<-- Archived --> (Battle Engine and Combat)

[DarkTl]

Can't we just use a battle log, like here?

[CherryWood]

Well, my favorite system looks like this   (basically sengoku rance bs altered for single characters)
 
...I guess it's a whole different then what you aiming for 


 

[Xela]

Can't we just use a battle log, like here?

As usual, your suggestion is "lets have it all and more"

I'll take a look at it...

I am almost afraid to ask:

1) How do you want damage to be calculated?

2) A more to the point question:
What do we do with targeting if everyone in the front row dies but melee weapons only have range of 1? I've seen two options that I could conciser acceptable:

- Everyone in the back row is moved to the front (annoying if you had one meat-shield and two mages for example).
- Everyone in the back row can simply be attacked as if they are in the front row.
======
What do you think?

Another question do we want a ChangeRow skill? Or should rows be fixed from game start?

This who row mess is faaaar more confusing to transfer into code than I've anticipated

[Xela]

Well, my favorite system looks like this   (basically sengoku rance bs altered for single characters)
 
...I guess it's a whole different then what you aiming for 

Do you have a full-sized screen shot of this?

But I looks like that there are portraits and 5 members per team... instead of 3. This is prolly easier to code since there are no rows but graphics or the attacks are also less cool and many thing in PyTFall would have to be adjusted like a 3 team-members limit...

[DarkTl]

Well, my favorite system looks like this   (basically sengoku rance bs altered for single characters)
 
...I guess it's a whole different then what you aiming for 

I'm familiar only with one part of sengoku rance, but it is always a turn-based strategy, right? I figured our SE will be something like a turn-based strategy eventually, not BE.

However, you could describe here how it works, it's not too late to change anything.

As usual, your suggestion is "lets have it all and more"

I'll take a look at it...

I don't know, it doesn't seem difficult. You just write all those "Our Amazing Hero landed Critical Strike on poor sod called "Goblin Archer"" lines there, and add a scrollbar.

1) How do you want damage to be calculated?

Not sure yet. I guess it should be the difference between attack and defense, but normalized somehow. Can you take a look how it's done in Jake BE?

- Everyone in the back row can simply be attacked as if they are in the front row.

That's how it works in Dis, I don't see any problems with it.

Another question do we want a ChangeRow skill? Or should rows be fixed from game start?

It should be changeable outside of battle only.

[Xela]

I'm familiar only with one part of sengoku rance, but it is always a turn-based strategy, right? I figured our SE will be something like a turn-based strategy eventually, not BE.

However, you could describe here how it works, it's not too late to change anything.

Well, that example looks like a BE doesn't it? Rance's version that I've played had on map mechanics paired with a BE where you had a leader and a army representing each character separately.

It should be changeable outside of battle only.

This simplifies things a bit...

I don't know, it doesn't seem difficult. You just write all those "Our Amazing Hero landed Critical Strike on poor sod called "Goblin Archer"" lines there, and add a scrollbar.

Yeah... but I wanted one or the other It doesn't matter, I'll make it work, my main concern with this is that GUI will get cluttered.

That's how it works in Dis, I don't see any problems with it.

Ok. It'll work like this than.

Not sure yet. I guess it should be the difference between attack and defense, but normalized somehow. Can you take a look how it's done in Jake BE?

Like this:

Code: [Select]

            damage = 0
           
            #calculate damage same as usual
            if (target.Stats.Defence < 1):
                defence = 2 - target.Stats.Defence
                damage = attack * defence
            else:
                damage = (attack/target.Stats.Defence) + 0.5
               
            # Get a random number between 0.8 and 1.2
            random = (renpy.random.random() * 0.4) + 0.8

            damage = int(float(damage) * multiplier * 10 * random)
Attack was basically the attack stat of the character * (initial!)multiplier for the skill (weapon/magic).

The multiplier you see in this code bit, is different and was added by me. It starts at 0 and than is changed by alignments (magic) or critical strike (for melee weapons). Just to settle all the alignments in the game and possibility of the Critical Strike, 100 lines of code are needed...

That's why I am asking what do you want to do with damage, we've mentioned many options and there are plenty more...

- Alignments for weapons.
- Skills for every weapon (focus on one weapon for better results).
- Multi-Leveled alignments for characters.
- Different attack skills per weapon.
- Skills (Haste/Regen/Poison and etc.) OR we can also move this to Magic spells.
- Items and their effects.
- and etc. etc. etc.

EDIT: Also row damage can be calculated in a number of different ways for magic and ranged weapons alike! I need to get some sort of general opinion of these thing before adding it...

We need to come up with the best possible options for the game that will be easy to understand and implements and filter out the rest.

[Xela]

Kewl!

I almost got the targeting and positioning down

[DarkTl]

Well, that example looks like a BE doesn't it? Rance's version that I've played had on map mechanics paired with a BE where you had a leader and a army representing each character separately.

That picture is so small, I can't see what's going on there 
We don't have an army, so I don't understand how could it work for party vs party battles. Like I said, Cherry could explain it to us, and we may like it enough to change something or everything in our BE 

- Alignments for weapons.

makes their attacks elemental, but they still use normal weapon formulas to calculate damage after possible resistance/weakness script is implemented.

- Skills for every weapon (focus on one weapon for better results).

It is possible. We could use ranged small, ranged big, melee small and melee big skills. They suit our items perfectly.

- Multi-Leveled alignments for characters.

A tough question.

From the viewpoint of packs making there are characters who mastered two or more elements.
From the viewpoint of BE it makes things complicated, especially when it's two opposing elements.

First of all, what do you prefer? Percentages like in our original concept, or exhaustible defense like in Dis?
I don't even know how else they could possibly work.

