History Main / MultipleLifeBars

* ''VideoGame/{{Champions}}'' has at least 3: Stun (go to 0 and you fall unconscious), body (go to 0 and you may die) and endurance (go to 0 and you are too exhausted to take most actions).

* ''Franchise/KingdomHearts'' bosses use layered health bars (which are only visible with the Scan ability). [[VideoGame/KingdomHeartsI In the first game]], there is a single bar that cycles through colors for each additional bar's worth of health (green > blue > yellow > red > purple, with green being the "base"). Some bosses (such as [[VideoGame/FinalFantasy Sephi]][[BonusBoss roth]]) had health ''beyond'' the maximum the bar could display, causing them to appear to be taking no damage from any attacks until they were brought in range. Every game since then has stuck with a green bar and squares underneath, showing how many they had in all.

* For critters with more than 500 [=HP=] in ''VideoGame/ImpressiveTitle'', each extra bar represents an extra 500 [=HP=] and they disappear as the critter's health is lowered.
* ''Franchise/KingdomHearts'' bosses use layered health bars (which are only visible with the Scan ability). In the first game, there is a single bar that cycles through colors for each additional bar's worth of health (green, blue, yellow, red; with green being the "base"). Some bosses had health ''beyond'' the maximum the bar could display, causing them to appear to be taking no damage from any attacks until they were brought in range. Every game since then has stuck with a green bar and squares underneath, showing how many they had in all.

* ''Videogame/LeagueOfLegends'' has a weird example in the form of Kled. He has two health bars: his own and his mount's, Skaarl. While he's mounted on Skaarl, the latter takes all the incoming damage, and any additional health from items, masteries, runes and abilities goes to Skaarl, while Kled's own health grows only by leveling up. When Skaarl's health is depleted, she runs and leaves Kled on his own, and only comes back when he charges up his courage again, regaining Skaarl's health bar on top of his own (whatever is left of it). This can happen several times on a single fight as long as Kled keeps on gaining courage by recklessly attacking the enemy, which makes Skaarl's health bar function more like a regenerating shield for Kled than a proper health bar.

* The ''Videogame/MechWarrior'' series often mixes SubsystemDamage with multiple life bars like [[Tabletopgame/BattleTech its source material]]. Mechs are split between multiple distinct zones (such as legs) which have their armor healthbar and internal structure healthbar. Stripping the armor of a section exposes the internal structure, allowing successive hits to damage the internals and individual components such as weapons. Blast through the internal structure and the entire limb or section is destroyed. A mech is only destroyed if it loses the center torso, [[SnipingTheCockpit cockpit]], or in some games both legs.

* Most of the enemies in ''VideoGame/NekketsuOyako'' have them, especially on higher difficulties, while the FinalBoss has all three.
Your character can have a second life bar by picking up healing items after your first bar is full, this was removed on the Saturn version.

** The earlier builds of ''VideoGame/StarWarsGalaxies'' gave all characters a health, action, and mind bar. Depleting any of these three would result in the character becoming incapacitated and susceptible to a deathblow, and most attacks would hit one of the three at random. Oddly, these were same bars that were expended to perform both combat and non-combat actions, meaning that spamming special attacks in battle could easily reduce the bars to critical levels if you lacked buffs to reduce special costs. The mind bar was also the only one that couldn't be healed in battle, which gave classes with the ability to specifically target it an understandably huge advantage in PvP.

Commonly seen on a MarathonBoss. Contrast SharedLifeMeter.

* 1E ''TabletopGame/GammaWorld''
** Mutants with the Force Field Generation ability could create a force field that absorbed up to 5 dice of damage. Once the force field went down, any further damage reduced the mutant's hit points, and the force field could not be generated again for 24 hours.
** Some types of powered armor had force fields that worked similarly, except that they returned to full strength at the start of the next melee turn even if they took more damage than their limit.

