Enemies visible damage Yes or No (Health Bars)?

[BrutishVulgarian]

A simple plea to all you "winners", spend some time in CTRL-H mode. This game is a living, breathing, moving painting, why spend any time at all looking at health bars?

[312_JS]

Voted no. It is a huge immersion breaker for me. I like the idea of having to judge if the ship is out of the combat or not (I hope the ships wont be sinking every time like they do now). I could live with a compromise of having a verbal description of damage in looking glass view as I understand it would take an enormous effort to introduce a real looking stages of damage.

[NorthernWolves]

I think you should be able to see more of your teammates overall state than your enemies to reflect signaling, shouting etc.

Some really good points here on both sides and as much as you'll see me on the 'realism' side on most issues, this is one where we do need some sort of indicator.

 

I think what the admin said about the psychological payoff of seeing that bar nosedive from a good hit (and the frustration when it barely moves sometimes) is worth it. Plus they said it can be turned off if you want.

 

I like Black Dynamites idea of only seeing it in the spyglass or seeing more info in it and I wouldn't mind the range at which you see it now shortened a hair.

[NorthernWolves]

A simple plea to all you "winners", spend some time in CTRL-H mode. This game is a living, breathing, moving painting, why spend any time at all looking at health bars?

Gave me an idea for an option where UI stays hidden unless you hold one button down, that way you can see your loads and sail settings and compass, then let go and go back to playing.

[Ink]

I definitely would like to test one day a couple of fights with fog of war...Long time ago, in an old age of sail 2 game we were playing like this now, with health bars for everyone, but then in a couple of fights we tried fog of war and guess what? It was really fun and added some tactical things in the fight, with fog of war there are more immersion, no doubt. The only problem, major part of players get used to health bars for everyone like in almost every game these days

[hoarmurath]

I'm against health bars, there are already plenty of ways to know if a ship is crippled or not, and it can only improve as more details are added. I think battles would be far more interesting without these health bars.

[kaboki]

I'm also gainst the health bars purely because they ruin my immersion, also I don't like the "nametags" when getting closer to ships, I would like to identify my foes with the spyglass(what flag they are sailing with). Also hope we can name ships someday so we can identify each other by looking at the stern(name of ship).

 

To make a compromise, what about adding an option to remove these clues for people that don't want to see them?

[Månis]

A question thou, should a player who recive the damage be able to see the health bars of his own ship or should he spin the camera around ( how they managed to do that in RL i dont know but...quadracopters perhaps? ) to inspect his own ship all the time?

[Robert Danforth]

I think seeing one's own damage is fine, and it makes sense. You're getting damage reports from your crew.

[kaboki]

A question thou, should a player who recive the damage be able to see the health bars of his own ship or should he spin the camera around ( how they managed to do that in RL i dont know but...quadracopters perhaps? ) to inspect his own ship all the time?

 

I would prefer that my crew yells out damage reports, like "captn, we got leaks on starboard", "sails are down to 50% sir!!", "we are gonna sink, sir!!" etc ect(and an option for deaf people to have these displayed as text messages),,,,or something like that.

[Robert Danforth]

While I get that for realism, I think you have to remember that this is a game, and that we don't have a decade of sailing experience like most of these officers would. There's got to be a balance where we can keep in mind the whole situation of the ship even as we're focused on one particular aspect in the moment.

[kaboki]

While I get that for realism, I think you have to remember that this is a game, and that we don't have a decade of sailing experience like most of these officers would.

 

Well, I have never sailed my whole life, but I do understand if someone yells "got dammit captn, when are you gonna order repairs, we are f.cking sinking"(this is being yelled the third time because you didn't listen the first time your crew warned you)

 

But offcourse this is just my "pipe dream" and would probably never be implemented:p

[Månis]

I would prefer that my crew yells out damage reports, like "captn, we got leaks on starboard", "sails are down to 50% sir!!", "we are gonna sink, sir!!" etc ect(and an option for deaf people to have these displayed as text messages),,,,or something like that.

Wouldnt it be better if the crew then actually yelled what sailed they lost instead of screaming percentage? I doubt many sailors during this time even knew what a percent is

[kaboki]

Yep, it was just an example I used to illustrate my idea, and that's why I ended my sentence with "or something like that"

[Robert Danforth]

But in that case, the Captain wouldn't need to do anything, really, because the crews should be repairing things themselves.

[kaboki]

But in that case, the Captain wouldn't need to do anything, really, because the crews should be repairing things themselves.

 

The captain wouldn't repair shit, but he would give the order when apropriate to start doing so, but he would offcourse need feedback from the crew about he's ships health. Chain of command etc...Just the way it works now, but instead of that stupid "health bar" it would be more immersive having the crew report it with their voice... And if the damage is still low the captain may decide that he can wait with the repair and have he's crew focus on fighting instead of repairs.

 

I just don't understand your point in this case....

 

Your putting to much into the my "example" dialogues, all I want is an "audio" version of the health bar, simple as that. What they might say or not in different circumstances would be up to the devs to decide, not me. Im sure they are better to come up with some "smart" dialogues for the different damages and such.

 

And last, no, you don't have to be Lord Nelson to understand when the crew says "we got a leak captain"

[Robert Danforth]

My point is more the manageability of it given that this is a game, and I'm not actually standing on a deck. I'd actually love voices coming from my officers, reporting things from the crew, but I think it needs to go hand-in-hand with some kind of visual representation.

[kaboki]

Yeah yeah, ok, it's a game for me too and we have different tastes for what we like in games. I want more immersion and having the health bar kills my immersion, you like the health bar, that's ok, lets agree to disagree. This whole discussion is moot anyway because as far as I know what I suggest probably never will be in the game

[Robert Danforth]

Well I like my healthbar (actually not as a bar; some kind of damage report would be better, like specific parts of my ship in colors or whatever). I don't like enemy healthbars, which is really what the thread was about.

[PrezesOi]

Health bars in games shows what in real world is visible to the naked eye - wounds, damages. If character  or vehicle model is graphically primitive, and may not reflect the damage, then some imitation way to provide information must exist.

I hope that the ships model in NA will be even more enhanced in the future, and we will be able to determine condition of the opponent ship  using only our eyes or a telescope.

[BrutishVulgarian]

I sure hope the enemy crew population will just be a guess. I would sure like to hide a crew of hooligans below decks, while above decks I look like a fat, lightly manned merchantman.

It would be disappointing if all ships came equipped with FLIR infrared sensors that always gave an exact count of enemy crewmen.

[Robert Danforth]

Then you can paint your ship like a whaling boat, so when the Acheron comes upon and says "Eeenglish Whaleeuur!" you can blast him!

[Rhythm]

Instead of seeing the armour/damage information when you look at a ship you shouldn't be privy to that information. You should judge it based on the ships model and damage representation. I feel it would give a better feel to the gameplay instead of just hunting the guy that has damage on his "meter". It would force players to start looking for damaged ship models, overall improving the excitement and feel of gameplay. 

[Flip]

It's been discussed, the current UI is really just for testing.

[Rhythm]

It's been discussed, the current UI is really just for testing.

Thanks, good to know! Disregard, i looked through the first page or two of the suggestions and didnt see it so i wasnt sure if it was brought up yet. I cant believe this is just early alpha testing. This could pass as a finished game from most companies.