battle system question

[ErikaFuzzbottom]

Re: battle system question

Actually, the Luck stat doesn't affect critical hit rate, it affects evasion. You're really better off renaming it to "evade" or something like that. Far as I know, there isn't anything that affects critical hit rate for party members. Heck, it's entirely possible to crit-hit for 0 damage.

The scenario change is pretty much like when you change disks in PS1 RPGs like Final Fantasy. It continues with all your stuff, there's just different event data. The easiest thing to do is simply copy the scenario card you just finished, rename the copy to "scenario 2" or whatever, and delete the events and pages that no longer matter. This also means you can re-use switches that were dedicated to events that already ended. Yes, switch data does carry over, so whichever ones you'll want to re-use need to be turned off at the start of the scenario card.

[Karr Lord of Chaos]

Re: battle system question

oh wow, so it has no effect on the crit rate? how interesting. i thought agility was all part of the hit miss evade triangle? how the hell does everything work. its so damn vague that its hard to figure out.

[ErikaFuzzbottom]

Re: battle system question

Admittedly, yes, some stats could've used better clarification. So allow me to clarify.

STR (strength): Attack power. Pretty obvious.
DEF (defense): Defense power. Again, pretty obvious.

One thing to keep in mind is the formula for physical damage: Half the attack power minus half the defense power. I think some people aren't aware of this, because occasionally I come across this piece of equipment with a defense of 2 and I'm like... Okay, so I lose one less HP when I get hit. So what?

Naturally, there's a slight randomizer, so damage is never exactly the same. Even when you're hitting for 0 damage, the randomizer might bless you with 1 or 2 damage.

Also, unless you do change otherwise, character (not monster) STR and DEF already start off at 10 points each, so whatever stats you add are on top of that base power.

STA (stamina) / HP (hit points): This is kinda confusing, because at first glance, they're the same thing. But STA is your max HP, and HP is your current amount. And like STR and DEF, character HP already starts off at 30 points.

INT (intelligence) / MP (magic points): INT is your max MP, and MP is your current amount.

AGI (agility): This is your "speed", or rather, this stat determines turn order. Basically it counts down from the highest character's/monster's speed to the lowest. If your speed is 50 and the monster's is 25, you're probably going to go first. Useful information, when you need to determine who's more likely to get a potion in before the enemy attacks.

Strangely, this is also affected by a randomizer. There have been times where a monster attacked first when my speed was slightly higher than the monster's.

Luck (um... luck): Like I said, this determines your evasion, and works in conjunction with AGI. If your Luck is higher than your attacker's AGI, the attack is more likely to miss. Interestingly, enemies don't have a Luck stat. Personally, I think this was a smart move on Enterbrain's part. I mean, do we really want to play a game somebody made play out like RPG Maker 3?

M.DEF (magic defense): Has nothing to do with damage from magic attacks. Rather, it affects your resistance to status attacks, like poison and silence. Not sure if it affects status drainers. Not sure how much it affects. Obviously, 9999 pretty much would mean total immunity. But where 50% immunity falls in, not entirely sure. Never really tested it. I do know that, on their own, certain status attacks are only sometimes effective, like I think death has a 30% chance of working (or was it failing) while poison works just about all the time.

R Attack / L Attack: the combined attack power of your base stats and equipment on whichever hand your weapon is. Status boosting spells and accessories affect both hands, weapons affect whatever hand is equipped. Only time both hands attack is if both hands hold a weapon.

Guard: the combined defense power of your base stats and equipment.

There's another stat that sometimes pops up underneath your HP and MP, called "CRS" or something like that. Sometimes it's there, sometimes it isn't. I'm not entirely sure what the stat does.

Magic GRD: This is the actual stat that determines defense against magic damage, based on a percentage (maxes out at 100%, so sorry, no elemental obsorbing). It's only affected by equipment that raises guard against the magic elements. Depending on whether you have elements turned on or off, it'll either be one stat, or a stat for every element.

EXP (experience) / Next Level: I hope I don't have to explain these. I could give an EXP chart, but there's other places you can find them. Just know that after level 22, all levels take the same amount of EXP to level up.

[Lord_Mofop]

Re: battle system question

Thanks Draygone for the clarification on stats. I knew most of them, like Magic Resistance, but I had no idea that Luck doesn't effect crit. That's nice to know because I wanted to make a ninja character that could dual wield. I was afraid of boosting his Luck because I thought he'd crit too much and be unbalanced, but I also wanted him to evade alot.


I think I've got the Change Scenario option down. It sounds like if I copy all of the NPCs, buildings, and all of that, that'll I'll be using up memory faster.

So it seems that Treasure Chests don't carry over, right? If so how do I get around that? Would I inevitably have to use switches for my treasure chests? Or would the player just have to pick up the chests during the scenario, and if they didn't, they lose them forever?

Also I heard about people going back and forth between scenarios and farming chests. Is there anyways I could prevent that?

