I dont remember reading anything about whether there will be drinking animations for using potions. I have always thought that being able to quaff a potion mid battle, while swinging a weapon was something of a cheat. I'd prefer it if there were a drinking animation.

I believe it would add another level to combat tactics when you have to stop fighting to drink. During a lull in combat, with both you and your opponent at low health, do you go for the hit hoping to finish him off or do you use the time to heal and risk getting hit in turn? think of reloading in shooting games.

it should however be done right. there are games that have drinking animations but force the actor to sheath the weapon or unable to move. the actor should still be able to keep his weapon out and run while drinking.

Not really practical mate. Imagine wielding a claymore whilst drinking a potion and running. The animation would look pretty dumb in my opinion.

not much worse than the weilding a claymore while casting a heal spell and running in OB, imho. I'd settle for a quick swig while standing still if they cant make the animation look right.

Maybe not an animation, but there should certainly be a delay before the effect happens.. and maybe during that delay the character should have to walk.

In any case they really need to end the "freeze time and chug 10 potions" nonsense of Morrowind/Oblivion

Pause
Drink 50 sujamma
Kill Vivec in one hit at level 1

Yeah... I hope they do something about that.

to much fuzz really, good gameplay always comes above what "looks real", in OB unless you where using Restoration potions where your friends, and I′m not eager knowing I die because I waited for a potion chugging animation mid battle.

Might seem unrealistic but (unless I missed the memo somewhere) Morrowind was a video game. Oblivion was a video game. And Skyrim will also be a video game. Even in most PnP campaigns I can name you'll never have something as unwieldy as this going down, so I have to agree to disagree with you.

What do you mean, I hang all my potions around my neck like a necklace and then I put drinking straws in them, this way I can even drink from 3 bottles at once since I can fit 3 straws in my mouth, at the same time!

:D

No really let us have an animation, just a quick one where you see your hand reach down into a pocket and come up with a bottle that will be put up at the screen and the camera should face upwards for a bit and you should hear drinking sounds and then it′s over.

Has already done it in Oblivion, only 4 active potions at once. Yes the ready made potions are instant so you only have to wait a fraction of a second to drink more.
But if you drink 4 self made ones you have to wait before drinking more.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kC5CI-I1ftw was a videogame too. Note the potion-drinking animations. :rolleyes:

Osmosis is a powerful thing.

Seriously though, I'm sure there will be a potion drinking animation. There are a lot of things that BGS can add to Skyrim this time around because they aren't limited by making a game for a console that doesn't exist yet. I'm sure they have all the subtle things added.

http://www.bigislandparty.com/images/pt_16644.jpeg
It's a helmet enchanted with a constant effect of restore health.

Constant effect restore drunkenness, is more like it.

Wow, I don't know why so many people are AGAINST this.

I mean, it DOES affect gameplay,d id some of you even read the bloody post?

When you are in the middle of combat and go to chug a ]potion it should have an animation imo. It gives weight and strategy of knowing when/how to use potions

When you choose to drink a potion, during a fight, it should have a risk. IF you get hit during the drinking animation you obviously drop it. At the same time if an enemy does the same you can make a quick attack to make him drop his.

This adds a small layer of strategy to potions rather then letting people spam it or use it without regard to what's actually going on.

It doesn't have to be a long potion, just a quick animation of the character grabbing near his waistline and then putting a bottle to his mouth and gulping it, a second or two tops. As for weapons, umm, most swords are very capable of being held in one hand, even two handers(we are talking < 5 lbs for most swords, with the bigger ones going up to 7'ish pounds or so). Just have the weapon rest in one hand during the animation.

I'm personally all for it, as I've mentioned this same idea before. It gets rid of the silly arbitrary limit on potions while also still putting a limit on them in a fight. The 4 potion limit didn't help much in Oblivion when you could still pop a single potion and go to full health in an instant. If there was an animation, then you might think twice about WHEN you're going to use that potion, as it could very well get you killed.

I, personally, don't give a crap about realism as long as NPCs are on equal circumstances as you. The issue with the game is while you could drink 10 potions, your enemies couldn't. It's sort of stupid.

no is not you are the hero ,enemies are not.

