Should health bars be added to the game

[Cruvimaster]

I use the "Epic Healthbar" mod (only for giants) and I don't use it out of necessity, as I know the life and signs that Klei leaves for all giants.

I use it because it's fun to see the life drain from the giants during combat.

It would be nice if Klei brought something native to the game with the option to disable it in the game settings.

As for regular monsters, I think it pollutes the screen a lot, especially dozens of bees, frogs, monkeys...

[Swiyss]

But guys, health bar would ruin close calls.

[Mike23Ua]

3 hours ago, Cruvimaster said:

I use the "Epic Healthbar" mod (only for giants) and I don't use it out of necessity, as I know the life and signs that Klei leaves for all giants.

I use it because it's fun to see the life drain from the giants during combat.

It would be nice if Klei brought something native to the game with the option to disable it in the game settings.

As for regular monsters, I think it pollutes the screen a lot, especially dozens of bees, frogs, monkeys...

I mean …. There’s still the “Target Lock”  (L3 click in on Analog Stick for Xbox) Wouldn’t that focus on one single enemy and that enemies health bar? It would probably not even show a HP bar if you don’t target lock, you can cycle through targets on screen.. etc.

[Cruvimaster]

4 minutes ago, Mike23Ua said:

I mean …. There’s still the “Target Lock”  (L3 click in on Analog Stick for Xbox) Wouldn’t that focus on one single enemy and that enemies health bar? It would probably not even show a HP bar if you don’t target lock, you can cycle through targets on screen.. etc.

I don't know how Klei could improve this for mobs in general. Giants is easy.

In mods that already have this function, if you activate it to display the mobs' life bar, the screen becomes completely polluted, displaying everything at the same time.

Of course, Klei could do similar to the mods (show the life bar of all creatures), but it should certainly leave this as optional for us.

[Mike23Ua]

Just now, Cruvimaster said:

I don't know how Klei could improve this for mobs in general. Giants is easy.

In mods that already have this function, if you activate it to display the mobs' life bar, the screen becomes completely polluted, displaying everything at the same time.

Again though… when you play something like Dead Island 2, you don’t see the health bars of every single zombie on screen with you (that’s something a silly broken player created mod would do) you only see the health of the enemy your focusing on/hitting with a weapon at the current time. 

We shouldn’t compare what should be an official feature that works well and feels pleasant and natural, to a player created mod.

[benfroyobro9381]

I really don't see why this is such a controversial issue. Just make it optional in the world settings for all enemies and bosses. More options; win-win for everyone. 

[Cruvimaster]

1 hour ago, Mike23Ua said:

We shouldn’t compare what should be an official feature that works well and feels pleasant and natural, to a player created mod.

I just wouldn't reduce the importance of mod creators, as many of their works are far superior to so many QOL that Klei has already brought.

31 minutes ago, benfroyobro9381 said:

I really don't see why this is such a controversial issue. Just make it optional in the world settings for all enemies and bosses. More options; win-win for everyone. 

We always come to this conclusion in this type of debate. I mentioned this same solution in the topic about allowing clothing to be worn with a backpack in a separate slot.

[AliceShiki]

On 5/12/2024 at 12:34 PM, grm9 said:

it'd remove the need to predict bosses' phase transitions e.g. getting FW into a corner right before p2, putting CK just slightly above heal threshold before killing claws and then continuing attacking him, getting close to a road before BQ p3 starts, timing dfly stuns to cancel enraged phase, only chopping 1 tree before starting attacking toad if it's low enough etc., so you'd become unable to mess those up and there wouldn't be as much risk in doing those and trying to maximize damage before a transition

I don't disagree with you that QoL improvements can sometimes make a game easier.

I'd say the pros of this outweigh the cons though. As in, the QoL benefit is more important than the fact it makes the game easier in this case.