[orius]

Re: battle system question

There's another stat that sometimes pops up underneath your HP and MP, called "CRS" or something like that. Sometimes it's there, sometimes it isn't. I'm not entirely sure what the stat does.

I think that means you have something cursed equipped. Possibly you might be talking about someting else.

I think I've got the Change Scenario option down. It sounds like if I copy all of the NPCs, buildings, and all of that, that'll I'll be using up memory faster.

So it seems that Treasure Chests don't carry over, right? If so how do I get around that? Would I inevitably have to use switches for my treasure chests? Or would the player just have to pick up the chests during the scenario, and if they didn't, they lose them forever?

Also I heard about people going back and forth between scenarios and farming chests. Is there anyways I could prevent that?

Depends on how you have the scenarios set up. If it's set up that the player goes from scenario 1 to scenario 2 with no return, then yes all the chests in the first scenario become missable. If you set the scenarios up so that the player can move back and forth between them, then the chests can be farmed, so you'll probably want to use switches to prevent it. You could also do a treasure system like FFXII or something where chests are supposed to respawn if you want the player to cross back and forth bewteen two scenarios. If you do that then you'll probably want to make minor treasures treasure events and treasure you want to keep limited based on switches.

[ErikaFuzzbottom]

Re: battle system question

One interesthing thing about dual-weilding. Each hand is counted separately by the crit/miss randomizer. One hand could crit and the other hit normal. One could hit normal and the other miss. One could crit and the other miss. Sometimes, yes, both would crit or miss at the same time, but not often. So as far as crit-hitting goes, you won't have to worry about crit-hitting for 4x damage very often.

You do want to be careful about letting a character dual-weild, though. You don't want the character to be hitting too much more than a character using one weapon, so what you'll have to do is either have the weapons that will be dual-weilded have weaker power than normal weapons, or the character that dual-weilds will have to have a lower base attack stat than other characters.

Then again, maybe you do want to have the dual-weilder to be more powerful than other characters. It is your game, after all.

[Lord_Mofop]

Re: battle system question

Hmm.. I sort of like the idea of being able to miss treasure if you don't look for it. It sort of punishes the player for speeding through the game and not taking the time to explore.

You do want to be careful about letting a character dual-weild, though. You don't want the character to be hitting too much more than a character using one weapon, so what you'll have to do is either have the weapons that will be dual-weilded have weaker power than normal weapons, or the character that dual-weilds will have to have a lower base attack stat than other characters.

Then again, maybe you do want to have the dual-weilder to be more powerful than other characters. It is your game, after all.

I'm trying to go for a Samurai like character with some healing magic and support, and a Ninja character with some damage magic. I want them to be equally useful so it would come down to the characters' personal choice as to if he'd want one or the other, or both.

So I'm giving the Samurai character high STR / decent DEF and the Critical Hit Up ability. The ninja will have low STR / high Luck and the First Attack ability. The ninja is the one who will be dual wielding.

I don't want an overpowered dual wielding character. I'm having a hard time trying to keep him in balance with the other physical fighters. I think I'm going to do what you suggested and lower his weapon attack bonuses.

Out of curiosity, would you happen to know how the mechanics of the Critical Hit Up ability? Thanks!

[ErikaFuzzbottom]

Re: battle system question

Oh yeah, I forgot about that ability. I'm not entirely sure, but I think it doubles the crit hit rate.

[Karr Lord of Chaos]

Re: battle system question

thats exclusive to monsters isnt it? it increases the chance for them to score a crit id wager.

[Lord_Mofop]

Re: battle system question

I was referring to the added effect given through the Skill title option. I knew it increased Critical Hit chance, I just didn't know how much.

[Karr Lord of Chaos]

Re: battle system question

oh, i forgot about that one. i imagine its going to be like the other skills where it randomly gives a critical hit; maybe it ignores the other normal parameters? the magic damage doubles activates so little that i assume its of the same stock.

[orius]

Re: battle system question

You do want to be careful about letting a character dual-weild, though. You don't want the character to be hitting too much more than a character using one weapon, so what you'll have to do is either have the weapons that will be dual-weilded have weaker power than normal weapons, or the character that dual-weilds will have to have a lower base attack stat than other characters.

Or you could balance things out by making shields a significant enough source of defense that it give the player a choice: dual wield and do more damage, but take more damage from monsters, or use a weapon and shield, doing less overall damage but also taking less damage. This might be a harder method of balancing things though.

[MRevelle83]

Re: battle system question

You could always rule out duel-wielding and take off the option to use L Hand or R Hand.

[orius]

Re: battle system question

There is that, but I hate the idea of the cursed item on the offhand because it essentially punishes the player for a programming flaw. If dual wielding was something that the game designer could turn on or off either globally or for specific characters, that would have been a good feature.

[ErikaFuzzbottom]

Re: battle system question

I think MR actually was referring to the global option to turn off dual-weilding.

As for using a cursed item for characters that can't dual-weild, I don't see how it's a punishment to the player. How many commercial RPGs out there have some characters that dual-weild and others don't? Pretty sure they still show both hands, too.