- Different attack skills per weapon.

I lose the essence of this conversation. Do you mean skills like refinement, or skills like double attack? 
We should use different terms for them.

- Skills (Haste/Regen/Poison and etc.) OR we can also move this to Magic spells.

I'd like to use vitality in battle, not mp only. Haste sounds like a spell (unless you can open the eight gates from naruto  ), Poison doesn't have to be a spell.

- Items and their effects.

Ok, here is another question. Do you want items that can be implemented on enemies, reducing their health, giving debuffs, etc.? Or you want them only for MC party?

[Xela]

That picture is so small, I can't see what's going on there 
We don't have an army, so I don't understand how could it work for party vs party battles. Like I said, Cherry could explain it to us, and we may like it enough to change something or everything in our BE 

CW fixed that.

makes their attacks elemental, but they still use normal weapon formulas to calculate damage after possible resistance/weakness script is implemented.

Maybe... This is interesting but it could be a very decent feature to be introduced in a future release. By your logic a fire mage, using a fire staff does not get added advantage? That's how it would work with Jake's BE...

It is possible. We could use ranged small, ranged big, melee small and melee big skills. They suit our items perfectly.

In terms of attacks, large or small weapons don't really matter.

A tough question.

From the viewpoint of packs making there are characters who mastered two or more elements.
From the viewpoint of BE it makes things complicated, especially when it's two opposing elements.

First of all, what do you prefer? Percentages like in our original concept, or exhaustible defense like in Dis?

I've only played one version, very long time ago so i don't remember how that works but battles there are almost the central part of the game, I doubt we can afford to maintain that level of logic for any one module.

Also we cannon really properly recreate natural alignments for everybody, some kickass characters don't even have them. If we stick with elemental concept, we need to realize that. Another options is to add "personal skills" (with some default) and have them advance + operate on per character basis (scrapping elements).

==
I can't tell you what I prefer because I am not sure how the exhaustible defense works.

I lose the essence of this conversation. Do you mean skills like refinement, or skills like double attack? 
We should use different terms for them.

I mean BE skills here (Be thread and all). In the above post I meant adding skills from BE as skills to the game mechanic, increasing their damage as user becomes more proficient at them. It's just a vague suggestion, there are far too many options here

So the original question was multiple skills per weapon (somehow), current logic does not anticipate it but it's also fairly flexible. This is just another vague suggestion.

We can just say skills/battleskills.

I'd like to use vitality in battle, not mp only. Haste sounds like a spell (unless you can open the eight gates from naruto  ), Poison doesn't have to be a spell.

I didn't even think about using vitality once...

I am asking this because of a clutter on the interfaces, both in the game and in the BE ui that a lot of options may create...

Ok, here is another question. Do you want items that can be implemented on enemies, reducing their health, giving debuffs, etc.? Or you want them only for MC party?

Items reducing health in enemy hands will be a pretty shitty implementation. If such an item is used on MC even in a safe environment, game will end unless I put even more checks in the code.
I don't care otherwise, I don't recall playing one game where I would use items except those that healed/restored.

[DarkTl]

Aha, I see it's another Touhou game. Well, I still don't understand what's going on there. There is some kind of grid 5x5, I have no idea what it does.  I guess those numbers, 30 and 29, are relative strength of parties or something like that.

It's not too late to use this kind of BE too, but I need to try it out. I don't mind any kind of BE as long as it's not repetitive, boring and way too simple. I'm gonna try it right now before deciding what to do.

[Xela]

It's not too late to use this kind of BE too, but I need to try it out. I don't mind any kind of BE as long as it's not repetitive, boring and way too simple. I'm gonna try it right now before deciding what to do.

It might be too late... I wrote all the complex logic for rows, targeting and positioning for nothing if we go with this. This requires no positioning logic at all, just two vboxes with frames and buttons + some ui in the middle. I doubt that you need to move anything around there, so it's prolly simple enough to be a screen without any python code at all.

I don't know... I always thought of these portrait BEs as ancients and inferior to even simplest rpg types. From programming point of view that is definitely true... my preference would be to an unmodded Jakes version then to the one in Valet Pletej with portraits but far more complex mechanics (that I never really understood).

Although I'll admit that adding content to portraits is prolly super simple...

[DarkTl]

Your vision is too narrow. We can use any type of gui and rows too, no matter base mechanics.

[Xela]

Your vision is too narrow. We can use any type of gui and rows too, no matter base mechanics.

So you're basically saying lets get rid of backgrounds and most special effects and use portraits instead. I've been against that idea from the start. Rows with portraits and effects (besides simple damage/sound/status) will look really out of place.

[DarkTl]

Oh god. No, I'm saying that we can use bgs, sprites and effects no matter what.

[CherryWood]

Aha, I see it's another Touhou game. Well, I still don't understand what's going on there. There is some kind of grid 5x5, I have no idea what it does.  I guess those numbers, 30 and 29, are relative strength of parties or something like that.

It's not too late to use this kind of BE too, but I need to try it out. I don't mind any kind of BE as long as it's not repetitive, boring and way too simple. I'm gonna try it right now before deciding what to do.

I didn't mean this as a serious proposal, don't think it's suitable for us for many reasons, just wanted to show... I dunno now  

But because you asked:
That 5x5 box is relative distance between each character to determine who can attack who. It's Touhou, so air combat between flying magicians is taking place, and this is somewhat simulating 3D space. (you can be closing to one enemy and still keeping distance from others)
Not usable for us as its kinda ill-suited for interiors/dungeons obviously.

Otherwise it's very Rance-like, battle ends when action timer runs out, and it have the same more HP=more dmg formula.