Work around for balls bouncing too low

So I've got a layout full of circular sprites with the bullet behavior. Sometimes one such ball will hit the environment in such a way that it travels nearly horizontal near the ground. I want to have a player that is confined to the floor (no jumping) that won't be damaged by such balls. I want the player to only be allowed to destroy balls above her. My current best idea is to have a life bar that recharges. Anyone have other ideas?

EDIT ---

(Maybe this is a more readable format)

Game type: walking left/right, shooting up to destroy balls

Problem: the balls sometimes end up bouncing so low that the player can't destroy them without being hit by them

Best solution so far: a rechargeable life bar

Any ideas?

Hi bachrock. Could you set an invisible ground at head level so that the balls don't bounce so low?

P.S. Jacques Loussier fan by any chance?

Thanks for the suggestion, — Part of the gameplay involves avoiding balls so having an invisible ground would remove that difficulty.

Another idea I had was to have the balls destroyed if they're both near the ground and have a velocity vector sufficiently close to horizontal. It's not ideal though and I haven't tested whether it's doable or not.

EDIT: I had to look up Jacques Loussier. My Bach knowledge is far less than my rock knowledge.

Maybe turning 'bounce of solids' off in the bullet behavior and making my own bouncing behaviors using instance variables is the way to go...

What shape is the environment?

If it's just square you could do this:

Could you make the player's collision poly round and bounce the balls off the player? The bounce off object action may work well enough for that to get the ball out of the horizontal path.

R0J0hound:

The environment is relatively square, yes. I guess I left out that I want the balls to be under the influence of gravity. Still, I think your general solution is the way to go. Thanks for that.

How would I set up equations to model a ball bouncing back and forth across a flat room at a constant max. height?