I don't really understand constitution

[SmellyTerror]

...is it fun?

Mostly you ignore it. You come across shards and stuff all the time. It makes no difference.

But I was in the Stairs of Sorrow and couldn't rift out. My constitution was almost zero, but I'd cleared absoluyely everything but the final boss and there wasn't a shard to be had. So I went in against the Executioner and pretty much straight away had zero constitution.

It was my first time fighting that boss so I'll know better next time, but even with good HP (6k or so) and 50-80 resists he ended up getting me. I was a pyromancer, and was throwing out pets to kite while I healed after each attack, but yeah, no constitution meant I was down to potions.

I don't really get the idea of constitution. It seems it's 99% of the time meaningless, but 1% of the time a massive pain the backside. Is there some cunning interaction I'm missing? Some way to get it back if you can't get shards or food? Did I miss a consumable?

And in any case: is it fun? What's the point?

[DeadlyDanDaMan]

It's just a game mechanic they decided to use. Sure they could have just stuck with only pots, but they didn't want to. Constitution just adds another layer of strategy into the game. Think of it like an HP shield. And no you can't get it back without consumables. You can ask a cook in town to give you a meal, but you only get one per play session so I don't even bother with them.

[SmellyTerror]

So... how is there strategy? 99% of the time you wander into shards etc without even trying, and constitution is irellevant.

1% of the time (less than 1% really) you can't find shards *and* can't rift out. In which case you have zero options, since there's not a damn thing you can do about it.

[DeadlyDanDaMan]

Originally posted by SmellyTerror:

So... how is there strategy? 99% of the time you wander into shards etc without even trying, and constitution is irellevant.

1% of the time (less than 1% really) you can't find shards *and* can't rift out. In which case you have zero options, since there's not a damn thing you can do about it.

The strategy is in tough fights, make sure to use your pots before you lose your constitution. Use the pots to keep your constitution from draining. As you found out, when you run out of constitution, you die REAL quick unless you have godly HP regen.

Whether or not that's fun? I don't really feel anything about it. Like I said, to me it's just a mechanic that I learn to play with.

[Matthew]

I think I remember reading it was added just so you aren't forced to use potions after every fight just to keep at full health at the start of every battle. You really aren't supposed to rely on it during fights. More of a quality of life change so you aren't constantly chugging potions outside of fights.

[blokkemblokkem]

Originally posted by SmellyTerror:

So... how is there strategy? 99% of the time you wander into shards etc without even trying, and constitution is irellevant.

1% of the time (less than 1% really) you can't find shards *and* can't rift out. In which case you have zero options, since there's not a damn thing you can do about it.

A couple things pop into my head upon reading this.

1. Youre taking too much "unhealed" dmg.

2. Youre relying on the auto recovery to heal too much of the damage you take.

3. Dont be afraid to use a healing potion in place of auto healing.

[Aelies von Saladir]

Well, it is a way to measure your char's survivability. A survivable char almost never run out of Constitution while the squishy ones do often. That happened to me when I played a very very squishy Arcanist. She spent most of the time with 0 constitution.

[SmellyTerror]

Again, though, the problem was that no shards dropped for pretty much the entire dungeon. I could have used more pots, it's true, but I've never had to worry about it for the entire game to that point. Then no shards show up, and suddenly I've got no constitution for a boss fight, and there is nothing I can do about it.

It was *during* the boss fight that I got the tutorial message for running out of constitution. It had *never* happened until then.

I recognise it's a rare situation, and I'm not too worried about dying, it just seems weird that there's this mechanic that essentially does nothing, but then can leave you in an almost impossible situation.

[Aelies von Saladir]

It's not because the Steps of Torment has less food ration/essence. It's supposed to be slightly (a lot) harder than the areas around it. You've been using constitution more often in that dungeon without knowing it.
On the bright side, it means your character is survivable in the normal, non-challenge areas.

[powbam]

Constitution is there for one reason and one reason only: To prevent abuse of the Out of Combat regeneration. (<---Note the name: Out of Combat). OoC for short.

Before they added constitution you could endlessly run and heal while IN combat, over and over, which is not what the regeneration is meant for. Constitution limits your ability to do this repeatedly in a "short time-frame" while still enabling you to make limited use of it in this fashion. Otherwise tho the regeneration is meant to be used after combat.

http://www.grimdawn.com/guide/gameplay/combat.php#q13

[Terroriza]

view it as your glass of water and you have a loaf of bread in front of you that you must eat. so you chew on a whole slice of bread. Your good, but if you drink some water you will swallow the bread quicker. the more you want to speed swallow the bread the more water you will drink which means the quicker you run out. once you run out you need to refill the cup.

Food in the game refills the cup. You get hit you lose half your hp and now you need more. constiution fills this back up super fast. onnce your out you fill up slow. its a simple concept. dont worry about tryingto upgrade it. it is something which should be overlooked in all builds. it's pointless.

[SmellyTerror]

Ok, I understand the reasoning. It still seems weird. I used it for in combat healing all game (lob grenades and stuns, fall back a bit, heal). I never used up my constitution. The one time I I did use it up, I died (with the tutorial message blocking my pet status).

