Solved Deciding HP and Damage numbers

Question that is answered or resolved.

Aerisetta

Active member
One thing that's always been a mystery to me is how do designers decide what number values to use for HP and Damage?

Right now all my characters are base 100 HP and i adjust based on the archetype...and all damage uses base of 1 then higher if its supposed to be stronger. So I have two questions

1. What's a good way to decide what numbers scale I should use. 100 HP as standard? 1,000 HP? 10,000 HP? and adjust damage accordingly? Any best practice or guide to this?

2. Apparently the controller rumble and hitfx sound is altered based on the value, is it based on percentage of HP taken OR based on the numeric value of the attack?
 
Solution
In beat em' ups I always use 100 HP as a standard because of how many varying attacks there are. 1 - 100 is a nice damage range.

Anything simpler like a shoot em' up or action platformer I usually use 1 - 10.

If you are scaling from 100 you don't need anything to be 10,000 that's gonna get boring, same with 1 - 10 and something being 1000 HP to beat.
In beat em' ups I always use 100 HP as a standard because of how many varying attacks there are. 1 - 100 is a nice damage range.

Anything simpler like a shoot em' up or action platformer I usually use 1 - 10.

If you are scaling from 100 you don't need anything to be 10,000 that's gonna get boring, same with 1 - 10 and something being 1000 HP to beat.
 
Solution
The controller rumble and sound effect modulation are both based on absolute damage assuming an average of ~10. The assumption is HP totals will range from 30-500 with 100 as the typical baseline.

I wouldn't worry too much about controller rumbles. Technically they might have 256 levels of rumble, but in reality there's not a lot of human detectable precision. I'd be amazed if anyone could tell the difference between 10 and 50 points of damage.

There's really no one right formula. The choice comes down to your genre and individual game. The more HP you have, the more precise things like offense and defense become, as will differentials between characters, weapons, etc., but it does have diminishing returns. 1,000 is more than enough precision for just about anything you'd want to do, and I wouldn't even use that amount unless you really expect to do a lot of damage scaling calculations.

Stick to 100 as the base unless you have a specific need.

DC
 
I'm recently switching to base 100 now and redoing my game's balance.

Would like some advice on enemy HP

Game's combo system
Light Attack (L)
Heavy Attack (H)
LLLLL is a standard combo
Usually L combo will lead to a different H depending on which L combo you're on

Normal enemy
2 normal combos = dead, is that a good standard?
A full LLLLLHHH optimal combo will usually kill

Do beat em ups usually increase the enemy HP in later stages? or are the base enemy always the same?

My game does use the leveling script, but it does not increase attack power
 
I'm recently switching to base 100 now and redoing my game's balance.

Would like some advice on enemy HP

Game's combo system
Light Attack (L)
Heavy Attack (H)
LLLLL is a standard combo
Usually L combo will lead to a different H depending on which L combo you're on

Normal enemy
2 normal combos = dead, is that a good standard?
A full LLLLLHHH optimal combo will usually kill

Do beat em ups usually increase the enemy HP in later stages? or are the base enemy always the same?

My game does use the leveling script, but it does not increase attack power

It's one of those things that just depends on the game. I could write an entire book on difficulty, design, hitpoints, and so on, but I won't get into all that here. The mistake many designers make is seeing Hitpoints as a difficulty tool, when in most cases, they are a pacing tool.

Later enemies should usually get slightly larger pools, but don't overdo it. The sweet spot is making sure they're around long enough to use their tricks in mixed groups and give players opportunity to unleash the big guns once in a while, but not enough to make the game a slog. My measure is from SOR2, which I consider the gold standard for difficulty balance, and it's roughly the following:

Assume you are one to one and the enemy can't fight back. At the highest difficulty (ex. SOR2 Maina) you must be able to finish a regular enemy in no more than 10 real life seconds, including delays for knockdown recovery and such. Advanced enemies can last up to 30, but that should be special. Bosses should go down in around a minute.

There are exceptions to everything and game design changes a lot, but IMO that's a good general scale to follow.


DC
 
Back
Top Bottom