Like Dark Knights who consume their HP for more damage but then restore it with some life steal for example, it's really fun. But I think when you just expect external healing like making your healer focus more on that character, it's not as fun or engaging.

 

[Kes]

I have a couple of skills in my current project which use HP. I have set them so that a critical hit will restore some HP. This will, I think, increase the players' incentive to use these skills.

 

[LaFlibuste]

All I can really say is as a player I've always avoided these kind of skills when they were optional in a game and more often than not avoided games when these skills were not optional. But maybe it's just me, who knows.

 

[esterk]

All I can really say is as a player I've always avoided these kind of skills when they were optional in a game and more often than not avoided games when these skills were not optional. But maybe it's just me, who knows.

if you don't mind me asking, why do you dislike it?

 

[LaFlibuste]

I don't know, I've never really liked it. I have something of a "less is more" philosophy playing games, I guess, and spending life points for skills seems counter intuitive. I already hoard my skills and MPs as is, so imagine HPs!... It feels like spending something that's way too precious for effects that are generally just not worth it imo.

 

[mauvebutterfly]

Something to watch out for with this system is how it will affect your healer (if you have one.) If your more powerful abilities have an hp cost, the healer may end up being stuck doing heals every turn so that the other characters can keep using their hp abilities. In essence, hp costs allow the healer to become a communal party-wide mana pool that everyone draws from.

On the other hand, hp cost skills in a game that doesn't have a healer probably won't ever be used, unless they are so overpowered that using them is the obvious best strategy. Even if the game is cleverly balanced and hp skills are viable without a healer, most people will end up just ignoring the skills anyway since it doesn't feel good to be damaging your own characters.

 

[esterk]

I don't know, I've never really liked it. I have something of a "less is more" philosophy playing games, I guess, and spending life points for skills seems counter intuitive. I already hoard my skills and MPs as is, so imagine HPs!... It feels like spending something that's way too precious for effects that are generally just not worth it imo.

Makes sense, obviously HP is the most important resource you have, so spending it can definitely seem counter-intuitive. I'm the same way when it comes to hoarding, so I understand where you're coming from.

@mauvebutterfly Yeah good points. Without a healer, you have to fall back on items, and I think there is a mentality in games to use items sparingly. Plus as was pointed out earlier in the thread, having to keep going to the item menu to use healing items can be a hassle.

Good point on the healer as well. I think that having a healer that literally just heals over and over can get boring, so I'll have to take that into account.

 

[Redeye]

If you're gonna give a character HP-costing abilities, you should consider giving your character a method of restoring their lost HP without the need of a Healer or items, like a Vampirism spell or something like that. If you don't do that, you may run at the risk of making those skills too risky to use at all, which would render them obsolete to some players.

I have a rather masochistic character who does various things like inheriting the Status Ailments of her allies in order to cure them, and spending HP in order to perform powerful attacks. To make her more worthwhile, though, I gave her one or two sustain abilities so that she could become more independent.

 

[Lonewulf123]

It depends on how it’s balanced. I really like how SMT and Persona handles it, which are some examples that were stated above.

If you're gonna give a character HP-costing abilities, you should consider giving your character a method of restoring their lost HP without the need of a Healer or items, like a Vampirism spell or something like that. If you don't do that, you may run at the risk of making those skills too risky to use at all, which would render them obsolete to some players.

I have a rather masochistic character who does various things like inheriting the Status Ailments of her allies in order to cure them, and spending HP in order to perform powerful attacks. To make her more worthwhile, though, I gave her one or two sustain abilities so that she could become more independent.

I really like this approach. Give the character some ways to sustain.

 

[Wavelength]

I voted 'No', even though there are rare times it can be a useful design tool. These times are usually when the HP cost is used in conjunction with other costs, and often deal with percentage-of-current-HP costs rather than absolute HP costs.

I generally encourage people to have four or more types of "points" in their battle system. Hit Points are almost always one, Mana Points are a common second one - from there, you often need to get more creative. One reason it's nice to have several different types of points is that it creates incomparables (things whose value cannot be directly compared against each other), which fosters interesting decisions within battle. Should I use 30 MP in order to wipe out the enemies quicker, which will save me about 75 HP in damage? Will I need that MP later? If there's also an SP resource, should I spend that instead and conserve my MP? How does it affect my decision that one can be restored with expensive items, whereas the other is only restored over time in combat? Which one can I afford to spend?

Another reason it's nice is that it creates a wider set of outcomes - I survived the battle, but I spent a lot of MP to do it, because I was underleveled. I survived the battle, but I needed to use items because I made a mistake or two. Or maybe I crushed the battle, and barely lost any HP, and I can feel good about that.

One of the big problems with using HP as a cost for skills, especially when it's the only cost, is that it removes several of these nice design levers from your battle system. It reduces the set of possible outcomes, it doesn't allow for interesting incomparables, and it actually narrows the target that you need to hit as a game designer when you're balancing your battles (because the resource used for survival is now the same one you use to accomplish your goals).

For these reasons, I usually advise people to avoid using HP costs on ordinary skills. For special skills that, by design, will only be used infrequently, you can go ahead and add HP costs to them without worrying too much if you think that the HP cost will add something to the skill.

I love Persona, and I think the series' battle system is quite nice, but that doesn't mean that every mechanic in the game is a good one.