If constitution is supposed to stop you using it in combat, then it needs to be pretty seriously modified, becuase it is absolutely useable in combat. This was my first character, playing Veteran hardcore, and I was using the heal all the time. The first and only time I ran out of constitution was in the Executioner fight, and even then only because I hadn't gotten constituion refilled for a long time (I started the fight with about 5%).

It's not like I'm a very good player, or put much thought into my build.

Wouldn't it make more sense, if it's supposed to be out of combat, to do away with constitution, and just increase the timer since last damage, or just have the game check to see if you or a pet has got aggro from anything? No aggro for a few seconds: heal.

[powbam]

Originally posted by SmellyTerror:

Ok, I understand the reasoning. It still seems weird. I used it for in combat healing all game (lob grenades and stuns, fall back a bit, heal). I never used up my constitution. The one time I I did use it up, I died (with the tutorial message blocking my pet status).

If constitution is supposed to stop you using it in combat, then it needs to be pretty seriously modified, becuase it is absolutely useable in combat. This was my first character, playing Veteran hardcore, and I was using the heal all the time. The first and only time I ran out of constitution was in the Executioner fight, and even then only because I hadn't gotten constituion refilled for a long time (I started the fight with about 5%).

It's not like I'm a very good player, or put much thought into my build.

Wouldn't it make more sense, if it's supposed to be out of combat, to do away with constitution, and just increase the timer since last damage, or just have the game check to see if you or a pet has got aggro from anything? No aggro for a few seconds: heal.

It's not supposed to completely stop it, only limit how much in a "short" time period.

Constitution is designed to be a more outta sight, outta mind type thing. You are NOT supposed to have to pay much attention to it. It just simply works. Most times you never have to worry about running out.

What it will prevent is abuse. Lets say you are having trouble with a boss or you run into 3+ hero mobs and find that life is getting rough. In these circumstances without constitution there to limit abuse you would simply run around with super easy free heals the ENTIRE time until you win. Just kite around getting healed. Ezpz.

These are the instances that constitution will make itself known be cuz unless you manage to kill those heroes quickly chances are you will run down your constitution before you can refill unless you get those kills. You are thus prevented from abusing it in this scenario. You must either win, die, or run away and find more.

This is literally its purpose. Nothing more. Nothing less.

It is not supposed to be hard or challenging to keep your constitution up in normal circumstances and with light to moderate use.

[Gus the Crocodile]

Yeah I don't think it's supposed to be completely unusable in combat - I'm sure Crate know that a few seconds is enough to back off and regenerate in many fights. As I see it, there's nothing wrong with relying on constitution to get you through a prolonged fight - it's a game mechanic like any other, it's there to be used.

You just have to keep in mind, during fights both big and small, that if you want to rely on your constitution at the end of the dungeon you may need to actively preserve it earlier by using potions to heal instead. Because yes, constitution mostly relies on drops and although they've been made more common, random drops are never going to be perfectly reliable. That just becomes a factor to consider when building your character and when fighting enemies.

I'm sure the game would work just fine without constitution, but I quite like it, as I like Pillars of Eternity's endurance/health system. Here, your HP is your short-term, brute-force staying power and your constitution is your long-term endurance. It's a way of eliminating some tedious micromanagement without removing the potential for players to make meaningful decisions. I enjoy that there's that layering of both a "tactical" and "strategic" variety of survival resource.

[SmellyTerror]

...but can't you run around using potions and do the exact same thing, only slower? If there's a longer delay around the timer, wouldn't that achieve the same thing without the fairly obscure constitution mechanic?

I mean, as a new player, how am I supposed to find out it's "abuse" to use the heal? I genuinely didn't realise how much constitution was doing until it ran dry. I did use pots very regularly, I had a heal bird and Dryads and decent health regen.

Being outta sight outta mind is precisely my problem with it. The first time you actually see a game mechanic shouldn't be level 50 fighting a boss in hardcore.

What is abuse? Given that, without knowing I wasn't supposed to, I used delaying tactics and healing for 50 levels without running out of constitution. Yeah, it *is* super easy. The game was super easy up to the point I ran out of constitution. But... was I cheating or exploiting without even knowing I was doing that?

"You must either win or run away and find more."

Except I actually did try to find more before I even got into the fight. I was not allowed to rift out. There was no more to get. There was no way to run away.

So 20 hours of playing, and suddenly the way I was playing wasn't allowed? It's not a big deal - I love the game, I re-rolled a new character, and I'm trying to get friends to join - but surely there's a better way to make a mechanic so it's consistent, and is undertood and works the same way the whole game through.

This basic mechanic effected me ONCE, at level 50 and during a boss fight. Doesn't that seem a bit wrong?

[Matthew]

I would even argue that in many cases, by the time you reach late late game, your reliance upon it reaches almost zero. Depends upon build, of course, but if you have enough heal regen, heal procs, and such, you'll find you won't dip into constitution at all.

On one of my characters, I actually don't get to use it at all since I have a skill which uses hp regen to sustain. Game thinks I am always in combat because of it, so I'm never "out of combat" to ever get constitution to heal.