* Games by Palladium, including ''TabletopGame/{{Rifts}}'' and ''TabletopGame/PalladiumRolePlayingGame'', split a living creatures' health into Structural Damage Capacity (SDC) and Hit Points (HP). You lose SDC first, which is considered mostly minor wounds, but once you lose that, you start losing HP, which is your vital life force. SDC heals more quickly. Magical creatures tend to have Mega Damage Capacity instead of either.
* ''TabletopGame/{{Alternity}}'' had four different types of damage, each of which had to be tracked separately: stun, wound, mortal and fatigue. Losing half of your stun or wound points inflicted negative penalties. You suffered the same penalties for ''each'' point of mortal or fatigue damage.
** Armor only prevented the most severe damage, allowing half that value of lower damage to leak through. In theory, you could beat someone into unconsciousness even if they're wearing armor that entirely outmatched your regular damage value.
** Spaceships were divided into sections, each of which could be independently knocked out.
* Some TabletopRPG systems (''TabletopGame/{{Shadowrun}}'' and ''[[TabletopGame/{{Champions}} Hero System]]'' being prominent examples) differentiate stun damage and physical injury and keep track of them separately. Running out of either will knock you out, but recovering from injury is long and hard, while stun damage clears after a short rest.
* Games of ''TabletopGame/MagicTheGathering'' are usually lost when a player runs out of [[HitPoints life]], but you can also lose by accumulating 10 poison counters or running out of cards. All of these have decks behind them, though the poison counter deck used to be weak.
* ''TabletopGame/TheWorldOfDarkness'' tabletop [=RPGs=] all use a mix of SubsystemDamage and Alternate Knockout Conditions: Stun and Bashing damage merely gets converted to Lethal when it exceeds a threshold, but too much Lethal or Aggravated kills you dead.
* ''Iridium System'' has 10 areas (vital and non-vital) for a humanoid character, each with its own fortitude points; damage can be either normal or Concussion (non-lethal).

* ''Tabletopgame/BattleTech'' has both multiple life bars and SubsystemDamage. [[HumongousMecha BattleMechs]] are broken into Left/Center/Right Torso (each with front and rear armor facings), left/right legs and arms, and the head. Each section has Armor and Internal Structure. Once the armor is destroyed, the internal structure will be damaged on every hit and can have a very high probability of causing {{Critical Hit}}s on components mounted in that section. High-value systems like the fusion reactor, stabilization gyroscope, and sensors can take multiple hits (though not with CriticalExistenceFailure, their function will be impaired with each hit before full disability) though most weapons will be disabled in one hit and ammunition magazines will [[MadeOfExplodium go boom with one hit]]. The pilot has a semi-independent "health bar", as things that damage the 'mech may not necessarily injure the pilot. A 'mech may be rendered tactically inert (but possibly salvageable), but the pilot may survive having their 'mech shout out from under them (possibly by [[EjectionSeat hasty vertical evacuation from the 'mech]]). A 'mech might be decapitated by death of the pilot (by whatever cause), but the 'mech can be salvaged. Like the heavy core components, the pilot doesn't have CriticalExistenceFailure either; each injury causes the chance of being rendered unconscious from the injury, with the odds of such happening (and the difficulty of coming to again) increasing with each hit.