There should be a different system for drinking potions that makes it more believable. For example... using Ellert's suggestion to hang three bottles around your neck, maybe if they are small bottles that would work. So let's say we imagine that the size of the potion flask is not very big, certainly not this huge bulbous onion-shaped bottle you see in movies, but more like a small slender glass with a stopper and rope around the mouth. Here's how the system could work:

During the pause menu, you're allowed to EQUIP up to 3 potions that you have then hanging around your neck. When you press an assigned button to the first slot, your character drinks the first bottle you chose (drinking animation commences, just a quick tip back of the head followed by a casting off of the empty bottle onto the street). The bottle smashes and after a few seconds , the dead item vanishes from sight. You can pause the game to add a new potion to your empty slot, but if you do, there is still a small chance that as you click the pause button your enemy get's a chance to try to distract you. You don't know if they succeed or fail but if you fail, once you've equipped the potion and resume combat, if you failed the potion gets cut loose and falls to the ground, getting destroyed.

However if you are not in close proximity to your enemy, or they don't have a knife, then they can't try to distract you like that. So it wouldn't happen every time you paused, only a very small percentage of the time. Also, it only happens if you are trying to add a new potion to your three potion slots right away, instead of waiting. Let's say if you wait until all 3 slots are empty, and then evoke the pause menu, there is no chance the enemy can distract you. Why?

Because juggling your potions incessently in the middle of combat such that you need to keep each slot filled right after you drink the previous potion would be, in itself, a distracting process and might allow your enemy a chance to interrupt you, distract you, or cause you to lose what you're trying to pull out. But if you wait and pull out all three potions at the same time, it's like one continuous interruption performed when you know you have a moment to do that.

Perhaps (using a previous Poll I made about combat interruptions) the enemy in really tuckered out from swinging their sword (their Stamina bar is completely empty), and for just a moment they have to hunch over and take a few breaths, back away slowly from you. You see their distraction and open your menu and fill your empty slot without any fear of being distracted yourself. But if they actively engaged in trying to swing a sword at you, or kill you, then there is a chance, however small, that if you try to take that split second to add a new potion to your empty slot right after drinking the first potion in your 3 slots, then the enemy can ruin your effort. What about if your enemy isn't using a sword or knife, you say? Well, for a mage, if it's destruction damage striking you, then the distraction he pulls off if he does pull it off is to cause your flask to explode from the spell that also strikes you. Here how it might look:

1. Fire: your potion boils, rendering it burnt and useless, and not to mention, your potion is now boiling, how could you drink it at this time? (You can try to throw it at your enemy instead of drinking it. If it strikes him, it busts, burning him with boiling liquid.)
2. Ice: your potion is frozen solid, how can you drink it now? (You need to put it back in your inventory until it rethaws in about 1-2 hours)
3. Electricity: the potion is shocked, changing its chemical-magical nature, meaning it could have any kind of odd spell effects now from a huge list of flawed spells that could potentially harm you, some severely. It could be even be cursed or poisoned.
4. Spirit-Based: the potion is imbued with a spirit and should you drink it, you're possessed by a negative spirit that drains your energy, saps your will, etc.... until you undertake a quest to go to certain mystical graveyard in the back of the world where souls can be removed....

In this way, potion refilling and use would become a bit more tactical, adding in a strategic element both for you, AND your enemy. Your flaws in combat give him the time to recharge, and vice verca. Or you can choose to exploit the enemy's flaw (their weak moment) by attacking instead of reloading your potions distraction free. I seem to remember also that there was a limit to the number of potions you could drink while paused, so this system of being able to only load 3 around your neck would also more accurately reflect that limitation, and so I hope something like this can make it into the game.

Thanks.

iirc, the witcher had a drinking animation AND you had to prepare your potions beforehand. as i said, adds to combat tactical considerations

I remember laughing at teh "glug..glugg...glugg" sound in MW and expansions. Thankfully it didn't appear in Oblivion. The ingame clink reminded me of the sound sixteen ounce glass Coca-cola bottles made in my youth. It was one of the things I liked about OB.

Thats an odd thing to be sure about, when no other games of there have drinking animations or similar kinds of things, you don't inject yourself with a stimpak for example. And they were not limited at that point.

yeah i agree. plus it will force you to actually prepare for battle.
i always thought it broke immersion when you could just absorb potions in the middle of battle.

They could do like the first Dungeon Siege game and make you stop all movement, offense, and defense while guzzling your potion of choice. Some part of me really liked that little bit, made me miss it in the second.

nope.avi

There heroes only advantage over anybody else should be the quicksave button and the quicksave button only. If you want the hero experience, turn the difficulty slider down to the lowest setting.

why not? this isnt exactly a realistic game. could be a magic bottle.