Feedback: The 100HP/Armor/Armor Penetration system vs. Progression

Tiy's latest update indicates this thread will soon be obsolete! Beta'd! Thanks for your thoughts, everybody.

Greetings, devs (hopefully!) and fellow Starbound players! This is a fairly lengthy post, because it's not a simple topic and I want to try and hit all of the angles.

I wanted to take the time to relay my thoughts about the current 'Base 100' health system most monsters and the player utilize. I haven't played through all available content at time of writing, but the following at least applies to most things I've fought up through a level 20 planet.

Note, I acknowledge that the current system is functional. What I'd like to see has very little to do with the mechanics of how many hits it takes to kill something; this is mostly about how the system feels to me as a player, as I believe the way a mechanic feels is every bit as important as what it does.

The main point: the "(almost) Everything has 100 HP but different amounts of armor" system, while functional, is not satisfying to me as a player. My hope is eventually we'll make it to a more traditional system of "Low damage/HP at low levels that ramps up over the course of the game". The reason I want a traditional approach to damage/health is because it would allow the game to provide me with visual, gamplay feedback (not just a UI thing) that represents not just how strong I am relative to what I'm fighting right then and there, but how strong I've become relative to myself over time. This is progression in its most basic form.

Note, I'm not asking for absurd scaling that ramps up into 5 or even 4 digit numbers!

Contrary to that, the current 'Base-100' system is unsatisfying because I don't feel like I'm progressing or becoming stronger when I become ready to take on a higher level planet. Because of the nature of the procedurally generated monster system, nothing about a monster on a level 20 planet tells me it's stronger than the ones I saw on my starter planet. Instead, MY damage and survivability appears to go down. I'm robbed of the character power I just spent time accumulating.

While Armor/damage reduction can and should be A Thing™, I'd rather see the main indicator of a monster's vitality be the number of hit points it has. This way, as my character (and the enemy) becomes incrementally more powerful, I am presented with clear, visual, intuitive indications of it. I've heard, "But I know exactly what percentage of a monster's HP I've removed in one attack" but how valuable is that, exactly? And because of the Armor Penetration vs. Base Damage vs Monster Armor system, this actually gives you LESS information about how you stack up against a foe as the enemy values are invisible and everything is based on them. The 'traditional' way allows you to know about how much damage you'll do (I.E, the Damage rating on a sword is its actual damage) and you can weigh that against the enemy's HP (which should be displayed) BEFORE you actually smack it, but Starbound takes whatever a 13 Armor Penetration/18 Damage Sword does, sends it through an invisible damage algorithm to calculate it against an enemy's invisible values, then spits out the same numbers you've seen for 20 levels.

Note that although ever-increasing damage is a simple and common (for a reason) way of doing this, I'm absolutely open to other systems as long as I can feel like I'm progressing. Currently, as a player, I recieve no visible or visceral feedback for "Oh, wow! I totally just ignored 22 points of that enemy's armor!"The sense of progression and increased power is just not there.

To clarify what I'm asking for: I'd like gameplay feedback to reflect my character's power relative not just to the current monsters, but even to itself over time. An existing example of this that Starbound itself does well is mining speed. Doesn't it feel awesome to chew through dirt and sand extra fast when you finally find enough gold for that upgraded pick? Imagine that instead, as planet level goes up, so does the toughness of all material on the planet, slowing your mining speed back down. That's similar in principle to the tug-of-war currently taking place within the combat system. However, because it DOESN'T happen to the mining system, upgrades to your pick feel powerful, permanent, and measurable over the course of the game and its various material hardnesses. In the process of becoming more effective at mining Magmastone, I'll eventually 'one-shot' dirt and sand.

Thoughts?

EDIT: Edited heavily for clarity. I've made a number of responses throughout the thread that express my thoughts more clearly than the original post did, so I've gone back and incoprorated those, as reading the whole thread is not really a thing.

 

I prefer the current system. It provide concise, obvious feedback about how you stack up against what you're fighting.
Whereas with ever-increasing amounts of damage and health I find that the numbers become meaningless, not to mention cluttered as they approach five digits or more.

 

Levelups.

As far as I have put it together, there is no REAL armor system. Every (almost) enemy has 100 hp and a Level. Player has 100 hp, Defence level and Weapon level. The interaction between enemy level and player def/armor penetration (horribly misguided name btw) results in combat outcome. The progression weapons-wise is based in that later weapons have more base-damage, giving better results with same-level hostiles. Differences in the levels result in weapons 1-hitting lower-level mobs and player getting insta-gibbed by higher ones.

And as said - there is no armor 'reduction'. At 1-1 ratio both sides receive base damage, whatever it might be.

As to OP - it seems the problem is in wanting big numbers. You can insta-kill ANYTHING on those low-level planets. Why does it bother what number it shows? Dead is dead. Progression? "Hey! Remember how you insta-gibbed me two hours ago? Well guess what!"