* ''VideoGame/{{Iji}}'' has both "Armor" and "HP" stats, for the PlayerCharacter ''and'' enemies. Small arms fire only damages armor, with each HP equating one full armor bar. However, powerful attacks (melee attacks, explosives) directly damage HP, bypassing the armor entirely.
** Some bosses have such high HP that the stat is displayed with multiple layered bars. The FinalBoss has up to ''eight'' life bars.
* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyV'' gives us the debut of Golem, who once summoned absorbs damage for your party.
* Two superbosses in ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXII'', the Hell Wyrm and Yiazmat specifically, each had a variant of the game's normal boss health bar. What makes theirs different is the fact that they have '''50''' health bars apiece. Not too bad with the Hell Wyrm, which had only 8,930,711 HP. This sounds like a lot, and it is, but the game's battle system means you can hit hard and rapidly if you've got your Gambits set up right. That's ''nothing'' compared to what Yiazmat has. You really wanna know, huh? Well... 50,112,254 HP. There's a reason why Yiazmat is the page image for MarathonBoss. Strangely, the other superboss of the game, Omega Mark XII, does NOT have a health bar like this, considering how it has 10,370,699 HP in the Japanese version (even there it doesn't have it!) Possibly justified for the western releases, [[{{Nerfing}} which took 9,000,000 health off its original counterpart]].
* ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}'''s Substitute ability does this; the user pays 25% of their max [[HitPoints health]] to hide behind a plush Pokémon-esque doll (likely in a ShoutOut to ''VideoGame/{{Earthbound}}'', that had inventory-carried teddy bears that served a similar purpose) that has the exact same HP as the user lost, and absorbs any attack barring [[MakeMeWannaShout sound-based moves]] or the [[ArmorPiercingAttack Infiltrator]] ability - and while it seems like a UselessUsefulSpell, and often is in the [[PlayTheGameSkipTheStory main story]]; it has a plethora of secondary effects, including status immunity, and can also assist with [[GradualGrinder stalling tactics]] or even be Baton Passed onto another team member to protect them on switch-in.
* Some videogame bosses have multi-layered life bars, with each bar's depletion triggering a change in the boss' behavior. (cf. SequentialBoss, TurnsRed)
** Bosses in ''VideoGame/{{Touhou}}'' games have multiple life bars. Whenever one is depleted they switch to the next attack pattern.
** Several bosses in ''VideoGame/DistortedTravesty'' have multiple life bars, and usually [[TurnsRed change their behaviour]] after one of them is depleted.
* In the ''Franchise/{{Gundam}} Battle Assault'' games, instead of duels utilizing a best-two-out-of-three format, each fighter had three life meters. When one is depleted, the mech is "overheated" and flinches for a moment, but the fight otherwise continues without interruption.
* In ''VideoGame/{{Thexder}}'', using the shields activated a secondary (temporary) meter that could absorb 100 HP of damage, while your main LifeMeter was impervious to damage in the meantime.
* Many ''VideoGame/HarvestMoon'' games have both Stamina (your primary bar) and Fatigue (your secondary bar). Fatigue is harder to recover, and if you expend too much of it, it won't fully recover even by going to sleep. You'll need items. You burn Fatigue by working during bad weather or by working when your Stamina is empty.
* ''VideoGame/EVEOnline'' ships have shield, armor, and hull HP bars. Layered, but once one bar is sufficiently lowered, damage can start bleeding through to the layer underneath.
** If shield and armor are gone, the ship's weapons and modules are exposed to attacks. Any damage to hull may bleed through modules, damaging or disabling them. Even if the ship survives the ordeal, it has to dock up and get repairs to be spaceworthy again.
* The ''X Wing'' series and ''[[VideoGame/DarkForcesSaga Dark Forces]]'' series feature shields and health. In ''X Wing'', shields regenerate. In ''VideoGame/{{Dark Forces|Saga}}'', they take energy damage, but not punches. 0% on your health points kills you.
* ''VideoGame/{{Crackdown}}'' has an armor meter that regenerates fairly quickly, which gives way to a health meter that regens more slowly.
* ''VideoGame/MegaManZero'' introduced layered life bars to the series, and ''VideoGame/MegaManZX'' continued this tradition. In fact, you can even get your own layered life bar.
** Before that, most of the final bosses relied on having at least 2 phases as extra health, while ''Wily Wars'' featured Hyperstorm H, the only boss that had more than one health bar in the series, not counting layers or phases.
* Most bosses in ''VideoGame/ScurgeHive'' have layered life bars.
* ''Franchise/KingdomHearts'' bosses use layered health bars (which are only visible with the Scan ability). In the first game, there is a single bar that cycles through colors for each additional bar's worth of health (green, blue, yellow, red; with green being the "base"). Some bosses had health ''beyond'' the maximum the bar could display, causing them to appear to be taking no damage from any attacks until they were brought in range. Every game since then has stuck with a green bar and squares underneath, showing how many they had in all.
* ''VideoGame/ViewtifulJoe'' has layered health bars.
* ''VideoGame/MischiefMakers'' has three layered health bars. This was also affected by the game's continue system; if you went down during a level, you could pay in extra Red Gems to continue with more than just the basic first layer of health.

