RPG: Combat

I figured I’d post another one today to make up for my lateness.

I kinda feel like I’ve neglected the role in this game so far. I’ve been focusing really heavily on the puzzle aspect of it, and I feel like I’ve been chalking combat up as something boring and in the way. Basically, I’ve been drawing much too heavily on Golden Sun, in which monster encounters are few and far between and basically serve to screw you up when you’re trying to do the puzzles. This has been bothering me, and I want to do something about it.

I’ve been playing a lot of pretty combat-centric games recently, namely Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy 4, and Dungeons and Dragons. The one thing I see all of them having in common is well-defined combat roles, so that’s what I’m going to base my battle system on.

Basically, a combat role is what a character is meant to do in combat. Dungeons and Dragons does a very good thing by getting this out in the open (at least in 4th edition): there are Defenders, Strikers, Leaders, and Controllers. Defenders are in combat all the time, take lots of damage, and pretty much spearhead the party’s assault. Strikers stay out of combat and hit single targets, doing lots of damage, but can’t necessarily take many hits. Controllers do AoE stuff, deal damage to lots of enemies, and ensure that the battle stays under the party’s control. Leaders inspire and buff the entire party, making sure the party keeps itelf under control.

Now, I think the Leader role kind of fails to work in electronic RPGs, because the playable party has no morale, initiative, or variable chance to hit, and the only thing the Leader could really do is alleviate enemy buffs and buff the party, which isn’t really a very handy thing in an electronic RPG. But the other three are very alive and well in most of the games I play, especially Final Fantasy. Let’s look at my current party in FF4:

First, we have Cecil, a Paladin. Cecil is a Defender. He can do assloads of damage and cast white magic, but his real gem of an ability is Cover, which lets him take damage for badly-wounded allies. This is really handy, since Cecil has about 1,000 more HP than anyone else.

Next is Kain, a dyed-in-the-wool Striker. Kain is a Dragoon, so his special ability is Jump, which lets him jump extremely high above the battle and then land on an enemy weapon-first, which understandably deals a ridiculous amount of damage. As a sidenote, having a character from a military unit which is entirely based around the idea of jumping really high and landing on people is the most pointlessly badass thing ever.

Then we have Edge, a ninja. I’m not sure where to put Edge, but let’s look at his abilities: he can Steal, which is totally useless, he can Throw items from your inventory, which does a huge amount of damage and makes him look like a Striker, but he can also cast Ninjutsu spells, which are substitutes for other spells but also cause status effects. I think this makes him a Striker with a Controller-like ability to do mass damage and sow confusion

The next character, Rosa, is a Controller, although she might be the closest thing the game has to a Leader. She heals and buffs up the party, as well as crippling the enemy party with spells like Slow and Silence.

Finally, we have Rydia, who is also a Controller. She has all of the offensive spells, as well as the ridiculously powerful Summons, which do more damage than should be legal.

Now, that was pretty easy. I think that’s what makes the battles in FF4 so interesting: every character knows what they’re supposed to do, and pulls it off pretty damn well. This is pretty different from Golden Sun, in which every character can, with careful arrangement of stat-boosting items and Djinni, perform any given role in combat. Not that that’s bad; in fact, it makes what might otherwise be a lackluster turn-based battle system is made much more interesting, but I feel like I can’t do what Golden Sun does in battle without completely ripping it off. I’d like my RPG to retain the kind of well-defined combat slots that FF4 has.

Now, I haven’t even talked about the actual battle system yet. I know that I want random encounters on the world map, but what about the dungeons? Should I keep the random encounters for them, too? And how should I handle the actual battles themselves?

One of the things I like most about Chrono Trigger is the fact that the dungeons have an element of stealth: there is always a way to escape the monsters, who are always visible, without having to fight them as long as you know where to sneak past. There’s a tradeoff between getting experience by fighting monsters and progressing through the dungeon quickly by sneaking away from them that makes the crawl very interesting. On the other hand, sneaking past monsters would make it hard to do the puzzles that are kind of at the core of the dungeons.