But again, I play with mods that show HP anyways, so I'm fine either way. I can absolutely understand and accept anyone who disagrees with my opinion here. You certainly have the right to think that the change to the game experience that healthbars would cause would make the game worse. It's an opinion as valid as any other, just one I disagree with.

[Cruvimaster]

Many boss fighting games that are considered difficult show the life bar (Malenia, Elden Ring).

And in these games, when players are defeated, they return to a previous moment for new attempts. An automatic rollback?

They are different styles from DST, but saying that a simple life bar will make it easier to defeat Crab King or Ancient Fuelweaver doesn't convince me.

[AliceShiki]

1 hour ago, Cruvimaster said:

They are different styles from DST, but saying that a simple life bar will make it easier to defeat Crab King or Ancient Fuelweaver doesn't convince me.

I mean... Try to think about the fight against Malenia. Now imagine it without a health bar. Do you think it would be the same or harder?

Malenia happens to recover health when she hits you or when you block her attacks, so it would be hard to keep track of her current health, and without being aware of her health, it would be really hard for you to take a risky attack against her while expecting her to die with it.

But at the same time, the gist of the fight would still be the same. You'd still need to be wary of the waterfoul dance, try relying more on dodging than blocking, finding gaps on her huge waves of attacks to land blows here and there... The fundamentals of the fight would still be the same, but without a health bar, your sense of the fight's progression would be harder to grasp, and you'd be less willing to take risks in situations that could lead you to winning... Essentially making the fight harder to some extent.

Now the big question is... Would the fight be more fun without a health bar? Would you prefer fighting her without a health bar?

It's a subjective question with a subjective answer. I know I would certainly prefer the health bar to be there, but I can understand why other people disagree.

[HowlVoid]

On 5/11/2024 at 9:17 PM, Guille6785 said:

I think if a proper creative mode gets added health bars should be a part of it, but IMO health bars don't belong in vanilla gameplay

But is Dst reeeeaaally vanilla...

Imo it would be fine if it was tied to an item. Like a totem made from a red moonlens. Then it would have a cost and possibly be temporary or per boss. 

 

[arubaro]

19 hours ago, 00petar00 said:

For mistakes that you avoid by rolling back to practice fights. It seems very disingenuous to use rollback features or spawn items and compare to players that don't do that at all.

So bosses should be as easy as being able to be beaten at the 1st try?? What a non sense

Since always videogames have save points to repeat fights.

Not to mention how boring would be to repeat easier fights.  Dst is an unique sandbox, is the only sandbox where you can enjoy repeating most fights and keepe being rewarded by that 

12 hours ago, Cruvimaster said:

Many boss fighting games that are considered difficult show the life bar (Malenia, Elden Ring).

And in these games, when players are defeated, they return to a previous moment for new attempts. An automatic rollback?

They are different styles from DST, but saying that a simple life bar will make it easier to defeat Crab King or Ancient Fuelweaver doesn't convince me.

It is easier like how it makes elden ring easier

Low hp boss? Lets tank or throw a bomb to finish him safely. The ammount of bosses i defeated thanks to know they were 1 or 2 bombs away... elden ring or any souls would be way difficult without knowing the hp of the enemy

[ShadowDuelist]

No, but I’d add them as a wortox thing only. He should be able to see both enemies and allies HP.
A healer who can’t see who needs healing is really weird design in first place. And it also makes sense for him to “know” when creatures are dying.

[grm9]

13 hours ago, Cruvimaster said:

Many boss fighting games that are considered difficult show the life bar

you usually don't need to predict phase transitions in those games because you can react to them and it allows you to hit bosses more than you safely could've before stagger/death without counting hits to know that they'll stagger/die soon

[arubaro]

34 minutes ago, ShadowDuelist said:

No, but I’d add them as a wortox thing only. He should be able to see both enemies and allies HP.
A healer who can’t see who needs healing is really weird design in first place. And it also makes sense for him to “know” when creatures are dying.