* The ''Film/XMenOriginsWolverine'' LicensedGame had layered hit points for Wolverine: he had a standard life meter, and a "Vitals" life meter underneath that, representing his internal organs. The main difference is that his internal organs regenerated health more slowly.

* In ''VideoGame/LegendOfMana'', both you and the enemies you fight can have layered health bars. The colors in order were blue, green, yellow, orange, then red, though characters with sufficiently high HP would have the colors alternate between blue and green numerous times before progressing to the others.
* The ''VideoGame/StreetsOfRage'' series tend to give the bosses these, and, depending on difficulty level, some of the lower-level {{Mooks}} as well. ''Streets of Rage 3'' threw on a [[DifficultyByRegion couple more layers for the English release.]]

* ''VideoGame/MediEvil'' has a potion system for undead hero Sir Fortesque; any time he recieves fatal damage, he automatically uses a full health potion if available, which represents each extra life bar. This had the good side-effect of preventing strong attacks from dealing extra damage once an extra health bar was depleted.
* Bosses in ''VideoGame/BreathOfFireI'' had 2 life bars. A normal life bar, and a hidden one that activated once the normal life bar was depleted. The boss typically [[TurnsRed changed tactics]] once the hidden life bar activated.
* The ''VideoGame/SyphonFilter'' series has a health bar that's intentionally obscured by an armor bar. When armor is depleted, your health is damaged directly. Notably, armor was much tougher than health, as the same amount of damage to completely reduce your health to zero will only take off about half of your armor. Headshots bypass armor directly and are always instantly fatal.
* In ''VideoGame/DissidiaFinalFantasy'', you have crystals representing every 1000 hit points (up to 9 crystals). The sequel, on the other hand, has a straight-forward bar reflecting your percentage of remaining HP.
* ''VideoGame/{{Metroid}}'' games have Samus with multiple energy tanks. ''VideoGame/SuperMetroid'' also adds the Reserve Tank system, a secondary health storage method that could be triggered manually or when Samus runs out of energy in her main tanks.

* The ''Franchise/MassEffect'' series uses kinetic barriers (referred to as "shields" by you and your squadmates) followed by your actual health. Enemies in ''VideoGame/MassEffect2'' can have up to three layers of HP, the first being their Barrier or Shield, the second being their Armor and the last one being their Health. ''VideoGame/MassEffect3'' makes Armor an alternative to Health rather than a layer of protection.
* In ''VideoGame/MapleStory'', higher-leveled bosses will have multiple health bars, layered on top of each other. The different layers of the health bar are color-coded, allowing players to keep constant track of the battle.
* ''VideoGame/DragonAgeInquisition'' has health meters as usual, along with two possible extension on health. Barriers can be cast on party members by Mages, though they erode over time and don't benefit from armor damage reduction. Guard is generated by certain Warrior abilities, and while it has a far lower cap than Barrier, Guard does benefit from armor and doesn't deplete over time. Barriers are also vulnerable to magic-dispelling effects, while Guard is not.

