Cifer: The Awakening

[captain falcon]

Re: Cifer: The Awakening

im doin an anime as soon as castrophophe finishes the story

[Eschaton Orochi]

Re: Cifer: The Awakening

I have all the battle system info ready. Essentially, it's from (though not a blatant ripoff of) The God Gene. Each character will have 1000 HP and 999 MP.

[Red Dragon]

Re: Cifer: The Awakening

I'm beginning to question if this whole topic is one big joke or not.

Honestly, so am I.

Every time I hear "epic" or "Good" without any evidence backing it up, I really think this is some huge elaborate joke topic.

[Eschaton Orochi]

Re: Cifer: The Awakening

No, this is not just one elaborate joke topic!

[Wavelength]

Re: Cifer: The Awakening

I believe it's genuine, of course, but I gotta admit I have serious doubts about anything Captain Falcon works on.

[Eschaton Orochi]

Re: Cifer: The Awakening

That is understandable, as he really only posts as a joke. He should be the Joker! But xCifer666x has a much greater role in the game's creation, so I promise the Pavilion that he will not mess up xCifer666x's and my game.

[1ce]

Re: Cifer: The Awakening

So there's Captain Falcon, Batman, Cifer (who's name is in the game), and a Catastrophe working on a trilogy of games.

You gotta admit, if nothing else, that's pretty wacky.

[Eschaton Orochi]

Re: Cifer: The Awakening

I do agree with you there. But it's not as wacky if you say that my friends, my brother, and myself are working together on this game.

[Eschaton Orochi]

Re: Cifer: The Awakening

As an update, I have the full story of the game, by Chapter.
Chapter 1-Upon This Rock
This is the prologue, and is through Sigmund's viewpoint. Held on trial for the murder of James Cutley, the boss of Magenta Corp., he recounts his job as his hitman, and the night when Cutley attempted to exterminate him, by rigging his "office" with explosives. Cutley almost succeeded in killing Sigmund, if it were not for a split second move. Sigmund braces for the explosion, injuring his right leg, but Cutley was caught in the blast, and killed...
Chapter 2-The Clock Falls
After Sigmund's defense, regardless, he is found guilty for the murder of Cutley, and is to be executed by lethal injection in 6 months. But (un)luckily, CORE, an affiliated company, strikes a bargain with the police to take ownership of Sigmund and use him as a biological test subject. There, in the test facility, he finds two children around the age of 16, Alexander and Nikolai.
Chapter 3-Enter Ebon
Sigmund decides to escape the facility with the two boys, but the building has very tight security. And the secret exit requires a card key, which only Carlos Ebon, the main biological researcher for CORE has...
Chapter 4-Zane's Advent
The story goes at a tangent, now through the viewpoint of Zane, a freelancer with medic experience, who lives with his girlfriend Valerie. He recieves a letter from a man named Reaper, that says that he has been hired to become a medic for CORE, and to hop on the boat across the Atlantic. He does so, but his boat never arrives safely, as it was rigged...with bombs.
Chapter 5-New World Order
This chapter is told through the viewpoint of Valerie. She recieves a notice in the mail to go to the Vatican, as there are "divine beings" that are calling for her, specifically. She goes there, to see the 6 Divine Beings, and she has a special connection with them. Although she is not a Celestial like Alexander and Nikolai, she can channel their powers...
Chapter 6-Enter Ripps
Not long afterward. the scientific community gets involved with the discovery of the Divine Beings. They give off a strange aura called Essence, and this can be used for multiple things. Jason Ripps, being a mad scientist for CORE, brings back the dead. Valerie, Sigmund, and Alexander must fight Ripps before the situation gets out of hand...
Chapter 7-A Dividing Planet
After Ripps is exterminated, The man known as Reaper and a masked man send the message to the world's governments, saying that the world will be destroyed in 72 hours...
Chapter 8-Enter Octavian
Zane wakes up to hearing Reaper's broadcast. He tunes into the signal, and finds its location, as he wants to kill Reaper for what he has done. The transmission came from Octavian's mecha labs nearby. So, Zane sets off alone to find Reaper... Meanwhile, Sigmund, Alexander, and Nikolai, reach Octavian's lab...
Chapter 9-The Daemon
After Octavian is destroyed, the men giving the broadcast escape the building. When Zane catches up to Reaper, it is revealed that the boat was a trap, and that the explosion was formed by a man named Carlisle. (If you haven't guessed, he's the cause of the same explosion that injured Sigmund.) Carlisle is retrieved and questioned by Zane, and he joins the party, as recompense for what he has done...
Chapter 10-Ecstasis
From Carlisle, Zane was told that Reaper was not the man behind everything, but rather he was a decoy. The real mastermind behind all this was the masked man, known only as Hollow Shell. Finally, all 6 party members meet up with Hollow Shell. After a battle with him, Alexander is severly injured, and goes into Ecstasis, where to awaken, and protect his friends from Hollow Shell, he must fight his inner demons...
Chapter 11-Psychogenesis
Xander fights through all the previous boss fights alone, and only then does he fight Shade, the only 'evil' Divine Being. Xander is Shade's son, but he must defeat Shade to escape his evil influence. After which, the credits roll, and there will be alot of secret bonus material.
~~
This story has taken me 3 whole years to make, and I've finally made something good! I'm probably going to submit this for the Anything Goes contest, and I really hope the game will turn out good. My RPG Maker 3 disc is fixed (Yay!), and xCifer666x and I will work on it ASAP!

