Quote by DCollins
We would all love to see cannon in everything that relates to our beloved movies.. However with game mechanics it just does not work.. Can you imagine having to have your healer in the middle of ground combat in STO run up to you and hit you with a hypo?
You're taking the standard healthbar/healing/death model that we see in almost every MMORPG now as a given. This model isn't 'the game mechanics', it's just one way of doing combat that designers now seem terrified of changing or incapable of imagining differently, despite the difficulty it creates with the IP and, frankly, the sheer repetitiveness of it.
LotRO made a bit of an effort in this regard by switching 'health' to 'morale', which helps make the healing abilities of Minstrels, Captains etc make a little more sense. Rather than dying, you fall back or retreat from battle. IP intact, gameplay intact.
GW2 looks to be doing away with healing classes entirely, which despite being a healer in almost every game I play I thoroughly approve of. Also, their idea for replacing 'dead' with 'downed' (a state in which you can still do stuff) suggests to me that it's possible to reimagine this health/heals/death model that has become so dominant.
I would prefer to see healthbars done away with entirely in some MMORPGs, especially ones with a strong IP base in which regular death and resurrection makes no sense.