* The final bosses of ''VideoGame/Rockman4MinusInfinity.''
** The Wily Machine's first phase has what can only be described as a health bar ''[[UpToEleven made of health bars]]''. That is, one full health bar, where each hit point represents its own separate health bar. That adds up to 29 times 28, or 812 hit points. However, it takes above average damage from every weapon and lacks MercyInvincibility, so it's not as durable as it sounds.
** The Wily Capsule later on has two health bars, giving it 56 hit points.
** And then the Petit Robot Masters, who each has his own lifebar, with the one last hit's currently shown. That adds up to 8 times 28, or 224 hit points.
*** The Petit Robot Masters are defused somewhat by the [[EleventhHourSuperpower Wily Buster]], which takes them out in a few shots.
* ''VideoGame/PlanetSide'' has 2 life bars (or 3, with an implant) for its soldiers. Armor varies by the suit worn by the player, and absorbs some of the damage of incoming fire. Health is self-explanatory. With the Personal Shield implant, you could fuel a shield using your stamina, effectively giving you a third life bar. Vehicles had only one health bar by default, but certain facilities would charge up a "Shield" health bar on the vehicle when inside the facility's sphere of influence.
** ''VideoGame/PlanetSide 2'' follows the RegeneratingShieldsStaticHealth model for its foot soldiers, and only has one life bar for vehicles and PowerArmor.
* ''VideoGame/TeamFortress2'' features Temporary Hitpoints known as "overheal", bestowed by the Medic's Medigun and certain LifeDrain weapons. Overheal slowly depletes over time (how fast it depletes depends on your maximum HP; full overheal will always be gone after 20 seconds).
* This was parodied in the ''Film/SpiderMan2'' tie-in game. After having dealt with Mysterio a couple of times, running his obstacle courses and fighting through his [[HallOfMirrors fun house of illusion]], all that's left is to defeat and capture him. Spidey gets word that Mysterio is...[[FelonyMisdemeanor robbing a convenience store]]. Spidey shows up at the store, and when he approaches, a boss icon for Mysterio appears onscreen, which is then encircled by three health meters.[[note]]This is impressive looking, since the player has already fought Rhino, who had only one health meter.[[/note]] Spidey's first punch knocks him down and depletes all three meters. It turns out that without all his [[MasterOfIllusion smoke and mirrors]], Mysterio isn't all that impressive.
* The bosses of ''VideoGame/TheWorldEndsWithYou'' each have two layered health bars, a yellow one with more health and a green one with less. Bosses generally [[TurnsRed Turn Red]] at around the start of the green bar.
* The ''VideoGame/StreetsOfRage'' series has multiple life bars for boss characters or mooks that have a ton of health. In the first game, a boss' life bar would not empty, but it would go through different color shades to indicate damage. Once their life bar turned orange, it then depletes as normal. The last two games has enemies with multiple life bars work the same way as the player's life bar where once it fully depletes, the next one pops up.
* The final boss of ''VideoGame/DeadRising2 Case West'' and the final boss of ''Off the Record'' both have a total of three life bars, which is three times the life of a normal psychopath.
* ''VideoGame/TheOutfoxies'' uses the layered variant with three bars for each character, going from green to yellow to red.
* Characters in ''VideoGame/StarOceanTillTheEndOfTime'' get knocked out if they run out of mana, and many attacks exploit it by [[ManaBurn targeting]] [[ManaMeter magic points]] instead of or in addition to HitPoints, resulting in this trope.
* ''VideoGame/MetalGear'' games starting with ''[[VideoGame/MetalGearSolid2SonsOfLiberty Sons of Liberty]]'' (for enemies; the player doesn't get a separate stamina bar until ''[[VideoGame/MetalGearSolid3SnakeEater Snake Eater]]'') have separate stamina/psyche and health bars. The former is only drained by non-lethal weapons which are usually more difficult to use than their lethal counterparts (and games where the player has one, the bar slowly empties to represent starvation and/or exertion), but knocking enemies out has advantages (the most obvious one being that most bosses in the series give you some sort of bonus for knocking them out instead of killing them).
* ''VideoGame/{{Champions}}'' has at least 3: Stun (go to 0 and you fall unconscious), body (go to 0 and you may die) and endurance (go to 0 and you are too exhausted to take most actions).
* ''VideoGame/BillyVsSNAKEMAN'' Delivery Missions have Drivetrain (the HP of your bike/car), Durability (the HP of the pizza box you're delivering), and Deliciousness (the temperature/HP of the contents of the box, also a time limiter for your run). All of these are needed to continue, so at higher difficulties the game's about anticipating the most likely threats and balancing speed, risk and high-stress maneuvers.
* ''VideoGame/PrimalRage'' uses both a traditional health meter, as well as a "brain meter." When it was depleted, the character would become temporarily stunned, allowing the opponent to get in some free hits.
* Petey Piranha in ''VideoGame/SuperSmashBros Brawl'' holds 2 cages, each one with a life bar, to defeat him you have to destroy either of the cages while attacking him directly lowers both cages bars equally. You can abuse this fact by positioning yourself so your attacks hit both him and one of the cages simultaneously.
* The earlier builds of ''VideoGame/StarWarsGalaxies'' gave all characters a health, action, and mind bar. Depleting any of these three would result in the character becoming incapacitated and susceptible to a deathblow, and most attacks would hit one of the three at random. Oddly, these were same bars that were expended to perform both combat and non-combat actions, meaning that spamming special attacks in battle could easily reduce the bars to critical levels if you lacked buffs to reduce special costs. The mind bar was also the only one that couldn't be healed in battle, which gave classes with the ability to specifically target it an understandably huge advantage in PvP.

