Jay Wilson Talks Health Orbs and Tactical Combat - hellforge

4players.de caught up with Blizzard who gave them an interview relating to Diablo 3, in which they had a few questions answered by the game's lead designer Jay Wilson.

When asked how Blizzard planned to reconcile the elimination of 'potion spam' with the new inclusion of health bubbles with tough boss fights, Jay answered, "Essentially when we are designing a boss, health recovery is built in the design. We could drop health orbs at some percentages of the creature's overall life and that's what we do with rares and champions, actually. So those guys (a sort of mini-bosses) get a chance to drop health orbs, when you're fighting them. In a bigger boss fight, which is more structured, we could provide some small creatures for health.

We've considered out a fight, where we use the wells like in Diablo 2 that bubble up over times. So you might have multiple of those. Then you have to run over and hit them for health and for a certain amount of time you can't use them and then they come back. So there are a lot of different ways how to do this. And really, the idea is that, when we are a designing a boss, we should figure out how health recovery could be an interesting mechanic for this boss."

Would there be skills that allowed players to regain and regenerate their health during combat? Jay responded, "Yes, there are some ways for the characters. One example is the barbarian skill Bloodthirst - but we didn't decide if we keep this skill or kick it in the final version. It is like a temporary boost/buff for yourself to recover health by killing enemies. So there are other ways to recover and we didn't remove the potions. They are a lot less effective and you can't use them very often. They should be used in emergency situations."

"For me there is a big difference between difficulty and challenge. Challenge is compelling, like challenge is basically the illusion of difficulty. When you feel a game is really challenging, then the game is exciting. Difficulty is where the game is hard and frustrating. So difficulty we try to avoid and challenge we totally want to embrace. And one of the problems I think Diablo 2 had, it would feel difficult and easy but almost never challenging. You had almost infinite resources and health. So as a designer our only option in this case to actually challenge you is to crush you with damage. Anything less then just crushing you (like one-shotting you) with damage is not gonna challenge or scary you, cause you could instantly recover your health. So what we are trying to do is, essentially create a game, where it is a challenge to just surviving and in which we don't have to make the monsters crush you again. We could actually reduce the damage they do quite a bit. Because essentially entering a fight with them is something you have to do and you have to do it with limited health and that makes the game more exiting and more challenging. And we are really trying to make it not difficult," he continued.

When inquired as to whether the fights the player would require tactics and consist of more than potion spam and simply clicking on enemies to death, Jay responded with a resounding, "Yes! That's exactly what we want to do and the health system fits into that. A good example: Shield skeletons that block you from the archers in the back. In Diablo 2 they wouldn't be very threatening, well, except in one case, when the archers do a ridiculously high amount of damage. We could actually make the archers do very little damage, but because you know, that you don't getting the fast health back (potions) and suddenly those guys are attacking you, it makes the archers threatening. And so it's really purges the player to get through the shield scouts quickly. And there are a few ways you could do this. With the Barbarian you could leap pass them and get directly to the archers or you could stun the shield guys, cause them to drop the shield, in which case they are much weaker and power right through. "

Further questions and answers pertaining to the game's randomly generated content and PvP modes can be found at 4players.de.