Quick question: What do you think would be the best way to represent a rechargable resource that has two recharging states: 1) Full mandatory recharge after a certain time 2) Temporary recharge I was thinking a simple bar with a falling upper limit might work, like this: The upper limit would represent the mandatory recharge state, while the amount of points within the bar would represent the temporary recharge state. If this is confusing, here is an example: Health: Health is always declining, down to one point for certain types of characters. Sleeping and eating restores it, however. The upper limit of health falls at a rate of so many points per game day, while the actual amount of health falls by so many points per game hour. So the upper limit falls slower than the actual points within the bar. The upper limit represents sleep, while the actual contents within the bar represents nourishment. You can sleep and not eat, gaining a higher upper limit but not filling the bar; or you can eat and not sleep, which fills an ever smaller bar. I'm thinking this could be used in a few key areas, like with rechargeable equipment that also needs periodic maintenence. A vehicle, for instance, might have repairable damage and overall wear and tear. The higher the wear and tear, the more brittle the vehicle is, no matter how much you repair it. Thoughts?

Star wars galaxies does this.
they just paint the right portion black, as your bar shortens.
you can only fill up to where the black portion starts.

maybe there's some screenshots out there that can give an example.

I think it's a great idea! I was hoping to implement sleeping in my RPG, but rather than utilize a slowly declining health-bar, it would just cause the characters to be slower and weaker. Your model is nice since it applies to a wide range of objects, but don't necessarily take into account declining statistics such as speed and power, unless you're planning on implementing them somewhere else?

I'd suggest having the outline of the bar show 'full', and 'grey out' the amount after the upper limit. This allows you to represent the current upper limit, the current value, AND the maximum value a character can have.

In my MUD programming days, I coded something a bit like that which caused no end of complaints from the players (so I removed it).

effective_max_hp = true_max_hp * (1.0 - wound);

for each blow that hit you

wound = max(wound, damage / current_hp);

So if you have 100hp and take 10 hits (i.e. 10%), you're now capped at 90%, i.e. 90hp
If you then take 5 more hits, the cap isn't lowered (5.6% < 10%).

If you are down to 20hp and take 10 hits, you're now capped at 50%, i.e. 50hp

Those were the days...

Actually thats the system we are using. I played a cool FPS called "killswitch" where I recognized it for the first time.

I think this is an amazing way to direct the player towards using medical help and simulating persistent damage.

Instead of limiting health (which is seen as a negative, and people dont like), Give a bonus for sleeping. Instead of penalizing the players who dont do it, reward the ones who do.

Quote:

Original post by Talonder Instead of limiting health (which is seen as a negative, and people dont like), Give a bonus for sleeping. Instead of penalizing the players who dont do it, reward the ones who do.

This sounds like a smart way to go, but I've got two reasons for doing it this way - first, in order to make the world extremely concrete, and to provide a management mechanism for "gardeners," those roleplayers who like manage resources, build things up, and who want to feel like the world impacts them.

For those who don't like this type of play, there's the cyborg character class. They never sleep or eat.

There is, btw, a bonus for sleeping, involving neural nanotech systems and leveling.

Quote:

Original post by Talonder Instead of limiting health (which is seen as a negative, and people dont like), Give a bonus for sleeping. Instead of penalizing the players who dont do it, reward the ones who do.

Every time you got awarded xp, half got added immediately, half got placed in a delayed pool. [Originally this pool was due to the addition of "exploration" experience - hitting certain rooms gave you XP, but you wouldn't want people to precisely know which].

When you sleep, the delayed pool empties faster into your regular XP total than when you're awake.

Would age affect the max limit at all?

So when the character reaches 1/1 and then looses his daily hitpoints he dies of natural causes?