Plethora of ideas? Check. No idea what I'm doing? Check.

[Deepthroat]

Hey, I'm new, what's up. Okay, the title isn't completely true, but anyway...

So, I've always loved playing video games and it's been a dream to design video games. I found out about RPG Maker, and picked up Maker 3 last year. I spent a few months working on a game where I thought I was doing everything correctly, but...

Judgement day came, I started up my deformed creation... I couldn't talk to anyone. My battles were completely screwed up, where I die in one hit, and then my other character kills the monster with one hit and levels up by three. It was basically an unplayable mess.

I was so angry at how much time I wasted and figured I'd have to start from scratch, and even then I didn't know what to do, that I buried the game in my closet and moved on to games that required less thinking, and more mindless violence like Battlefront Renegade Squadron and Mercenaries. Yay! I needed room I my memory card though, so I ended up deleting my mess of a game.

Since then, I haven't given up on becoming a game designer and have signed up for classes. I'm doing fine, but we haven't gotten too deep into it; it's like puzzles and linear games.

So I dug out this game, and I want to design a game with it, and I want to understand what I'm doing, but I don't want to spend all my time to create something that is unplayable. So, before I get started again, I was wondering if I could have some help:

1. Can someone tell me exactly what variables and events are? I know from the classes, but I can't say I know how to work them in the game.

2. How do I use variables and events? Can someone please just give me a detailed... guide, I suppose to using them? In my last game, I tried avoiding events as much as possible (if I remember correctly, I wasn't as confused with variables, but a little review would be greatly appreciated) and I ended up with that mess. Now I know I NEED to use them...

3. Can I have a, I suppose chart type of thing, or guide, as to what are good numbers for enemy health/enemy attack power/hero health/hero attack power/hero level up numbers.

4. How can I bring up multiple answers for questions? For example: Do you accept this quest? And then you can choose yes or no, and they both bring up different scenarios.

5. Can someone give me a layout of how to go about doing these things? I didn't like how you just start anywhere; it was a little awkward. How did you do it in an easy way? Make the character or weapons first? Like what is a good place to start?

6. Say I screw up as much as in my first game. Is it a lost cause, and easier to start from scratch, or can it still be saved?

7. Anyway to have battles with character models?

Sorry if this is in the wrong place and it's length, but I really want to understand how to use this. Thanks to all that help, and to whoever actually explains everything easily in detail, I will be forever in your dept!

[Fading]

There are far better candidates to answer your questions, but I've received a lot of help so will try to help the best I can in return.

1. Variables, best way I can describe them is with an example. There is this guy in my first game named Delen. He will only give you a ride back after you talk to the other 3 survivors. I had in Delen's event coding to check, "Gaia variable = 3", and anything below it. Now the 3 survivors (Dexy, worried mother, and kid) all had in their event coding to add 1 to Gaia Island's variables when you talked to them. So each one added 1 to Gaia, and Delen had a specific set of events that triggered when you talked to him at 3. Anything less and the main character would say something along the lines of, "I still need to check the Island, I'm not leaving until I find my family", at 3 you would say, "I've checked the entire Island, my family....dad, mom, Eric...." and so on. Basically think of it like a way to have certain events trigger only when you want them to. You could have a guy talk normal, and have it where a boss fight gives +1 variable to him to where he'll say something different.

2. How do you use them? Well Events have 3 modes, Touch, Auto, Button. Touch activates when you physically touch the event. Auto triggers the second you are on the same map, town or whatever. Button is by pressing a the x button when next to it. So let's say you have an auto event in a house, and have it say, "Home sweet home". The second you enter that house, that message appears. The problem tho is it will loop, as it's auto it'll say "home sweet home" and then the second it ends it will just trigger again. So you need to add 2 pages. Have the first as auto and have it say what you want, and then under that add in another code. Add in change mode = 2, that will change the page to 2, have page 2 as empty and touch or button. That way the auto event will trigger, and then switch to the second page which does nothing.

Also if you don't want to see an event, have it as invisible. Make sure it's on a path you have to walk over where you want it to trigger at. Or if you want it to give you an item, make it a pedestal and have it as button, then in the event coding section go to party control and have it give you the item you want. There are many many things you can do with events, you just have to be creative. It's not too hard when you get the hang of it.

3. There are a few thread on this, I found them with the search function. However to my understanding it goes like this. Half of your armor + your entire natural def = minimum enemy strength...I think. So like if your leather armor gives 12 armor, and you have 6 natural defense points, at 12 strength the enemy will do 0 damage. At 13 strength he will do 1 damage, at 14 he'll do 2 and so on. Of course the reverse is the same for you.

