Long post. Might add more later.
First a few things about the staff:
-
Jamuko is joining us as an art person. She's going to be working on new portraits for us which will replace the ones we grabbed from Walfas.org
-Kregon is joining us on mission design. He has experience with XML.
-Has anyone heard anything from Water and Wind? He didn't make the transition to the new forum and we kind of need him for map tile stuff.
Elcura, all those sprites and the Reimu animations look good.
Current work in progress
- Wrapped up the deploy system, but it's still a bit shaky and experimental. Still ironing bugs out here and there.
- Working on the trading system right now. The primary focus will be just on getting it up and running.
- Here are some ideas I've outlined regarding the system -
http://wiki.featheredmelody.com/Story_of_a_Lost_Sky/Shop_System- Some ideas for treasures:
http://wiki.featheredmelody.com/Story_of_a_Lost_Sky/Treasure_ListHere is where we stand on the main already planned out things that need to be implemented to the game engine:
- Revised Spell Animation System (Kyre's stuff)
- Revised AI system (BBM29's stuff)
- Trait learning system
- Spell Synthesis system
I think we can implement those over the summer and at the same time plan out any additional features we might want.
The difficulty with implementing the ideas that Psieye presented are that the game treats each confrontation as a 1 unit against 1 unit event. Adding the types of changes to handle two unit attacks and two-units-in-a-tile to the battle engine would require a significant overhaul of the battle system.
Fire Emblem took the let two compatible units sit next to each other for a long time and you could get them to start chatting. Their relationship effects affected stat boosts to each other when they were nearby. This could reasonably be woven into the battle engine and would be the easiest one to implement. We would also need to establish how these relations are formed.
I like the idea of having offensive / defensive modes on the support system. It seems to add a lot of flexibility to the use of a summon. On the other hand, the choice of having to give permission to do the support actions seems to me to add a layer of complexity to the decisions the player has to make. Where along the road does the player make the decision? How is it handled if your unit is the one being attacked on the AI's turn?
We'd also have to introduce this concept fairly early on in the game so as not to introduce a big new part of the gameplay once the player has gotten used to playing a certain system. Mid Chapter 3 at the latest.
There would be a couple ways that we could shape the Support Character Plan
Defensive / Offensive Modes Separate and can be Switched- User invokes a Support Spell. It's a once per battle spell (treated as a 1 use recharging spell action)
- Target is tagged with the Support Spell Status
- Support Character's presence limited by number of attacks and has an HP. If either goes to 0, support disappears. Effectively treated as a character.
- { Undecided: I don't know what would be a good way of having the player make the choice of putting the support onto offensive/defensive mode }
- Offensive mode:
-- Support Character less damage, Target takes more damage
-- Support Character does more damage on its action phase
- Defensive Mode:
-- Support Character takes more damage, target takes less damage
-- Support Character does less damage on its action phase
Pros:- Adaptive and flexible. A support character isn't locked into a pre-defined role
Cons:- More complexity in player choices. Player needs to actively manage their support.
UsageI'd imagine the usage of a support would be early on into battle.
Defensive / Offensive an inherent part of the character- User invokes a Support Spell. It's a few times per battle spell action.
- Target is tagged with the Support Spell Status
- Support Characters are classified as defensive or offensive. Defense characters have a limited HP and they soak say 50% of an ally's damage through putting up a barrier or something. They remain present until their HP drops to 0. Offensive characters have a limited amount of uses and don't soak any damage. They give an extra attack after the counterattack phase.
Pros:- Less micromanaging required for each unit. Cast the spell and be done with it.
Cons:- Inflexible, especially if player predicted what was going to happen to a unit wrong.
UsageUsage would be situational. It gives you the extra bit of attack/defense in a tight situation.