[ishpeck]

I've noticed that, as I design video games and especially CRPG's, that my design philosophies differ very strongly from other peoples'.

Would you rather have an invincible character or dangerous battles?

I've always leaned more towards the "Player Strategy over Character's Numerics" philosophy but it seems that people, when looking for a RPG absolutely hate having to think about what they're doing. They just want to say: "Kill that monster!" and have the character's XP do the rest.

Which do you think should take higher priority? Strategy or Level+Weapon?
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[ThousandKnives]

Interesting topic, but I hope you realize that this is a very personal thing. Everyone will have their own answer, and no one will necessarily be wrong.

Personally I like a game that has a steep enough level up curve that you can make the game harder for yourself by not leveling up, or by reducing the size of your party or something. Like in DW3 you could play through (most) of the game without taking on any party members.

[white_door]

In a balanced rpg, the player is given the choice of the difficulty. This catters to all play styles, I've seen it done in two ways.

1. when you start the game or in the game menu there is a difficulty option that modifies the percentage of damage that is dealt to the characters by enemies. As long as easy is easy, normal is normal, and hard is hard, this can be really good. This isn't really balanced gameplay.. but it works.

2. Like ThousandKnives mentioned, If the game includes repopulating monsters, large/optional areas with optional fights, or random combat. The player may control the difficultly level, by controlling the characters' levels. If you go out of your way to 'level up' with lots of simple fights you will end up with a easy experence, if you just go hard and skip any unrequired combat, you will end up with a much harder game.

Personally I suck at balancing stuff... most games I have made are too hard. Partly that becuase as a developer, you know all the answers and tricks..

[Anonymous Coward]

When you ask "Would you rather have an invincible character or dangerous battles?" I think you need to consider other aspects of the RPG.

Here are some things that would make me want to have an invincible character:

* The story is interesting, but many combat sequences are interposed between the next story-advancing sequence.
* Combat sequences get monotonous - same monster(s) every time, no varying tactics or fundamental decisions other than who to attack, and when to heal your party members.
* Combat sequences get frequent, like in the Final Fantasy style games: walk 10 pixels, fight, walk 5 pixels, fight, etc...
* You have to fight many combats to get to the next save point. (If you die, you just wasted all that time, and you have to do it all over again.)
* Combat is ridiculously difficult or volatile. If I only win 1 in 10 combats and have to reload my game every time I lose, I'm wasting 90% of my time.

Here are some things that would make me want more dangerous battles:

* Save points between battles, so that difficult battles do not have to be repeated. (Alternatively, losing a battle does not end your game.)
* The battle system allows you to flee, so that if you get in over your head, you can at least back out, rather than wait for your party to die off and then reload a saved game.
* More interesting combat systems (like Final Fantasy Tactics).
* Less interesting story - i.e., if combat is the focus of the game, as opposed to story, the challenge of combat becomes important. (Diablo is a good example.)
* Unique battles. I expect scripted, unique battles to have challenge to them, and I am willing to spend more time on battles that are story-critical, character-driven, or simply with a unique foe.
* Ability to easily re-load a game. If I have to reset my console to load a game, I don't want to be dying often!
* In-game rewards commensurate with challenge. I'm willing for combat to be more deadly in a game if the character advancement is proportionately accelerated and combat becomes less frequent. (I'd rather fight 10 battles for 20XP each than 100 battles for 2XP each.)
* Story advancement within combat. Having foes talk to you during battle gives you a story-driven reason to have challenging combats.
* Ability to 'gear up' - Having tough encounters is more acceptable if you can go on a side-quest to level up and come back later. (This is particularly true of novice RPG'ers who don't have all the combat optimization tricks that experienced RPG'ers have.)

Anyway, I don't think it's a one-or-the-other thing. I think your best bet is to make the combats pretty challenging, but give players the option to 'level up' before taking on the next dungeon/boss/whatever. It gives them a chance to control their game play a bit (do I plunge through by the skin of my teeth, or do I practice ahead of time so I can be reasonably assured of victory?), and it gives you an opportunity to introduce more of the game world through side quests, larger explorable areas, etc. Better yet, the player feels like he accomplished something if he comes back and whomps on a boss monster that was previously making him wear his own ass for a hat.