Should enemy attack damage scale down with hit point reduction?

[CPA]

While I've played games for ages, only recently I've been asking "why don't enemy's attack damage scale down as the enemy is injured?" IRL, if I'm badly wounded, chances are my strength and agility would be significantly diminished resulting in less powerful and damaging blows. In games, however, there is generally no correlation. This is most likely due to the notion of keeping the "fun" factor alive during battle.

I think a more interesting approach would be to have enemies start with a greater amount of hit points but as they become wounded their attack damage diminishes. I think a programmer could work this in such a way that the end result of damage delivered by an enemy by its life's end would be similar to current standards, but the progression during the fight would be more "realistic".

It may also change strategies. Most of the time, in a group of enemies, I beat down one until it is dead, knowing that if I don't, I will continue to receive the same amount of damage from that minion. However, if that enemy's attack damage decreased, I may let the wounded live for now and fight off a separate enemy that has now become more dangerous.

Thoughts?

 

[mundane]

I've seen such a system in pen-and-paper RPGs, and in some wargames. I doubt a programmatic reason is keeping it from mainstream titles, but rather as you suggest for the end-user experience.

 

[ikachu]

I think this could be an interesting mechanic for fighting bunches of weaker enemies. For boss fights I think it could be anticlimactic... generally you want a boss to get stronger and stronger as the fight goes on to heighten tension.

Of course, you could apply the same mechanic to the player so that long fights end up with two weakened dudes drunkenly trading ineffective attacks...

 

[maniacalpha1-1]

If this mechanic was implemented for enemies, it'd be considered for players too.

 

[CPA]

I think this could be an interesting mechanic for fighting bunches of weaker enemies. For boss fights I think it could be anticlimactic... generally you want a boss to get stronger and stronger as the fight goes on to heighten tension.

Of course, you could apply the same mechanic to the player so that long fights end up with two weakened dudes drunkenly trading ineffective attacks...

I could definitely see an exception for bosses using the rationale that bosses fight or flight, and adrenaline kick in. But, skeleton minions or henchmen?

 

[DaveSimmons]

Some games do have fatigue separate from wounding, where a hit can reduce your action points.

Some games have status effects like BLEEDING.

Some games have the player's vision start to become erratic at low health. For opponents this might be modeled by decreasing their accuracy.

For modern / future games I'm not sure DPS reduction makes sense after wounding. If you are burst-firing a SMG the number of bullets fired is not reduced by you or the henchman taking a hit, nor is the force of the bullet reduced.

 

[Ancalagon44]

Some games actually have the opposite effect, where a character does more damage when wounded, due to desperation.

Personally this would irritate the hell out of me. Start getting wounded and you become weaker and less able to fight back. You'll die a lot quicker.

 

[rivethead]

Good concept. I like it. Like you, I flail away on one minion until he's eliminated...then on to the next. You idea would open up more tactical choice during battles:

My turn, do I:

1) Heal myself so that my attack is back up to "100%", or
2) Attack minion 1 who is at 10% health doing 10% damage, or
3) Attack minion 2 who is at 80% health doing 80% damage, or
4) Attack minion 3 who is at 100% health doing 100% damage, or
5) Run like hell

I like choice!

 

[TheSlamma]

Yes.. do you know how many times the "sliver of life" has killed me over the last 35 years?

 

[CPA]

Some games do have fatigue separate from wounding, where a hit can reduce your action points.

Some games have status effects like BLEEDING.

Some games have the player's vision start to become erratic at low health. For opponents this might be modeled by decreasing their accuracy.

For modern / future games I'm not sure DPS reduction makes sense after wounding. If you are burst-firing a SMG the number of bullets fired is not reduced by you or the henchman taking a hit, nor is the force of the bullet reduced.

I believe there are a few turn-based games that use fatigue, but most games use weapon durability as the only attack modifier. Durability is a fine modifier, though irritating at times, but it's only half the equation.

As for BLEEDING, that is more of a hit point reduction accelerator than an attack modifier. Same with POISON. Now, WEAKNESS can modify attack damage but that is usually from a spell. No mage, you're out of luck.

You may make a point with guns, but I would then argue that accuracy should suffer proportionate to hit point reduction. But, yes, a bullet from a wounded enemy does as much damage as a bullet from a fully healed enemy.

 

[SunnyD]

Given there's been games with skillsets/class choices where when YOUR character gets injured, he does more damage (aka: The Berserker's Rage effect), seems legit.

 

[MustISO]

I've thought about this since I started playing games. While I don't expect games to be realistic or make sense I always thought it weird that as an enemies life (or mine) decreased their power never did.