I recommend you make stats go up slowly as well. Have strength increase by 3 per level rather than 14. At 14 you'll have 28 strength at level 2, you will start 1 hitting monsters quick. Same with defense, at level 1 they may do 20 damage, at level 2 they'd do 0. I recommend leveling stats be kept at small controllable levels. Make up the lack of strength and defense, both physical and magical in armor and weapons.

4. Mutliple questions is easy. I believe it's under control in events, there are several options. It should be "Decision". It will prompt you to type in text, like let's say, "Hey I have a boat, do you want a ride?". Then underneath that is two long boxes, these are your answers, put "Yes" on one "No" on the other. Now after this it should look something like (going off of memory lol, not entirely accurate) -

Decision start
"Do you want a ride?
Yes
<Start>
(Put your coding for yes here)
<No>
<Start>
(Put coding for what happens if you say no here)

5. Personally I just do it as I go along. I made the story and then went back and balanced the monster fights for that area after. I knew by the boss I wanted to be level 7. There is a thread on this site with the listing of how much xp is needed per level. So I playtested and found out that with low amounts of fights in x dungeon I'd encounter 20 enemy fights let's say before the boss. So I made sure the enemies gave out the right amount of xp in those 20 fights to get me to the level I wanted to be. I'd also put their strength at something, go playtest and see what they hit for, if it wasn't right I'd go back and edit their strength and tweak it just right. I just recommend starting small. Decide on how much HP you want to start with, let's say 200 hp for the main character. You want the monster to hit you for 15 each time. You have leather armor with 12 defense, and you get 3 defense per level. Let's say you're level 2, the monster will need 27 strength to do that 15 damage. At level 3 you gain 3 more defense, the monster will do 12 damage now. (Pretty sure this is right, atleast it's enough to get you on track)

6. It's never a lost cause. If your story is fine the monsters can always be rebalanced. However let's say every character is wrong, it could take a LONG time to go back and fix each and everyone of them.

7. I did this as well. Upon meeting the second character you gain in your party, Amelia, you battle her first before she joins. Just go to...forget if it's control or party control (just check both) and have "Battle (character)" on there, it will ask you which character. That's all there is to it. They will be whatever level you have them at.

A few more tips. Make a character in a city, make sure it's button. Now edit them. Select the first line and pick, "Message". Under message in the upper right corner is a box where you can select who's talking. It will show their pic, you can have multiple characters not even present talk like this. Then in the box below of course is your text. Try messing around with basics like that, once they work, build your way up to the complicated stuff. Once you get the basics down and start to understand it better the harder coding becomes much easier. Also make sure your group members all have classes attached to them. Let's say you have a guy named Joe, Joe won't do anything unless you make a class for him, let's say warrior. Joe will gain whatever level bonuses that class has set for it, and skills. Also every level gives you whatever you set for the bonuses. Let's say you have 3 strength, 30 hp, and a bonus of 5 hp. That means at level 2 you'll have 35 hp, 6 strength. At level 3 40 hp, 9 strength.

Not sure if I helped at all, or confused you more lol. Hopefully someone will come along (or has while I've been typing this) and can help you better than I have.

[Zeroth]

Re: Plethora of ideas? Check. No idea what I'm doing? Check.

I'd try and help, but Fading has it pretty well covered. Also, try looking at the RPG Maker 3 guide section. It isn't much right now, but it may be of some help.

[Deepthroat]

Re: Plethora of ideas? Check. No idea what I'm doing? Check.

Thanks Fading, that helped a lot. And yeah I'll check out the guide section.

[JPS]

Re: Plethora of ideas? Check. No idea what I'm doing? Check.

Creating a Streamlined Battle System

[Deepthroat]

Re: Plethora of ideas? Check. No idea what I'm doing? Check.

Thanks for the help, but I have some more questions...

1. How would I make it so at one part I can talk to some soldiers, but after a certain event happens they fight me?

2. How can I make it so someone needs me to pay them to join my party?

[Pagerron]

Re: Plethora of ideas? Check. No idea what I'm doing? Check.

For number 2, you could have the player find a treasure item called "Platinum coins" and then set having that treasure item as a condition to opening the mode of the NPC in which he joins your party.

You could also use a variable branch instead of modes with the above idea.

[Deepthroat]

Re: Plethora of ideas? Check. No idea what I'm doing? Check.

Well, what I wanted to do was have an optional party character that you would need to buy, by saving up your coins to have them join you.

Also, one thing I can't figure out to do is at one part, I wanted you to fight an angry mob of villagers, but before they attack, they go around and you can talk to them and stuff. Is this possible?

[Fading]

Re: Plethora of ideas? Check. No idea what I'm doing? Check.

Well, what I wanted to do was have an optional party character that you would need to buy, by saving up your coins to have them join you.