ALSO: More HP is false difficulty, simply making it more tedious to kill enemies. Making mobs increasingly harder with better AI, abilities and change in hostile/docile ratio, behavior are far, far better. (Better AI as in Tier 1 having 'dumb' solo mobs, where in Tier 10/insertnumberhere you would face intelligent packs working together.)

Thoughts?

 

Terraria didn't have this problem.

 

Honestly, in terarria you kill so many things so fast that you might as well turn the damage numbers off altogether once you get to a certain point.

 

I simple find it a little dull that everything has 100 HP. It's not going up to an enemy and wondering "I wonder how tanky this thing is?" instead it's just "I wonder what level it is?". By basing an enemy's strength entirely upon its level, you can't have glass cannon enemies or steamrollers who do very little damage. Everything is just generic and… dull. Like the above says, Terraria didn't have this problem. Enemies had widely varying HP/damage/armour and I think that was great.

Also I think that representing anything in sandbox games as levels is dumb.

 

Half correct; I want both smaller and bigger numbers, and the all important "why it bothers" is described at length in the original post (In short, a more traditional damage system allows me to feel like I've kept the power I've earned as the challenge increases. The existing system actually removes power when challenge increases). Numbers should be much lower early in the game and higher later on.

The gameplay these two systems create is very similar -- I acknowledge in my first post that the current system is functional. This is about feel. A level 15 weapon will destroy level 1 mobs and work well against level 15 mobs whether or not the weapon's power is represented with armor penetration or with a higher number for its damage; the difference is that I want to have an incremental, increasing indication of how powerful my character has become (The latter 'larger number' method) rather than the static/relative implementation that exists now.

Thank you for sharing your thoughts!

EDIT: Clarity

 

Enemies can still be tanky or fragile, just vary the armor on them. You would know you're fighting a tank when your sword does 6 damage.

 

Absolutely. The current system is functional, as I acknowledge in the original post. However, this is about the way the current system FEELS to me as the player. Ever-increasing amounts of damage (which have absolutely no need to approach 5 digits, I'd agree) allow the game to provide me with visual feedback that represents not just how strong I am relative to what I'm fighting right then and there, but how strong I've become relative to myself over time. This is progression in its most basic form.

Does this help clarify why I think the ever-increasing numbers system is better for a sense of progression in a character's power level? Thanks for sharing your thoughts!

EDIT: Clarity.

 

Well I don't want to sound offensive, but is you seek a magical number that will show everyone how close you are to goodhood, this isn't the right game.
That indication here is the equipment you use, the danger you can face and walk away whistling.

Tank-ness and fragility can be easily deployed with monster abilities. One having lack of attacks and loaded with defense-boosts, another being super-agile heavy hitter that has no defenses whatsoever. The defense boosts make harder to kill the first, while it can't dish out much damage itself (tank); the other is hard to catch, but once you do it's dead meat (glass cannon).

 

Not sure which way to lean on this issue myself. Moving up to a higher level planet is a significant change in capabilities (especially in the early Tiers it seems; but the upcoming patch may change things). Part of it is a visual thing; as the OP indicated we are only seeing the damage applied via the floating red numbers, not the amount of damage mitigated/absorbed. Of course screen clutter is something I am not too fond of, so I am not sure we should suggest additional number float bloat.

However as I assume there will still be good reasons to visit lower-level planets (unless higher-level ores/materials only appear on higher level planets) one's advancement will be quite clear when you stumble upon another Level 1 planet after having hopped around for a while.

 

I agree that enemys should get more health
Its more satisfying and only becomes tedious if your trying to fight a 30 armor rating 500 health golem with your 15 armor penetration 20 damage sword
its your own fault for bringing a bad sword
and its a GOLEM
its supposed to be tough to take done
and its not like its going to be in large quantities
In no way would combat become tedious
because enemys with high hp would be uncommon
or in packs that you find every few minute
while normal enemys that will swarm you will have low hp like 80

 

No offense taken. However, it seems you've completely missed my point. This is likely because of my wording, so can you explain why I gave you that impression so that I can correct it?

To frame the discussion in the context of your own example ("That indication here is the equipment you use, the danger you can face and walk away whistling") the system I'm proposing wouldn't change that. In fact, what about the current system's higher level monsters even tells you that they're more dangerous? It's still a number, right (the monster/planet's level)? The difference here is that with the system I'm proposing, the numbers that show power are those shown by the gameplay, not the UI. This is more satisfying because now I can measure my progress as a character of increasing power, and not SOLELY my progress relative to the current planet level. Does that wording make more sense?

Thank you for sharing your thoughts!

EDIT: Clarity. I'm bad at nailing my thoughts on the first try.