Or how about enemies wearing cloth with as much damage reduction as enemies in full armor. Seems like the enemies without significant armor would go down easier but in my experience that doesn't seem to matter.

 

[PrincessFrosty]

People tend to think in linear measurements and so damage and health is done as a linear measurement, non-linear measurements are notoriously difficult to keep track of and predict accurately.

Games over the years have emulated decreased output damage though, just not always quite as you framed it. For example the fallout games you could target specific limbs and cripple them which would often result in an inability to use certain attacks or enemies would drop their weapons. I believe in the older FPS game called Sin you could shoot people in their hands and they'd drop their weapon.

It's hard to tell visually how much damage an injured enemy would do, I'm more for slowing their movement, have them limping about unable to engage you as effectively and making them more of a sitting target, that way the decreased threat of the enemy is much more visible to the player.

 

[Gryz]

It would make combat in games more realistic.

However, it would also make combat in games less fun.

With a system as you describe, it's all about who gets in the first blow. As soon as one of the 2 combatants is injured, he is at a disadvantage. When the disadvantage gets bigger, the odds of him ever winning will be zero. That does not cause excitement. Once you get in a few hits, the fight is basically over. You just have to continue for a few more second, or dozens of seconds. But the thrill will be gone.

A similar question often comes up about NPC AI. "Why can't they make AI that's even better than it is today ?" Well, they can. It's easy to make NPC AI that has perfect aim, perfect dodging, perfect movement. It's just not fun to play against such AI. The challenge is to make NPC AI that behaves like a human. Makes the same mistakes. Is sometimes unpredictable. Is never perfect. That's a lot harder. This is another example where realism and fun in gameplay are opposites.

 

[Ancalagon44]

It would make combat in games more realistic.

However, it would also make combat in games less fun.

With a system as you describe, it's all about who gets in the first blow. As soon as one of the 2 combatants is injured, he is at a disadvantage. When the disadvantage gets bigger, the odds of him ever winning will be zero. That does not cause excitement. Once you get in a few hits, the fight is basically over. You just have to continue for a few more second, or dozens of seconds. But the thrill will be gone.

A similar question often comes up about NPC AI. "Why can't they make AI that's even better than it is today ?" Well, they can. It's easy to make NPC AI that has perfect aim, perfect dodging, perfect movement. It's just not fun to play against such AI. The challenge is to make NPC AI that behaves like a human. Makes the same mistakes. Is sometimes unpredictable. Is never perfect. That's a lot harder. This is another example where realism and fun in gameplay are opposites.

Theoretically it is more realistic to have flawed opponents who make mistake than perfect opponents who never screw up.

Unless you are fighting against robots perhaps.

I suppose realism is having your enemy behave in a way consistent who what that enemy is supposed to represent.

 

[Dannar26]

Has anyone played the banner saga?

One good hit on your high dps/low armor units, and they were rendered useless.

It's an interesting play mechanic, and one that annoys you to no end while you play. And given that the player and computer go back and forth for turns, it makes more sense to leave enemies alive but weakened so they soak up turns.

 

[QueBert]

Given there's been games with skillsets/class choices where when YOUR character gets injured, he does more damage (aka: The Berserker's Rage effect), seems legit.

Always use to work for Hulk Hogan.


Shake of his clenching fist as he was close to certain doom. Then he got up and whoever he was wrestling was in UH OH trouble

 

[shortylickens]

In Deus Ex your aim gets messed up with arm damage.
You slow down with leg damage.

 

[DigDog]

i have attacked this issue back in my years as gamemaster and designer;

i had to get to the root of "hit points",as they are not indication of physical damage, but rather a metaphysical score that, once is gone, means you get injured.

so i re-designed everything from scratch, with a different hit point system that meant, during combat, how much your focus allowed you to dodge attacks, once exausted, you got hit and took Injury Points. so essentially two different scores.

Also, your hit points regenerated partially after every successful encounter.

this system made players more powerful, but also more susceptible to traps and other situations where you could be damaged right to your IP.

it was better, but unwieldy. my players were very experienced and loved it, but by the time we were competent enough to use realistic simulations, we had drifted into more story-oriented games, such as CoC, and the simulation wasn't needed anymore.

 

[pontifex]

Some games do have fatigue separate from wounding, where a hit can reduce your action points.

Some games have status effects like BLEEDING.

Some games have the player's vision start to become erratic at low health. For opponents this might be modeled by decreasing their accuracy.

For modern / future games I'm not sure DPS reduction makes sense after wounding. If you are burst-firing a SMG the number of bullets fired is not reduced by you or the henchman taking a hit, nor is the force of the bullet reduced.

accuracy would be reduced so you'd get hit less often.