What have gamers got against regenerating health?

[G-Force]

Then there's no risk, there's no difficulty there's no tension

Oh no my health is low! I better just sit here for a few minutes! ...Okay now I'll gun down all of these guys. Heath regen games just wind up having the player spam reload when they die at a difficult part rather than taking a few bullets and learning to be careful.

It makes the game lack any sort of tension since you know you'll recover your health in a manner of seconds.

One could are argue that regenerating health creates more tension in a shoot out. While it is true you will heal to full, the mechanic has players seeking cover instantly when being shot. It is during the few precious moments when you are healing that you can easily be ambushed or have a grenade thrown at you causing you to flee. Typically games with regenerating health have a lower total health than health kit based shooters meaning tense situations happen MORE.

 

[Snotnarok]

Then there's no risk, there's no difficulty there's no tension

Oh no my health is low! I better just sit here for a few minutes! ...Okay now I'll gun down all of these guys. Heath regen games just wind up having the player spam reload when they die at a difficult part rather than taking a few bullets and learning to be careful.

It makes the game lack any sort of tension since you know you'll recover your health in a manner of seconds.

One could are argue that regenerating health creates more tension in a shoot out. While it is true you will heal to full, the mechanic has players seeking cover instantly when being shot. It is during the few precious moments when you are healing that you can easily be ambushed or have a grenade thrown at you causing you to flee. Typically games with regenerating health have a lower total health than health kit based shooters meaning tense situations happen MORE.

I don't follow, so you wouldn't take cover in a game with health kits with being shot?
You can always heal with regening health, you need to actually find a health kit to heal that's creating tension because you have to try and find that kit while being shot at.

Battlefield 3 probably has the best of both worlds, you regen health extremely slowly but if another player drops a health kit you heal quickly.

Regening health is more forgiving, I gathered that but it's weak because it's like having a rewind button in a racing game.

 

[G-Force]

I don't follow, so you wouldn't take cover in a game with health kits with being shot?
You can always heal with regenerating health, you need to actually find a health kit to heal that's creating tension because you have to try and find that kit while being shot at.

Health based games have higher margins for error and when they incorporate body armor systems then they can afford to have a straight up firefight in the open before needing to go to cover. Notice in regen based games it takes on average two to three shots before you're in critical condition as the player is more vulnerable so when bullets are even seen people start running for cover. I'm not saying in health based shooters you do not seek cover but because of the lower total health there is a much bigger intensive to do so.

We're both in agreement that tense moments are created when the player is in critical condition at low health. If games with regenerating health place the player in these situations due to the fact that they usually make the player more vulnerable to damage then that means regen health games are tenser

 

[Snotnarok]

I don't follow, so you wouldn't take cover in a game with health kits with being shot?
You can always heal with regenerating health, you need to actually find a health kit to heal that's creating tension because you have to try and find that kit while being shot at.

Health based games have higher margins for error and when they incorporate body armor systems then they can afford to have a straight up firefight in the open before needing to go to cover. Notice in regen based games it takes on average two to three shots before you're in critical condition as the player is more vulnerable so when bullets are even seen people start running for cover. I'm not saying in health based shooters you do not seek cover but because of the lower total health there is a much bigger intensive to do so.

We're both in agreement that tense moments are created when the player is in critical condition at low health. If games with regenerating health place the player in these situations due to the fact that they usually make the player more vulnerable to damage then that means regen health games are tenser

I don't really agree that they're tenser, you just spend longer behind cover going "Come on just fucking recover already!"
Vs 30HP
"Crap where's a health kit let's just peer around this corner ...Nazis! Runrunrunrunrun away! Heath kit! yes yes yes!"

I have fun in both games mind you, but there's always been the panic and scramble for a mid kit while your health blinks red 13HP. You take less hits in regen games sure, but there's typically less shooting at you vs a game where you have heath and maybe armor, and in that case jack up the difficulty problem solved you'll take 3 hits and then you're pretty dead.

I mean in multiplayer it's especially awesome to have health kits, because you know if you hurt an enemy but he manages to kill you, there's a short time where you can run and kill him easily before he makes it to health. Where as with regen he just has low health to begin with.

There's no real right or wrong here, this is just how I feel I love me some Call of Duty World at War but there's just that magic that games like Timesplitters has.

 

[WhyWasThat]

Part of what makes the old FPS games so fun is that your Health plays into how you play the game.

In Halo you can just charge in, fire bullets till your screen tint is too red and duck behind a wall, in Quake when your wandering around with 18 health your hoping that there is a health pack around the next corner...but it's always a Demon, or worse yet a Shambler!!!

I guess it does add to the tension when done well. Perhaps it depends on the style of the game. If it's purely action-adrenaline focused, then I think it feels more dynamic to quickly duck into cover and let your health recover a little before leaping out and headshotting the nearest oncoming grunt.