I think every player should know if a player is wounded like how we can already know if a player is hungry, insane or id is freezing/overheating

Character sprites should display scratches and wounds when wounded

Also i think we cant know if a player is wet? Never checked if the cursor shows blue words over a wet player 

[Ridley]

1 hour ago, arubaro said:

So bosses should be as easy as being able to be beaten at the 1st try?? What a non sense

No one is saying that.

The implication was that rolling back avoids the consequence of losing a fight and having to recover from it. If a boss heals enough it can cost you the fight which doesn't matter if you rollback.

1 hour ago, arubaro said:

Since always videogames have save points to repeat fights.

In RPG's sure, but not survival or roguelike-esque games where death is meant to carry big consequences.

[grm9]

5 minutes ago, Ridley said:

If a boss heals enough it can cost you the fight which doesn't matter if you rollback

do you realise that you can practice in a test world and not rollback when playing normally?

[arubaro]

9 minutes ago, Ridley said:

No one is saying that.

The implication was that rolling back avoids the consequence of losing a fight and having to recover from it. If a boss heals enough it can cost you the fight which doesn't matter if you rollback.

In RPG's sure, but not survival or roguelike-esque games where death is meant to carry big consequences.

But is on you if you want to tryhard since the beguinning or try some attempts in complicated boss fights before playing without rollbacks

Makes no sense to limit boss fights when we have the tools

How would you design FW or other cool fights to be able to be beaten without previous knowledge while not downgrading the numbers and ammount of mechanics?? Is like removing klaus' enraging when a deer is killed so people dont waste the entire autumn to repeat the fight because previously they tried to kill the deers. Better yet, charlie shouldnt kill players because that makes them lose their worlds 

Is on you how much unforgiving you want the experience,  downgrading the game makes no sense when there are already ways to make it easier and more friedly. Making things more accesible just makes the game way easier when you use the mechanics designed to make the game less hard

[Szczuku]

I think the game shouldn't have any healthbars at all.

A good compromise is having the bosses degrade as the fight goes on

Even though some people would still complain that there's too much ambiguity

[Clopsy627]

Yes i would love health bars because i loose a lot of confidence when i don't see the damage im dealing

 

[Copyafriend]

i dont really like the idea of health bars, but i'm not too upset about it. i guess i like the "being unsure" nature of fighting them. most of the bigger bosses have tells for how low they are anyway. 

 

i guess it feels like it would mess with my immersion

[Echsrick]

dontstarve together has become a fightin game anyways now with weird damage protection planar thingys so may aswell add more fightin game stuff in it

[goblinball]

On 5/13/2024 at 6:36 PM, AliceShiki said:

Now the big question is... Would the fight be more fun without a health bar?

No. Just no.

Malenia is already a Sisyphean task with her regenerating health when she damages you. At least with the health bar I know I’m actually making progress and how much. 
I don’t understand why anyone would complain about a health bar other than “muh uncompromising”. It wouldn’t make the fights any easier, it’d just help make bosses more fun and motivating because you can actually see your progress and how well you’re doing. It also makes the later parts of boss fights super intense; nothing beats the feeling you get when you know the boss is one hit away but so are you, it’s so much more fun and interesting than the boss randomly dying when their hidden hp value reaching 0.

[grm9]

4 hours ago, goblinball said:

It wouldn’t make the fights any easier

it'll make predicting phase transitions easier, so the fight'll be less complex and fun because a part of it that you can mess up would get removed

4 hours ago, goblinball said:

it’d just help make bosses more fun and motivating because you can actually see your progress and how well you’re doing

you can see their current phase and how much time you spent on the fight already

On 5/14/2024 at 1:36 AM, AliceShiki said:

Now the big question is... Would the fight be more fun without a health bar? Would you prefer fighting her without a health bar?

it wouldn't really change anything because you don't need to predict phase transitions in case of most souls bosses

[Jakepeng99]

Make bosses look different the more they are damaged.