Dev blog 97 - Nourishment!
This post is written by Mia, our gameplay designer.
Hello there!
This time Marko’s Wednesday post is being usurped by Mia. Hello! I’m the other game designer (other than Mat, that is) that is working on The Hand of Merlin!
Today I bring you news on what else is coming up in the next big content update, along with the two new Guardians. It is the “Nourishment System” which is an overhaul on how the supplies worked till now.
Supplies are one of the resources that you can gain, lose, and trade in the game. While having supplies (other than in easy mode) would virtually mean nothing, not having supplies would cost all of your heroes one health point for each node visited without supplies. It was apparently something that was easily ignored and not that impactful on the game. The damage may have been a bit more brutal in hard mode but it was still just not rewarding or interesting enough.
So, we sat down and brainstormed on what would make the supplies more impactful and actually make you want to go out of your way to buy or pick them as a reward. A lot of ideas were thrown around but what we settled for in the end is…
[h3]The Nourishment System![/h3]
It’s based on the idea that if your heroes are (or not) fed, their physical capabilities change. A well nourished person is stronger, faster, and has more energy than a person which is malnourished and/or has not been fed properly for days.
As character attributes such as power, speed, and range are meddled with in so many different ways (status effects, abilities, relics…) we decided to tap into an area which we have not touched yet - influencing max health (and armor).
There are 5 stages of nourishment:
Deep Negative - decreases max health and armor by 30%*
Negative - decreases max health and armor by 15%*
Neutral
Positive - increases max health and armor by 15%*
High Positive - increases max health and armor by 30%*
*The exact percentage is suspected to change for balancing purposes
Starting on neutral, the hero's current stage of nourishment changes depending on supplies.
Traveling with supplies will gradually bring you up the scale towards “High Positive” and traveling without supplies will gradually bring you down the scale towards “Deep Negative”.
It’s not possible to skip a stage, so just as the body needs time to gain back strength that was lost so will you have to slowly make your way back up through each stage should you reach the deep negative state of nourishment.
Changing just the max health while keeping the current health unchanged was more often punishing rather than rewarding, so the current health changes along with the max health while keeping the ratio static.
This did bring along a number of issues, the main one being that should someone go up and down the scale they could see the original number change. Rounding up numbers does that, and it seems to be unavoidable. However, at least you can rest easy knowing that these changes will always be in your favor. So if you happen to gain that 1 health point, good on you! MarkoP hates me for it, I’m sure…(no, just unstable systems :) - MarkoP)
Do come join us on our Discord server to share your thoughts or ask any questions you may have!
Mia
Hello there!
This time Marko’s Wednesday post is being usurped by Mia. Hello! I’m the other game designer (other than Mat, that is) that is working on The Hand of Merlin!
Today I bring you news on what else is coming up in the next big content update, along with the two new Guardians. It is the “Nourishment System” which is an overhaul on how the supplies worked till now.
Supplies are one of the resources that you can gain, lose, and trade in the game. While having supplies (other than in easy mode) would virtually mean nothing, not having supplies would cost all of your heroes one health point for each node visited without supplies. It was apparently something that was easily ignored and not that impactful on the game. The damage may have been a bit more brutal in hard mode but it was still just not rewarding or interesting enough.
So, we sat down and brainstormed on what would make the supplies more impactful and actually make you want to go out of your way to buy or pick them as a reward. A lot of ideas were thrown around but what we settled for in the end is…
[h3]The Nourishment System![/h3]
It’s based on the idea that if your heroes are (or not) fed, their physical capabilities change. A well nourished person is stronger, faster, and has more energy than a person which is malnourished and/or has not been fed properly for days.
As character attributes such as power, speed, and range are meddled with in so many different ways (status effects, abilities, relics…) we decided to tap into an area which we have not touched yet - influencing max health (and armor).
There are 5 stages of nourishment:
Deep Negative - decreases max health and armor by 30%*
Negative - decreases max health and armor by 15%*
Neutral
Positive - increases max health and armor by 15%*
High Positive - increases max health and armor by 30%*
*The exact percentage is suspected to change for balancing purposes
Starting on neutral, the hero's current stage of nourishment changes depending on supplies.
Traveling with supplies will gradually bring you up the scale towards “High Positive” and traveling without supplies will gradually bring you down the scale towards “Deep Negative”.
It’s not possible to skip a stage, so just as the body needs time to gain back strength that was lost so will you have to slowly make your way back up through each stage should you reach the deep negative state of nourishment.
Changing just the max health while keeping the current health unchanged was more often punishing rather than rewarding, so the current health changes along with the max health while keeping the ratio static.
This did bring along a number of issues, the main one being that should someone go up and down the scale they could see the original number change. Rounding up numbers does that, and it seems to be unavoidable. However, at least you can rest easy knowing that these changes will always be in your favor. So if you happen to gain that 1 health point, good on you! MarkoP hates me for it, I’m sure…(no, just unstable systems :) - MarkoP)
Do come join us on our Discord server to share your thoughts or ask any questions you may have!
Mia