New health system

[MrUnbecoming]

I do not agree with this. Maybe a hybrid system would work, but the way it is now, you just snowball from damage. It only works to mitigate damage, since any damage you take, you can only partly recover from. And it's on a timer, so if you don't kill enemies fast enough (not enough DPS, not your fault) then you cannot recover much health at all. There is no way to reliably recover except at the end of the section by the repair bot. Health drops should not have been removed, they were fine. At least create some items or perks for health to balance out the completely new health system.

[that's what she said]

That's the point - it forces you to play aggressively, it will mitigate damage you take this way. So the better you play - the less health you lose. And then there is health bot. Not to mention that health bot is upgradable. It works kinda good if you get a hang of it.

[MrUnbecoming]

Originally posted by that's what she said:

That's the point - it forces you to play aggressively, it will mitigate damage you take this way. So the better you play - the less health you lose. And then there is health bot. Not to mention that health bot is upgradable. It works kinda good if you get a hang of it.

Only kind of. I get that it promotes aggression to minimize damage, and that's how I play anyway. But once you take damage, there is no way to actually recover. Only to mitigate. When I mentioned a hybrid system, it could work where if you collect a certain amount of XP orbs, it also replenishes some health. So for example 15 tokens, 5 HP. That's probably not a balanced number, but whatever the number is can be tuned, we need some way of actually recovering from damage in combat. Right now, again, it's just a snowball until you can get to the Repair Station which is not good enough in my opinion.

[ZeroAffex]

I am REALLY bad at this game but I found I liked the new health system. It actually kept me a live longer than normal. I do wish we could still find health drops here and there though and not at the end of the level like you suggested with the hybrid plan of yours. Or maybe we can get some vampire skills going to steal health (maybe it exist, dont remember lol) but overall I like the change. Not perfect though, still could use some polish.

[MrUnbecoming]

Originally posted by 🎶ᔕYᑎTᕼ ᗷOT🤖:

I am REALLY bad at this game but I found I liked the new health system. It actually kept me a live longer than normal. I do wish we could still find health drops here and there though and not at the end of the level like you suggested with the hybrid plan of yours. Or maybe we can get some vampire skills going to steal health (maybe it exist, dont remember lol) but overall I like the change. Not perfect though, still could use some polish.

Yes I do like the change, I guess I didn't make that clear. But it needs something else on top. The way it is now is not enough to survive consistently. Especially if you get a bad room with tons of bomb or rocket damage all at once (taking you from 100% to 50% HP almost instantly, happened a few times). Maybe not health drops, but a vampirism skill is a step in the right direction. That being said, it would be a MUST pick. I still think picking up a certain number of XP orbs should heal you too.

[professional_kbabi]

You gotta start gaming the shields, king!

[MrUnbecoming]

Originally posted by keithnabe:

You gotta start gaming the shields, king!

The shields are pretty cheesy. You get the MUST PICK upgrade to get shields when meleeing, and you can just tank damage for a little while. Why would you not use that EVERY opportunity, because it's the dominant strategy? That upgrade is pretty stupid in my opinion, quite frankly. If you get it, you feel compelled to use it because you're inherently gimping yourself if you don't. It's not hard to use to get free shields, it's just tedious.

[professional_kbabi]

Originally posted by MrUnbecoming:

Originally posted by keithnabe:

You gotta start gaming the shields, king!

The shields are pretty cheesy. You get the MUST PICK upgrade to get shields when meleeing, and you can just tank damage for a little while. Why would you not use that EVERY opportunity, because it's the dominant strategy? That upgrade is pretty stupid in my opinion, quite frankly. If you get it, you feel compelled to use it because you're inherently gimping yourself if you don't. It's not hard to use to get free shields, it's just tedious.

Not a bad point in that multiple tactics / progressions should be rewarded. I personally like the shields, and I feel like the update made Guardian play a little more interesting. I agree with you that there should be multiple viable choices with upgrade branches though.

[GmanLives]

It makes the higher difficulties unviable.

[HardRock]

I dont know, how it was before new health system. But as a new player I cant imagine anyone playing any difficulty above medium. There is no way to heal in a fight, while every level is packed with constantly shooting enemies from all sides. There are also almost no obstacles to comfortably hide behind them either.

Seems like I have to play on easy, even if I was comfortably beating most FPS games on hard setting, lol.

[Sandrokun]

I think a good way to mitigate this issue would be to make the golden pickup from the 3rd chest in the red/green areas of the map actually refill a smaller portion of your health if you're already at a lower cap due to damage. Even if it were to heal half or 1/3rd of what the health bot heals you, you can still be highly aggressive and take some hits knowing you'll be able to recover at least some of that damage before you make it to a health bot, especially in any level after the first one where you have to do the arena challenges in between heals.

[MrUnbecoming]

Originally posted by el_sandro:

I think a good way to mitigate this issue would be to make the golden pickup from the 3rd chest in the red/green areas of the map actually refill a smaller portion of your health if you're already at a lower cap due to damage. Even if it were to heal half or 1/3rd of what the health bot heals you, you can still be highly aggressive and take some hits knowing you'll be able to recover at least some of that damage before you make it to a health bot, especially in any level after the first one where you have to do the arena challenges in between heals.

Could just add a healing station to the side paths, too. But I think healing mid-combat is more important. The main issue is that there is no way to do that at all, only to mitigate. So health drops should be reinstated, or just make it so collecting enough XP orbs recovers some HP.

[Fishy_F1shy]

I absolutely love the new health system. Sure it's not super intuitive but it makes the game work so much better in my opinion. Some people are saying that it makes the game harder but I completely disagree. In the old system health pickups only spawned often when you were low health meaning that your health would slowly be chipped away until you reached that threshold. You still have that saftey net of always being able to get back to 30% health or so, but now you can slow down the damage you take in real time by picking up orbs. Maybe Im just good at the game but I just beat heros +4 difficulty (with no sheild perks) on my first try (I swear Im not trying to humble brag, just sharing my perspective), I have the exact opposite experience than the people saying the system makes the game too hard. If anything it makes it too forgiving and easy.

In my opinion the new system is better in pretty much every way. I think it needs some tweaking, but I love it.

[[AN] Mad Scientist]

Originally posted by MrUnbecoming:

I do not agree with this. Maybe a hybrid system would work, but the way it is now, you just snowball from damage. It only works to mitigate damage, since any damage you take, you can only partly recover from. And it's on a timer, so if you don't kill enemies fast enough (not enough DPS, not your fault) then you cannot recover much health at all. There is no way to reliably recover except at the end of the section by the repair bot. Health drops should not have been removed, they were fine. At least create some items or perks for health to balance out the completely new health system.

maybe also have the health shared via the healing bots and the orb pick ups so it doesnt punish the one who doesnt pick it up

[MrUnbecoming]

Originally posted by GG Mad Scientist:

maybe also have the health shared via the healing bots and the orb pick ups so it doesnt punish the one who doesnt pick it up

Oh I was speaking in the context of Singleplayer, but yeah for Co-op, for sure there should be health sharing mechanics.

[Pootis Face]

when fully upgraded, health bots provide more than enough hp to carry you to the final area at least, especially if you play as engineer, whose drones will ensure you have enough orbs to collect that you barely ever take damage. the game is already easy, i've made it to the final area on hero +2 on my first attempt, and allowing for more healing would just make the game too easy.