* In ''VideoGame/TheReconstruction'', every character has Body, Mind and Soul points, all of which serve as HitPoints and {{mana}} at the same time. Any of these reaching zero KO's the character.
** The prequel ''Videogame/IMissTheSunrise'' does the same with spacecrafts' hull, systems and pilot.
* ''VideoGame/MasterOfOrion 2'' has damage applied to sectored regenerating shields, then armor, then hull structure and systems -- drive, computer and shield generator has separate points, other systems are either broken or not. A ship is killed only when its structure ''or'' drive is reduced to 0 HP. Drives are low on HP, but rarely get hit and stations haven't any. Some weapons can penetrate normal shields or armor, emission-guided missile variant always hits drives and [[{{EMP}} one gun]] ignores armor and structure, dealing only shield and system damage, which can immobilize or kill ships really quick. All bypassing measures can be [[NoSell countered]], though.
* ''VideoGame/WingCommander'' has shields and then various part of the ship damaged and repaired separately.
* ''VideoGame/VegaStrike'' has sectored regenerating shields, then sectored ablative armor, then hull. Each hit to the hull has a {{c|riticalHit}}hance of causing SubsystemDamage. "Non-lethal" {{EMP}} weapons don't kill the hull and can disable a ship so it can be captured.
* ''VideoGame/ChaosLegion'' bosses often have multiple life bars (up to four) in different colors (yellow, green, blue, purple). Subverted with the {{mooks}} in the game, who may have different-colored life bars, but those life bars are merely indicators of how tough they are (mooks with yellow bars die quickly, while those with white bars will take a while to take down).
* ''VideoGame/{{Bayonetta}}'' and [[VideoGame/{{Bayonetta2}} its sequel]] has some of the tougher enemies and especially bosses who have multiple life bars (up to five layers) in different colors. For example, if you see an enemy with a green life bar, get ready for a long fight, but when you see a boss with a white life bar, get ready for a ''really'' long fight.
* ''VideoGame/TheWonderful101'', in the same vein as Bayonetta, can also have bosses with multiple life bars. Most bosses have somewhere around five to ''ten'' layers of health. If you see a boss that has a purple life bar, then get ready for a really long battle. [[spoiler: The final boss's health bar has ''[[UpToEleven eleven]]'' layers.]]
* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyX'' has a GiantFlyer enemy that basically has an extra lifebar: it starts out every battle flying but lands when heavily damaged. Thing is, you can't one-shot it even with 99999s, it always goes to the landed stage with HPToOne.
* In ''Rapid Reload'' for the UsefulNotes/PlayStation, Area Bosses have several overlapping life bars, going from blue to green (which is the color of the player's only life bar) to yellow and finally to red. There is also a digital counter, which helps show the damage you're dealing on tougher bosses whose blue bars won't start going down until they're more than halfway to destruction.
* ''VideoGame/RaptorCallOfTheShadows'' has this for the ''player''. Each set of purchasable shields effectively gives the player an extra health bar. A maximum of five extra layers could be purchased from the store, but an unlimited amount could be stacked if you found them in the levels. Of course, considering how rarely they were found, if you were good enough to build up a significant stock over the normal maximum you didn't need those extra shields in the first place.

