Guild Wars 2

I feel something that needs to be added is a stronger near death alert. At the moment I get hit and I have no idea I’m so low on health until its too late. Sometimes there is so much going on screen in dungeons or WvWvW that you can’t glance at your health that easily.

I think this game needs a more obvious on screen alert, like the colour fading to b&w and a recognizable sound like a loud heart beat or some sort of alarm. Nothing too jarring, just something subtle that makes you aware that your about to going down.

You don’t see the red everywhere?

You mean a notification in addition to the red on the screen, your black health circle and the character voice comment?

StarFreeze.3812:

You don’t see the red everywhere?

Yes I notice the red everywhere when I get hit but it seems to stay the same no matter how much damage you’ve taken. Whatever the alert is it needs to get gradually more intense the closer you are to death. That’s why I think an audio alert will help too. Sometimes there are so many effects going off it’s hard to take notice whats going on with your UI.

Tera had a system that made the screen go b&w, and the sound faded a little and you could hear a loud heart beat.

As for the character voice, that easily gets lost in the cacophony of battle.

I find it very obvious when I’m low on HP. It’s kind of hard to miss my red health circle going down and the HP number going down. Right in the middle of my skill bar. How hard is it to pay attention to the little red bar? Too many effects is no excuse. Try playing a healer in other games, having to pay attention to effects, everything other players or mobs are doing, all while looking at the HP bars of all your friends to keep them alive. You have one little HP circle at the bottom of your screen and that’s it.

Leiloni.7951:

I find it very obvious when I’m low on HP. It’s kind of hard to miss my red health circle going down and the HP number going down. Right in the middle of my skill bar. How hard is it to pay attention to the little red bar? Too many effects is no excuse. Try playing a healer in other games, having to pay attention to effects, everything other players or mobs are doing, all while looking at the HP bars of all your friends to keep them alive. You have one little HP circle at the bottom of your screen and that’s it.

Your answer here seems a little accusatory, like I’ve done something wrong? Something wrong for just expressing my thoughts? These aren’t poor excuses, they aren’t excuses at all. Just my thoughts. I’m not trying to be excused of anything.

Anyway some of your points are valid. Yes all those alerts do happen, however I’m not consistently looking at my health bar all the time, and as a very squishy character it only take a couple of hits to go down, so if I took my eyes off it for a second it could all change very dramatically, and in a fast game like this I can’t really be looking at the bottom 1/10th of my screen the entire time.

Let’s take into account the people who need to play with very large screens. Sometimes it requires you to move your entire head to look somewhere else. And also those who play with the sound muted. They need a more distinct and general audio and visual queue.

the previously full red health globe is no longer full red.

that itself is an alert already yes?

and your character will comment about the serious injury etc.

They need a more distinct and general audio and visual queue.

Like… do you have any suggestions? Because I can’t what else could be added if the player is missing every single death alert thrown at him :-O

lorazcyk.8927:

They need a more distinct and general audio and visual queue.

Like… do you have any suggestions? Because I can’t what else could be added if the player is missing every single death alert thrown at him :-O

Yep see above for some of my suggestions.

kaotiktheory.8942:

Let’s take into account the people who need to play with very large screens. Sometimes it requires you to move your entire head to look somewhere else. And also those who play with the sound muted. They need a more distinct and general audio and visual queue.

How large is said screen that it requires you to move your head? Frankly, I don’t see this as being a problem, as no screen should require that. It should never be more than a quick flick of the eyes to the health gauge and then right back up to the action. I’ve played on some large TVs/monitors, I’ve even played on a projector aimed at the side of a garage, and I’ve never been forced to move my head to take in the entire UI.

As for those who mute the game, that’s their decision to do so. I understand that not everyone wants to listen to the game’s music and SFX at all times, but that is their choice. What we have now for visual indications are more than enough, and ANet shouldn’t be forced to add more for those who choose to “impair” themselves.

I think it is good as it is.. more would be annoying.. alrdy now my toon is complaining about his health, even thouh he should know that I will pop the signet in 1/4 sec

I see what yer sayin’, and I admit that a few times I’ve not been paying enough attention an’ been killed for it … but that’s always an “oops” on my part. Payin’ attention to your health is kinda one of those skills you need to master in a combat system what requires some skill more than just button mashing.

I’m not trying ta judge ya … I mean, it took me 10 levels in the BWE to figure out that flanking was the key to surviving in combat and before that I was dying every other fight. And I’m still not always the best at timing my movements to dodge those telegraphed power attacks. But, that’s all part of getting better at the game …

Part of the problem in your examples is that they’re too situational, too … “some people have very large screens” well they can’t very well add something just for those people, and “some people mute the sound”, well then you wouldn’t hear a heart beat type alert anyway with the sound off and, again, they can’t expect to make alerts just for those people. (they already have a visual alert)

I think it’s just a matter of needing more practice … nothing wrong with that, there are still things I need more practice with … but if you make the alerts too obvious then you take out a level of attention needed while playing; you make the game easier.

Adding some sort of alert sound other than the casually said ‘this is getting serious’ or changing the colour of the screen isn’t going to break the game. Furthermore it can be optional if Anet choose to implement anything further.

Try a human engineer – he spells it out nicely for you:

“I need healing – seriously.”

kaotiktheory.8942:

Adding some sort of alert sound other than the casually said ‘this is getting serious’ or changing the colour of the screen isn’t going to break the game. Furthermore it can be optional if Anet choose to implement anything further.

I don’t believe anyone has said it will. I’ve seen people specifically pointing out the various, current alerts available and giving advice on how to keep up with them.

That said, I’m still very curious about the size of a screen that forces the user to move their entire head. Or was that hyperbole meant to reinforce your argument?

No disrepect, but you need to pay attention if you need more things to remind you.
There are two notifications that appear as you’re about to drop. 1. Your health bar goes red and I believe there’s also something else. That’s visual. 2. Your specific character race will notify you with his or her voice. That’s audio. What more do you need?

While I agree that the current alerts are effective I’ll humor the OP. The only other option I can think of would be something in the floating text saying LOW HEALTH or some such. Other than that, all the bases are covered, visual and audio.

The problem might be more that when you get focused by 3 or more mobs or players the time from “argh, I’m going to die soon” to being downed is maybe a second or two.

But if you are facing those odds you should already be hammering your dodge roll to get the heck outta there. A nice thing would be if your heal skill would override ANYTHING else you are doing at the moment. The ties in with complaints about being stuck somehow when rezzing or in a channeled skill.

I thought this was a troll post…

Screen has red “blood” on it, your character says something, and you hear a heartbeat with a breezy gust of wind sound. I really don’t see what else they could add besides a pop-up that says “OMGZ ABOUT TO DIE!!” on the middle of the screen.

Raven Paradox.1860:

Screen has red “blood” on it, your character says something, and you hear a heartbeat with a breezy gust of wind sound. I really don’t see what else they could add besides a pop-up that says “OMGZ ABOUT TO DIE!!” on the middle of the screen.

But then the pop up would get in the way and I wouldn’t be able to know a good time to heal myself…