Also, one thing I can't figure out to do is at one part, I wanted you to fight an angry mob of villagers, but before they attack, they go around and you can talk to them and stuff. Is this possible?

Give each character 2 modes (pages, whatever you want to call them). On the first page have them say what you want, and at the end have it switch them to mode 2. Then on mess with the events on Mode 2 and have it do, "Battle (characters)", and select that person as who you want to battle. Under the battle code select under (think it's control, might be property control tho) "turn display off". That way they'll talk, then next time you talk to them you will fight them, after the battle they'll disappear instead of still being there. Turning display off makes something turn invisible so whatever still isn't standing there.

[Deepthroat]

Re: Plethora of ideas? Check. No idea what I'm doing? Check.

I didn't want to fight them at any time though. Like I wanted to go back like half way through the game and have to stop a mob.

Also, I was curious, I know if it is possible it would take a while, but could halfway through the game you be asked to join the villians, and then depending on your answer the game proceeds differently? I'm assuming it's possible, but would take a while though.

[Deepthroat]

Re: Plethora of ideas? Check. No idea what I'm doing? Check.

And one more thing (for now):

I want to work for someone, like I'll go get someone for him, and then once I've done that, he tells me to go to something else. How would I do this?

[Zeroth]

Re: Plethora of ideas? Check. No idea what I'm doing? Check.

What you would do is set up a condition for him. You could use just all variables, and you could use a mixture of variables and mode too. Create two characters, and have two modes for each character. With character A, you want to make him say something like,

" I need someone to work for me. Would you be willing to work under my command?"

Create a yes/no option. In the place where you ask the question write,

"Will you be willing to work for me?".

In the yes option write, "Great! Now as your first job I need you to get one more person to work for me.".

In the no option write something like, "No? Oh well, guess I'll just have to find someone else."

Now go back to the yes option, you want to modify character A's mode to 2. After that is done, go create character B. Make character B have two modes. In the first mode make him say something like,

"Man, I wish I could find work around here."

Now go back to character A and in the yes option, modify character B's mode to 2.

Now, go back to character B and in mode 2, make him say something like, "What? You found work for me? This is great!" Now warp him to were character A is by placing a warp command.

The next segment includes variables, but I'll wait to tell show you how to do that until you have this part complete. Hopefully this isn't too confusing.

[Deepthroat]

Re: Plethora of ideas? Check. No idea what I'm doing? Check.

Okay, I think I got that, thanks. Now what do I do?

[Deepthroat]

Re: Plethora of ideas? Check. No idea what I'm doing? Check.

One other thing... this seems like a stupid question, and I know I've been able to do this before, but I can't figure it out now...

Okay, I have the simple 'go find a kid in the cave' thing. I got the kid, but how do I automatically make him go back to the town? Also, I wanted to fight something that was attacking the kid, but how do I make me have to redo that whole part if I die?

What I mean is, even if I die, the kid still goes back to the town (or would if I could get him to).

[Zeroth]

Re: Plethora of ideas? Check. No idea what I'm doing? Check.

Okay, I think I got that, thanks. Now what do I do?

For the second part what you would want to do is go to character A and in the second mode put Val-Conditional Branch and make it for two options. Now, that menu looks something like this:

Shared Variables
Variable 01
Value = Specified Value 123… 0
Value = Specified Value 123… 0

Go down to the forth option and change it so it looks like this:

Shared Variables
Variable 01
Value = Specified Value 123… 0
Value = Specified Value 123… 1

Got that done? Great. Go back to character B and in the second mode insert Increase Shared Var. BFORE the warp command. If you put it after the warp command it will not execute. Why? Because the Warp and Teleport commands cancels all the commands that come after it. Anyway, in the variable menu it will look like this:

Variable 01
123… 0

Increase it to 1. It should look like this:

Variable 01
123… 1


Go back again to character B and in option 2, write a message or messages of your choosing congratulating the character or something. After that is done go back to character A (sorry about all the back and forth stuff) and increase his mode to mode 3 (Yeah, I know I said both characters would need only two modes, but they will actually need 3 each.). When that is done, go back to character B and in option 2 increase character A’s mode to 3 so that he doesn’t keep repeating himself. Write whatever message you want in mode 3. Go back once again to character B and increase his mode to 3. Now go to option 2 and modify his mode to 3 (put Modify Mode after the messages or the messages won’t display).

Everything should be working now. The only weakness in this setup is that you have to make sure that your character doesn’t talk to character A before talking to character B, or else he will just repeat himself over and over again. I’m not sure how to get around this, but I could probably figure it out eventually. Anyway, as for character B asking your character to go on another quest, just make character B ask it in mode 3. I really hope this isn’t too confusing.