* The ''Videogame/MechWarrior'' series often mixes SubsystemDamage with multiple life bars like [[Tabletopgame/BattleTech its source material]]. Mechs are split between multiple distinct zones (such as legs) which have their armor healthbar and internal structure healthbar. Stripping the armor of a section exposes the internal structure, allowing successive hits to damage the internals and individual components such as weapons. Blast through the internal structure and the entire limb or section is destroyed. A mech is only destroyed if it loses the center torso, [[SnipingTheCockpit cockpit]], or in some games both legs.

* Bosses in ''VideoGame/NinjaBaseballBatman'' have two life bars.

* ''GuildWars2'' has the Necromancer's Death Shroud that radically modifies their abilities and adds a second layer of health that slowly decays over time when activated but prevents healing except for a few specific Necromancer traits that give gradual healing. The ''Path of Fire'' expansion adds the Barrier mechanic, used mainly by the Scourge and Weaver elite specializations, that adds temporary health that decays very rapidly and cannot exceed half the recipient's maximum health.

* The Japanese version of ''VideoGame/TheSimpsons'' arcade game allows for players’ health to extend past 100% (represented by different colors) This was left out of the international versions, but is in the XBLA/PSN release when playing [[spoiler: the unlockable Japanese ROM.]]
* In ''VideoGame/DivinityOriginalSinII'', every combat-capable character has both physical and magic armor from their gear in addition to a life bar; monsters generally have physical armor from their natural defenses but little to no magic armor. Each type of armor absorbs damage from attacks of that type until it's depleted, at which point that damage type will start draining the person's HP. Most status effects from abilities can only take effect if one of the armor types is depleted. A few attacks ignore both types of armor altogether, but they generally have long cooldowns to prevent them from being used several times in one battle.

* VideoGame/TheOutfoxies uses the layered variant with three bars for each character, going from green to yellow to red.

* ''Franchise/MetalGear'' games starting with ''[[VideoGame/MetalGearSolid2SonsOfLiberty Sons of Liberty]]'' (for enemies; the player doesn't get a separate stamina bar until ''[[VideoGame/MetalGearSolid3SnakeEater Snake Eater]]'') have separate stamina/psyche and health bars. The former is only drained by non-lethal weapons which are usually more difficult to use than their lethal counterparts (and games where the player has one, the bar slowly empties to represent starvation and/or exertion), but knocking enemies out has advantages (the most obvious one being that most bosses in the series give you some sort of bonus for knocking them out instead of killing them).

* ''VideoGame/BillyVsSNAKEMAN'' Delivery Missions has Drivetrain (the HP of your car), Durability (the HP of the box you're delivering), and Deliciousness (the HP of the contents of the box).

* ''VideoGame/DivinityOriginalSinII'', every combat-capable character has both physical and magic armor from their gear in addition to a life bar; monsters generally have physical armor from their natural defenses but little to no magic armor. Each type of armor absorbs damage from attacks of that type until it's depleted, at which point that damage type will start draining the person's HP. Most status effects from abilities can only take effect if one of the armor types is depleted. A few attacks ignore both types of armor altogether, but they generally have long cooldowns to prevent them from being used several times in one battle.

* In ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons'' 3[[superscript:rd]] Edition, some powers can deal damage to a target's [[TheSixStats ability scores]]. At high levels, a lot of monsters have hundreds or even thousands of HP and often a HealingFactor, but only 10 points of their lowest ability score, and most creatures don't have anything to heal ability damage. Since a creature is incapacitated for at least a day when any of its abilities falls to zero, this is a GameBreaker that was not carried over to 4[[superscript:th]] Edition.

* In the third edition of ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons'', some powers can deal damage to a target's ability scores. At high levels, a lot of monsters have hundreds or even thousands of HP, but only 10 points of their lowest ability score, and most creatures don't have anything to heal ability damage. This makes it a GameBreaker that was removed from 4E.