 

The base 100 system just wireds me out a bit... the fact a glass cannon and a tank both take 100 damage to kill but one just requires more swings is the exact same as the whole ever increasing damage in the end. Just you don't feel stronger fighting the tank its a problem of you feel strong fighting the glass cannon and weak vs the tank. While on the flip with the normal system you would feel just as strong with both one just takes longer.

Both system achieve the same exact thing in combat and allow for the exact same ai patterns and mob differences to achieve true difficulty while the base 100 system just has the singular flaw of making you feel weak in one case. Saying the system is fine cause you can just make mobs "Have real difficulty via ai" is flawed as you should do that in either case.

The base 100 system i would say is just less "average joe" friendly never design a mathematically better system at the cost of losing visual feed back. And that is really what is happening here. We are trading visual feedback for a mathematically simpler system. intuitiveness should never be compromised when designing a front end system.

Quick Edit - Just to clear something up cause i feel i may have not been concise on this. I do like the new system but i feel you should never make a system simpler for the sake of simplicity. If a more complex system can be understood organically as the player plays your game then it doesn't matter how complex it is they will learn it naturally as they play. While if the simplified system requires ANY ( and i mean any at all) form of explaining to be understood IF the complex one doesn't then the act of simplifying it has inherently made the system worse.

 

True, but we already hit this threshhold on the level 1 planet. The first craftable, level-5 swords are already capable of nailing the daytime level 1 enemies for 100 damage. When I go back with my amazing level 72 sword, I'm -still- only going to be hitting them for 100 damage. How much stronger am I, exactly?

 

Sure, this game has RPG elements, but at it's core, it isn't an RPG, so I don't feel the need to dish damage in higher numbers to prove my progression. You don't need to judge your strength level through lowbie monsters; why would you want to do that? Judge your ability at higher-level planets. Numbers aren't everything.

 

Well, I can agree on the fact that always sitting in the 'sweet spot' will result in facing enemies you can handle in relatively same amount time across the game. What I also agree is that it is satisfying to watch my character become ever-more powerful. But I also believe (know it actually) that becoming better as a Player is a satisfying thing in progression-based games.

To change the base 100 system (and I am no dev or even real coder FYI) would probably mean changing more than a few of the games inner workings. We have waited two years for this. Do you want to wait two more because the system "doesn't have gameplay progression". Well this is what, 3rd day since the game is here? This beta is, for one, to enable such concerns to be heard before it's shipped as a final product.
I am forced (by my sanity) to admit that progression can feel slow/nonexistent. We have 3 of the 10 Tiers open and even those are half-baked. I agree that core problems must be rooted out before they get buried beneath layers of code, but answer this. Do you taste a cherry and decide that the entire cherry pie will be just like it?

P.S. Yes, I'm hungry.

P.P.S. Putting the right words out in first try is a lacking skill for me as well.

 

Numbers indeed aren't everything, but quick concise feed back of progression should be. A better stat page or better names would solve the problem bitspolsion is having. Everyone here is arguing the completely wrong point against him. Then again he isn't being very clear of what he wants but that appears to be more cause he "knows" what he wants just not how it should be done. He wants obvious clear and concise visual feed back of time commitment to gaining power. In the old system case ever increasing numbers.

If we changed the name of armor penetration to "Power" this would solve a LOT of the issues merely cause it will be obvious in the stat screen that 5 power is better then 1 power. It's a clear meaning that shows you are getting stronger. While the damage wouldn't make sense right off the bat still this can be fixed by adding a tool tip on mouse over to the "power" stat stating "Your damage is power vs enemy's level" Thus showing the player that even with a higher power you will do less damage to higher level mobs, since to my understanding level = defense in the new system.

The problem is solved just like that you now have clear reasons why everything works as it does while the players have quick obvious access to the information with out having to have someone else explain it to them. From there Just make damage obvious based on level of the mob and what they look like. Allows for the new system to shiny great.

There are flaws with my solution i am sure but at least it is a good step to what needs to happen. Then again this may all be planed and we are all wasting our breath.

 

Well said! To clarify what I'm asking for: I'd like gameplay feedback to reflect my character's power relative not just to the current monsters, but even to itself over time. An existing example of this is mining speed. Doesn't it feel awesome to chew through dirt and sand extra fast when you finally find enough gold for that upgraded pick? Imagine now that as planet level goes up, so does the toughness of all material on the planet, slowing your mining speed back down. That's similar in principle to the tug-of-war currently taking place within the combat system. However, because it DOESN'T happen to the mining system, upgrades to your pick feel powerful, permanent, and measurable over the course of the game and its various material hardnesses. In the process of becoming more effective at mining Magmastone, I'll eventually 'one-shot' dirt and sand.

I believe the current numbers that increase to show power/difficulty, namely Armor Penetration and Monster Level, fail to provide the "power level relative to my character over time" in a satisfying way. While gradually doing more damage over the course of the game (what I've been asking for) is a tried-and-true way to do this, I'm absolutely open to others.

 

Amen. I agree with you 100%.