Clamped State with Helper Delegation

When a field has bounds and multiple methods update it relatively, the cleanest design has one setter that handles clamping and other mutators that delegate to it. This keeps the clamping logic in one place.

On the AP exam, this pattern appears in any health/score/balance class where the field is bounded.

Player class

public class Player {
    private int health;
    private static final int MIN = 0, MAX = 100;

    public Player() { health = MAX; }

    public void setHealth(int newHealth) {
        if (newHealth < MIN) newHealth = MIN;
        if (newHealth > MAX) newHealth = MAX;
        this.health = newHealth;
    }

    public void takeDamage(int amount) {
        setHealth(health - amount);
    }

    public void heal(int amount) {
        setHealth(health + amount);
    }

    public int getHealth() { return health; }
    public boolean isAlive() { return health > 0; }
}

Why this is cleaner than direct manipulation

Without delegation, takeDamage and heal would each need to check bounds — three places to maintain. Delegation puts the logic in one method.