* ''TabletopGame/TheWorldOfDarkness'' tabletop [=RPGs=] (and video games based on them, such as ''VideoGame/VampireTheMasqueradeBloodlines'') all use a mix of SubsystemDamage and Alternate Knockout Conditions: Stun and Bashing damage merely gets converted to Lethal when it exceeds a threshold, but too much Lethal or Aggravated kills you dead.

* ''GuildWars2'' has the Necromaner's Death Shroud that radically modifies their abilities and adds a second layer of health that slowly decays over time when activated but prevents healing except for a few specific Necromancer traits that give gradual healing. The ''Path of Fire'' expansion adds the Barrier mechanic, used mainly by the Scourge and Weaver elite specializations, that adds temporary health that decays very rapidly and cannot exceed half the recipient's maximum health.

* ''TabletopGame/Numenera'' has three pools which serve as both HP and as fuel for the character's abilities: Might, Speed, and Intellect.

* The Zoltan Shield in ''VideoGame/FTLFasterThanLight'' functions much like one of these. It blocks all incoming attacks and prevents your ship from hacking, boarding and mind controlling. The standard shield [[RegeneratingShieldStaticHealth cannot block missiles but slowly recharges. When damaged, your ship takes hull damage and the system hit takes SubsystemDamage.

* In the ''VideoGame/DynastyWarriors franchise, several games feature boss characters with multiple health bars. The Arslan crossover game incorporates an "overshield" mechanic, in which an active shield protects the boss. The shield must be attacked and depleted before the boss characters starts to receive normal damage. In the One Piece game, boss characters' have a single health bar, split into multiple sections, which signify the different "phases" of the fight.

* ''Franchise/DragonBall Advanced Adventure'' uses the method of layered lifebars to indicate that much more health while conserving screen space. Even though there's health power-ups that give you more layers on your lifebar, the first fights against General Tao and King Piccolo start you with one layer when the opponent has several, the telltale sign that [[HopelessBossFight the plot's calling for Goku to get clobbered]].

* In ''VideoGame/Maplestory'', higher-leveled bosses will have multiple health bars, layered on top of each other. The different layers of the health bar are color-coded, allowing players to keep constant track of the battle.

* ''Earthsiege'' utilize multiple lifebars to distinguish between energy shields (which may regenerate) and armor/HP for various components, usually resulting in SubsystemDamage as your armor/HP reaches low levels.

* ''TabletopGame/TheWorldOfDarkness'' tabletop [=RPGs=] (and video games based on them, such as ''VampireTheMasqueradeBloodlines'') all use a mix of SubsystemDamage and Alternate Knockout Conditions: Stun and Bashing damage merely gets converted to Lethal when it exceeds a threshold, but too much Lethal or Aggravated kills you dead.

* ''Videogame/LeagueOfLegends'' has a weird example in the form of Kled. He has two health bars: his own and his mount's, Skaarl. While he's mounted on Skaarl, the latter takes all the incoming damage, and any additional health from items, masteries, runes and abilities goes to Skaarl, while Kled's own health grows only by leveling up. When Skaarl's health is depleted, she runs and leaves Kled on his own, and only comes back when he charges up his courage again, regaining Skaarl's health bar on top of his own (whatever is left of it). This can happen several times on a single fight as long as Kled keeps on gaining courage by recklessl attacking the enemy, which makes Skaarl's health bar function more like a regenerating shield.

* The Zoltan Shield in ''VideoGame/FTLFasterThanLight functions much like one of these.

* The FinalBoss of ''VideoGame/ClockTower 3''. This is quite jarring because no other boss had these, so seeing his death count translate to ''three full-sized health bars'' may have caused quite an OhCrap.

* Some TabletopRPG systems (''TabletopGame/{{Shadowrun}}'' and ''[[{{Champions}} Hero System]]'' being prominent examples) differentiate stun damage and physical injury and keep track of them separately. Running out of either will knock you out, but recovering from injury is long and hard, while stun damage clears after a short rest.