[Eschaton Orochi]

Re: Cifer: The Awakening

Boss Updates- 6/3/10
Every Chapter has 1 boss battle, except for Chapter 11, which has 3. Here are the boss battles, and the boss's strategies...
Chapter 1- Cutley
Playable Characters: Sigmund
This is essentially a tutorial battle. Cutley uses a move called Bomb Throw, which will inflict about 100 damage to your HP. Because you have MP Shield (every character and enemy has it.), it will take about 20 Bomb Throws to kill you. Usually, Cutley will attempt to defend against your attacks. Very rarely, Cutley will use Nuke Throw, which does around 250 damage to you. Since you can only do physical attacks, just keep attacking, and he'll be down.
Chapter 2- CORE Dreadnought, 3 CORE Mechanics
Playable Characters: Sigmund, Alexander, Nikolai
This is the first real boss battle. The CORE Dreadnought will do the most attacking, and can inflict serious damage to you. His attacks will inflict Slow or Death. The 3 CORE Mechanics go down in one hit, but you'll need to use Xander's World Inversion attack to defeat them all at once. Then the Dreadnought will not be healed, so it'll go down quickly.
Chapter 3- Admin Ebon
Playable Characters: Sigmund, Alexander, Nikolai
Before the battle, your party is infected with the Poison status. So, unless you have some healing items, you'll have to beat him in 20 turns. Use Nikolai's Paralysis move, Alex's World Inversion, and Sigmund's newly acquired Freeze Blade skill. He should go down, as he is vulnerable to Stop.
Chapter 4- Scylla
Playable Characters: Zane
Scylla uses Torrent every so often, and will inflict Slow. If you're slowed, use his Kinesis skill. After defeating the boss, there will be a cutscene.
Chapter 5- Holy Simulacrum
PC's: Valerie
This boss is not very dangerous, and will heal every time you attack it, but if you don't attack it, it will use Photon Flash, which may instantly kill you. But it will always heal less than the amount of damage done to it, and when you lower it's MP enough, it will stop healing. Just wear the Simulacrum down, and you'll beat it. After this, Valerie can use summons...
Chapter 6- Admin Ripps
PC's- Valerie, Alex, Nikolai, Holy Simulacrum
Ripps will heal after every attack until his MP goes all the way down, so lower it with your attacks. But when his MP reaches critical status, he'll use Ravage, which will do intense damage to all the party members. Beat him quickly...

Anyway, that's it for today. Maybe later, I'll reveal more...

[Wavelength]

Re: Cifer: The Awakening

These boss battles sound pretty interesting.

I hope you've tested them pretty thoroughly, particularly for enemy behavior. It's a cool idea to have the boss launch different attacks as its demise draws near (I'm guessing you're accomplishing this by biasing the enemy's behavior AGAINST these attacks but making them cost much less MP so they will be used when the boss' MP shield runs low). But be careful that the boss doesn't start just using Defend or simple physical attacks instead.

You'll need to do thorough testing for balance too; it sounds like this is the kind of system where slight imbalances in power can lead to absolute blowouts on either side. So if you're using a traditional level-up system, make sure to adjust the stats so that being a couple levels underpowered won't make a battle impossible, and being a couple levels over what you expect won't make bosses a breeze.

Also, how do your characters recover the MP that they are obviously going to lose through time? Is their power restored after each battle, so they can launch their own special attacks? Do they have the MP Regeneration trait?

Like I said, it sounds pretty interesting and I'm looking forward to seeing this game come out.

