Thread: health...

Well all you'd have to do is have it reprint the amount of health whenever it's changed. So if your enemy attacks and does damage then you would print the new value of 'health'. I'm not sure if that's what you're looking for or not, if not then I guess try to be a little more detailed.

Are you doing this in dos, 'cause if you are:
- you must create the main loop
- you must clear the screen at the end of loop
so you could write your health like this:

Code:

for(int i = 0; i < heath; i++)
{
      cout<<"|";
}

Well this is quite simple really.

First turn the health value into a percentage of the total.

Code:

float fHealthCoef=(float)CurrentHealth/(float)TotalHealth;

Now take this value and multiply it by the vertical height or horizontal width of your health meter.

Code:

float fHealthBarSize=fHealthBarGaugeSize*fHealthCoef;

Now find the starting x,y and add fBarSize to the correct component.

This would be for a horizontal gauge

Code:

float fHealthBarRight=(float)HealthBarGaugeLeft+fHealthBarSize;
..convert to integer and draw bar here

This is akin to a progress bar control in win32 programming. That stupid bar that comes up when you are installing programs that tells you how much is left to install(if you are pessimistic) or how much has been installed (if you are optimistic).

While clearing the screen seems like a good way to do this, take note at how successful things like MUDs have become where they display a bar of health, mana, stamina... or whatever else is important with every move.

Code:

HP: 100 | MP: 45 | MM: 88 > North
- You enter the great plains.

HP: 100 | MP: 45 | MM: 87 >

You don't need great graphics to make a good game. I wouldn't even think of doing a health bar unless I was doing a graphical program as Bubba appears to be suggesting. Then a meter would be slick and professional looking.

Easiest or most portable?

Look into the gotoxy() function in conio.h or windows.h. It's really not the best function to use if you want portability though.