I think I’ll have visible monsters in the dungeons. There will be ones you can sneak past in the halls, but they’ll be small encounters that won’t cripple you experience-wise if you sneak past all of them. Then, I’ll put harder encounters that you can’t sneak past (the monsters will chase you Earthbound-style) in major puzzle rooms and down halls that lead to treasure chests to ensure you get enough experience to beat the boss without having to grind.

The actual battle system is a little hazier in my mind. I know I don’t want a strictly turn-based Dragon Warrior battle system, because those are pretty bland, unless you throw in a gimmick like Earthbound’s rolling HP-gauges. I like the Active Time system that Final Fantasies 4 and up use where you wait for your characters’ speed gauge to fill up and then you can go, but on the other hand, that can get pretty annoying when the monsters are fast, because they can cast Bolt 3 a few times while you’re looking for a spell and all your characters do is sit around picking their collective nose. Nobody has menu speed fast enough to avoid this.

I think what I’ll do is have an implicit speed-gauge. You won’t be able to see it fill up, but it will be filling up, and then once it’s completely full, you’ll be able to do stuff. In addition, any menu screen past the basic ability-selection will freeze the combat while you look for a spell, so you’ll be able to spend as much time as you want selecting the spell and nobody will fry your party. My hope is that this will make the combat cerebral enough to be strategic, but fluid enough to be vicious at the same time.

Back on the subject of combat roles, I feel like I should go through the characters in this game and make sure that their roles are defined, more for my benefit than anyone else’s. Here we go:

Alarim functions as a Controller with Defender tendencies. He can attack and cast black and white magic. He should have the battle well in hand at all times, and he’s the only character I’m allowing to have a more vague combat role because he kind of has to be flexible to tie the whole party together.

Imere is a bit of an anomaly. She can function as both a Striker and a Defender depending on which techs you learn, which is in turn influenced by who is in your party. If, for example, your party includes Baldwin and you continue to use Imere’s Defender-style techs exclusively, you’re kind of a dumbass. So she starts off vague, but develops into more of a defined character as she levels (puberty metaphor is unintentional).

Alistair is a Controller of the Rosa/White Mage variety. He keeps the party tied together.

Enata is a Controller. She blows shit away with fire.

Khavir is a Striker, definitely. His Rage ability lets him basically insta-kill one enemy per turn, but makes him a high-maintenance character who will require a lot of healing. In addition, his Curse ability lets him screw up one enemy as a counterattack, which makes target selection pretty damn easy: the enemy that attacks him gets poisoned, and then he tears them in half and crunches their skull.

Vinan is a Striker. He hits pretty damn hard with his techs, but he can also do some more general stuff: he can freeze single enemies, shield other party members and even use small-radius ki blasts to hurt larger numbers of enemies. So he’s more versatile than Khavir, but still definitely a Striker.

Cathan is a Defender, but his Stance ability makes him more pretty flexible: depending on the turn, he can wildly alter his combat role. He’s played most comfortably as an armored Defender-type guy, but depending on the party he can be very resourceful.

Sufiri is a Controller, but his reach is a little more limited, because his Charge ability only targets a few of the enemies. He functions better as a sub-Controller – he keeps the battle in hand, but only one portion of it.

Avira (Avi is actually a common Jewish name and only applies to men, so I changed her name) is a Striker. She has guns and good aim, so she can do shitloads of damage with a basic attack, but she also has a very Controller-like ability to Bomb all of the enemies. She doesn’t get it very often, though, so I’m leaving her as a Striker.

Baldwin is, obviously, a Defender to the bone. All of his abilities involve taking metric fucktons of damage.

Eusoph is a Controller. He’s not as good at healing as Alistair by the time you get him, but he can use Divine Wrath, which status-effects the shit out of the enemy and does a good amount of damage.

Ricca is a Controller. She can summons monsters, and they can do lots of damage to everything. Pretty obvious choice.

~ by pieboy on July 29, 2008.