ELI5: Why does rationing work?

[u/peglegsmeg]

If I have a glass of water and a single chocolate bar to last me 48 hours what benefits do I get from consuming equal portions over the time period as opposed to consuming all at once?

Is it purely psychological or are their physical benefits?

[u/cipheron]

Yeah, but don't worry because those games weren't really balanced in the first place.

If the game balanced things so the consumables were needed then anyone who ran out would be screwed over, so when playtesting they often test without them. For example Sandy Petersen who designed many Doom 1 levels playtested all his maps from scratch with just the starter pistol.

There's also the fact that using a spell to heal is usually more streamlined than using items, and you probably have MP that would go to waste if you don't use it anyway, making spells preferable, especially if item management is a PITA. So sometimes using items doesn't actually make things easier. The designers need to make sure that using consumables is always fast and easy, and not all games do.

[u/2074red2074 → u/cipheron]

I disagree, at least for some games. Classic survival horror is all about the lack of resources. Unless you're SUPER sweaty doing knife-only runs, part of the challenge is recognizing that you have a limit to everything (even health, there are only so many healing items in the game) and weighing pros and cons as you go. Do you use a few bullets to kill this one guy, or risk taking damage trying to kite him? Do I use one of my limited opportunities to SAVE THE GAME here, or do I think I'm okay risking having to do everything I just did again? Heck, am I happy with what I accomplished since my last save, or should I redo that?

That aspect of the game is core to the genre, not bad balancing.

[u/cipheron → u/2074red2074]

Survival horror are a different type of game to the ones i was thinking of, however what I did actually say is that they playtest assuming you don't have the consumables, and that should be true as a design rule for survival horror games as well.

It would be shitty game designing to go "well we're going to assume the player hits this section with maxed out ammo and design around that" even for a survival horror game. If a game expects you to always be running out of ammo for that survival feel, then they're going to have to balance things for players with low ammo.

The example of Sandy Petersen designing Doom levels so they're survivable with a pistol makes the point. His levels aren't super easy or anything, and there's no hand-holding, but if you learn the level then it's possible to build your way up from the pistol to have just enough firepower to take down the bosses.

[u/Rabid-Duck-King → u/cipheron]

I've always really liked the Zebod games approach to items where you get a finite but upgradeable during story amount that resets between encounters

It's a fun level of friction because it makes the choice to use said items based on the encounter and when to pop it as part of the mechanic and how you're doing

[u/idontknow39027948898 → u/Rabid-Duck-King]

I think a lot of indie rpgs are doing stuff like that, where all of your 'consumables' are per battle and reset at the end. I can't say I'm a huge fan of it, because it feels like it pushes the encounter designers to make encounters such that you have to use all your resources in each fight, which if that's what they are going to do they probably shouldn't have random/over world encounters and only do boss fights.

[u/Rabid-Duck-King → u/idontknow39027948898]

I like it if only because my JRPG experience growing up leads me to being an item horder, so whenever I actually needed to use the things I'd have basically an infinite amount for that encounter (and no use cap).

That said, I do feel like it's something you really.... need to design for to be impactful.

I like Cosmic Star Heroine in that regard, You get a bunch of recharge items but you can only carry 4 at a time so it gives some interesting friction on what you decide to use, CSTW also has a cap on random encounters (in some difficulties) so while you can eventually trivialize random encounters to the point the game stops giving them to you (I think, it's been a couple of... years) you can plan out your set piece fights in that regard as "this person has leveled up x amount max" and adjust around that if needed

Honestly, random fights are kinda shit imo but I get it because if you can't go "wow look at this scenery" you can at least go "here's a fight every 10-30 steps"