[Eschaton Orochi]

Re: Cifer: The Awakening

Well, Wavelength, the level up system is non-existent. Every character will automatically be at Level 35, with 35 in every stat, except SPD, which will be 999, as to remove lag. Speed variances will be arranged by using the 'Swift' trait. MP is generated by attacking, as every character and most enemies have MP Drain. Also, Valerie comes with the Restore MP trait. Other stat variances are made by weapons, armors, and accessories. Carlisle, the character supposed to have the highest physical attack power, will have access to the strongest weapon. Sigmund, having the highest defenses, will have access to the best armor. Also, here is the Weapon Strength Scale.
Physical Weapon Strength/ Magic Weapon Strength
15
40
65
90
115
140
165
190
215
240
265
290
315
340
365
390
415
440
465
490
515
540
565
590
615 is the highest available.
Defense Scale/ Magic Resistance Scale is the same, but it stops at 590.

[Wavelength]

Re: Cifer: The Awakening

OK, so I've worked very little with MP drain, along with MP shield, wouldn't it go something like this?:

* Player attacks enemy, doing 100 "damage". Enemy's MP is decreased by 100; player's MP is increased by 80.

* Enemy attacks player, doing 80 "damage". Player's MP is decreased by 80; enemy's MP is increased by 100.

Unlike most games, the player actually has a net MP gain. They could repeat this process ad infinitum and win the battle without ever being in danger. Eventually, the enemy's MP runs out completely, and you start depleting the HP until the enemy falls, but this MP gain & loss cycle will still work essentially the same way. Moreover, they'd finish with full HP and a full MP shield!

The reverse of this would happen if the player's weapons/armor were a little worse. Now, the enemy would be gaining on you each round no matter how much you attacked it. So the specials would have to be designed extremely well to be able to turn things around in this scenario without completely blowing the balance of the game, and that could "break the vicious cycle" nicely.

Let me know if you've done playtesting and I'm understanding one of the mechanics incorrectly, though!

[Ivan Rosenguard]

Re: Cifer: The Awakening

Wow, I have to say, you've taken some of my ideas (concerning how to make RPGMaker3s battle system something that won't put people to sleep) and took it one step further. I like the idea of the struggle this system evokes, since, if I have this right, both players and enemies will essentially be breaking each other's shields while protecting and replenishing their own.

And I certainly wouldn't have thought up some of the awesome elemental system ideas you have. It will be interesting to see how you make this work, because I know how tricky it can be when you try to use what RPGM3 gives you to do something way different.

In fact, I'm kind of jealous, because, if this turns out to be well-balanced, it could end up overshadowing my own attempt at customizing the battle system of RPGM3.

Of course, I've been fooling around with MP shield (though I don't use it as a main mechanic in my game like Catastrophe, certain bosses utilize it, and the ability to draw enemy attention away from party members and block enemy attacks with MP shield is the hallmark of my game's Sentinel class) and MP drain more so than most, so I think I understand where Catastrophe is going with this a bit better. Maybe. I think I can clarify for Wavelength, though:

MP drain adds to the attacker's MP equal to 1/4 the damage dealt by the attack command (it says in the description of it that it restores HP equal to damage dealt, but it lies).

With MP shield, the same amount of damage is done as would be without it, but the damage is done to MP instead of HP. The target will only have their HP damaged if they have no MP. As long as the user has at least 1 MP, no damage will be taken when they are hit.

Still, I have some of the same balancing concerns as Wave. A lot of attacks in my game deal MP damage (often referred to "staggering" a target since these attacks reduce their momentum--like all wind-elemental attacks blow the foe over, tripping them up in addition to doing HP damage). Attacks that deal incredibly heavy blows often have the same staggering effect. Other attacks (such as the Acromanticore's Eight-Eyed-Glare) have a stunning effect without dealing damage. My point in mentioning that is that I found that, without some serious tweaking on the foe's intelligence and the cost (thus affecting how many times they'd have to attack or stand by to gain the momentum to use them) and effectiveness of these attacks, I found that one of two things usually happened:

Either the player party dominated the fight by effectively canceling every attack the enemy was about to use, or it was the other way around, and foes either wiped the floor with the party, or the party had to pretty much resort to killing them with "attack. attack. heal with item. use damage item. use skill" rinse repeat. Eventually, I got it right, but it takes some doing. So, in addition to Wavelength's "vicious cycle" scenario, it should be noted that its quite easy for a system like this to be one sided. I've learned that traditional methods for balancing are useless in this case (I had to invent my own system for that).

[Eschaton Orochi]

Re: Cifer: The Awakening

Well, I've tested that HP/MP attacks bypass the MP Shield, and attacks as such are used by both parties. Also, the enemies tend to use skills instead of magic to do damage. This is so the game can be more balanced. Also, every character's Magic Defense Stat is 0, but there are equip items that boost resistance.