Health Globe

Health Globes are orbs of life energy that can drop from some slain monsters. Characters refill their hit points by walking over health globes. The benefit of health globes are shared to every player in the area. Health globes persist forever, and if not consumed after a battle will float in space indefinitely, allowing players to save them for later, if necessary.

Two health orbs after battle. Full picture.

In early builds of Diablo III there were also Mana Globes, but these were removed in mid-2009, and Health Globes now provide mana bonuses to characters using mana.

The official Diablo III website includes a flavorful explanation of the health system.

Why They Exist

One health orb in the middle of a fray. Full picture.

While there isn't a given reason in the lore (yet) for these power-ups floating in mid air like an arcade game, the reason for their existence in the gameplay is to increase speed of gameplay without relying so heavily on potions. The development team wanted to keep Diablo III fast paced and filled with action, not waiting idly for health or mana to regenerate. Jay Wilson also said that they wanted to change the old potion-based combat (where potions were basically extensions of your health and mana pools) to a system that encouraged a more tactical play style.

Game Mechanics

Health globes work as you would expect. After stepping on them, you get an increase in health. The increase occurs over time (not instantaneous) and you can only activate them if you are lacking health. The interesting thing about multiplayer and orbs is that they heal all party members in the vicinity, enabling any player to become a makeshift healer. Even if the person picking up the orb is at full health, other members of the party will be healed.

The drop rate is quite low, but with the sheer number of monsters coming at players, there should rarely be a lack of orbs. If health orb drops become few and far between, health potions can still be used. However, health potions have a significant cooldown period between uses. Additional tweaks have also been promised.

We're also playing around with some alternate functionality for when/how they're picked up while you're at full health, as well as some visual tweaks. Regardless we're going to make sure it's as fun and balanced as possible.

Health globes restore health on a percentage basis. If the globe is meant to fill 25% of a character's hit points, then a Barbarian would recover more health (in absolute terms) from one than a Witch Doctor would. Regardless, both would see their health fill the same relative amount.

Drop Rates

During an interview with Gamereactor (@2:45) at GC2008, Jay Wilson stated that they intend for health globes to drop at about a 25-35% frequency. He also added that health globe drops would not affect treasure/loot drops.

Boss Battles

During Boss battles, or battles with rares and champions, Jay Wilson said "they would drop health globes at percentages of their health. Rares in particular are almost guaranteed to drop about every 25%."

Arena Health Orbs

Health orb Arena sequence.

Health orbs appear in the Arena every so often, on pre-set points. There were four such points in the arena map seen at Blizzcon 2010, all located around the center of the arena. Orbs appeared there, always on all 4 spots, 30 seconds after the start of each round. (Assuming the round wasn't already over.)

Health orbs grabbed in the arena grant their full benefit (40% of max hit points) to all nearby members of the team, as well as minions. This dynamic can be seen in the three shot series to the right, where the blue team Witch Doctor gets an orb which grants a health bonus to his Mongrels, as well as the blue team Barbarian.

Characters and minions need to be nearby to share in this health bonus; a character off the visible screen will not partake of the healing bonus.

Health Orbs were a strategic factor in the Arena matches; getting them was obviously a benefit, but it was also helpful to grab them simply to deny the heal to the enemy team.

That the health orb spawn points were right in the middle of the arena forced the action into the center of the level. Many rounds ended with the last survivor of one team dodging attacks around the perimeter of the level, and while this could extend a round for some time, it was very seldom a way to win, since the pursuers tended to be in the middle and would therefore score some health orbs, while the character running for it had no chance to heal up as they hid.

Appearance

A new globe as seen in the Wizard gameplay trailer.]] In the BlizzCon 2008 build, health globes experienced a slight visual change. Some sort of ornamental graphic on the top and bottom of the globes (like a small golden crown) were added.

Health Globes and Mana

In the GamesCom 2009 demo, Mana Globes have been removed. At the end of one video, the Wizard regains a large amount of mana by picking up a Health Globe. This is because they now get mana - as well as health - from Health Globes if they invested in Stability Control.

Witch Doctors also receive mana benefits from health globes if they have invested in certain mana recovery skills.

Controversy

There has been some small level of controversy about these Health Orbs as some players do not like the idea of "power-ups" in a RPG game. It is nowhere near the levels of the art controversy, but some people are genuinely upset.

In either way, it is highly unlikely that Blizzard will change Health Orbs significantly at this point.

Development

The first Health Globe was shown at WWI 2008 with the announcement of Diablo III and the Barbarian/Witch Doctor. It was originally just a floating red "blob", but has since received a graphics update (as of BlizzCon 2008) with a little golden crown on the top and bottom.

By BlizzCon 2009, the mechanics of the globe had been changed slightly as well (with the disappearance of Mana Globes). In the BlizzCon 2009 build, health globes gave mana to Wizards using the Stability Control skill. Stability Control was removed from the game prior to Blizzcon 2010.

In January 2010, the Wizard got a confirmed new resource pool known only as instability. Instability has since been removed and replaced with Arcane Power. The Witch Doctor, however, might still be able to benefit from Health Globes when recuperating mana.

References

Additional resources:

• Full Wizard Skill Trees
• GamesCom 2009 demo
• Wizard Gameplay Blizzcon 2008