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tcaudilllg
Dragonmaster


Joined: 20 Jun 2002
Posts: 1731
Location: Cedar Bluff, VA

PostPosted: Sun Apr 24, 2005 11:03 pm    Post subject: New Ideas [quote]

Well we don't seem to have been having many development discussions lately, so why don't I start the ball rolling with a few ideas of my mine?

I was playing Dragon Quest III the other day, and I noticed that half the time in a battle that often raged for a minute or more. was spent cycling through the individual turns of the characters and monsters. It seems to me that letting all of the monsters attack at once, a la FFX-2, would be a reasonable device, even for a turnbased battle system. It would make battles much less tedious, and ultimately, I think, be more realistic. What you all think?
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janus
Mage


Joined: 29 Jun 2002
Posts: 464
Location: Issaquah, WA

PostPosted: Sun Apr 24, 2005 11:44 pm    Post subject: [quote]

If they all attack at once, it isn't really turn based.
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tcaudilllg
Dragonmaster


Joined: 20 Jun 2002
Posts: 1731
Location: Cedar Bluff, VA

PostPosted: Sun Apr 24, 2005 11:53 pm    Post subject: [quote]

Well it is kinda, that is, you have--yeah, it's "phase based". Kinda, yeah.
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Mandrake
elementry school minded asshole


Joined: 28 May 2002
Posts: 1341
Location: GNARR!

PostPosted: Mon Apr 25, 2005 6:37 pm    Post subject: [quote]

It's still turn based- Phantasy Star games played this way.
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Verious
Mage


Joined: 06 Jan 2004
Posts: 409
Location: Online

PostPosted: Mon Apr 25, 2005 9:22 pm    Post subject: [quote]

I don't think that would afford the player the opportunity to heal before they are wiped out by the onslaught of attacks.

From a player's perspective, it would require a completely different strategy than turn based games.

The overall concept could work, but it would definately require some planning to pull it off successfully.
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DeveloperX
202192397


Joined: 04 May 2003
Posts: 1626
Location: Decatur, IL, USA

PostPosted: Tue Apr 26, 2005 3:31 am    Post subject: [quote]

Verious wrote:
I don't think that would afford the player the opportunity to heal before they are wiped out by the onslaught of attacks.

From a player's perspective, it would require a completely different strategy than turn based games.

The overall concept could work, but it would definitely require some planning to pull it off successfully.

Play Suikoden. It play like this:

All 6 players get a turn, then the enemies get theirs.
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Verious
Mage


Joined: 06 Jan 2004
Posts: 409
Location: Online

PostPosted: Tue Apr 26, 2005 9:17 pm    Post subject: [quote]

Couldn't all of the monsters attack a single character and wipe them out before the player had a chance to heal them, if the monsters all get to attack at once?
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LeoDraco
Demon Hunter


Joined: 24 Jun 2003
Posts: 584
Location: Riverside, South Cali

PostPosted: Wed Apr 27, 2005 3:32 am    Post subject: [quote]

Verious wrote:
Couldn't all of the monsters attack a single character and wipe them out before the player had a chance to heal them, if the monsters all get to attack at once?


Yeah, that's one of the potential aspects of such a system. Kartia, for example (or, for a more recent (on US soil, that is) example, Disgaea) had a system where all a players units got a turn, then all the enemies units, etc.

Although, Suikoden did not do exactly that: each enemy/character still had a speed attribute; while the player entered character commands in mass---so that there was a "party" turn---each character in battle would still go in some definitive order. Downside? One side could still spam a unit to death. Upside? If done well, battles can be over pretty quickly. Suikoden IV, for example, has a system that is of this ilk, and its battles hardly last more than a few party turns.
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Nephilim
Mage


Joined: 20 Jun 2002
Posts: 414

PostPosted: Wed Apr 27, 2005 4:17 am    Post subject: [quote]

Verious wrote:
Couldn't all of the monsters attack a single character and wipe them out before the player had a chance to heal them, if the monsters all get to attack at once?


I think what he's saying (and correct me if I'm wrong in this) is that in RPG's where you have a combat system where the "good guys" all attack, and then the "bad guys" all attack, then you can cut down the time spent in battle sequences if the "bad guys" all attack at once. The net effect would be the same; you just wouldn't be sitting there waiting through the attack animations for each monster individually. (This is particularly a good idea in those battles where you're fighting a lot of little wussy monsters - they pose little threat, but you still groan when they show up because you know you're in for a long haul.)

Even if you had a turn-based system that interspersed PC and monster attacks, you could still time-collapse it by having monsters all attack at once if they would normally attack in succession. In other words, if you have a combat order of PC - monster - monster - PC, you could collapse that to PC - two monsters - PC.
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janus
Mage


Joined: 29 Jun 2002
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Location: Issaquah, WA

PostPosted: Wed Apr 27, 2005 6:10 am    Post subject: [quote]

Nephilim wrote:
Verious wrote:
Couldn't all of the monsters attack a single character and wipe them out before the player had a chance to heal them, if the monsters all get to attack at once?


I think what he's saying (and correct me if I'm wrong in this) is that in RPG's where you have a combat system where the "good guys" all attack, and then the "bad guys" all attack, then you can cut down the time spent in battle sequences if the "bad guys" all attack at once. The net effect would be the same; you just wouldn't be sitting there waiting through the attack animations for each monster individually. (This is particularly a good idea in those battles where you're fighting a lot of little wussy monsters - they pose little threat, but you still groan when they show up because you know you're in for a long haul.)

Even if you had a turn-based system that interspersed PC and monster attacks, you could still time-collapse it by having monsters all attack at once if they would normally attack in succession. In other words, if you have a combat order of PC - monster - monster - PC, you could collapse that to PC - two monsters - PC.
Wouldn't that cause lots of problems with status effects and such that alter the effect of attacks? For example, if a monster casts Defense Down and then another monster attacks, having all monsters attack at the same time would break this and make it behave differently.
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DeveloperX
202192397


Joined: 04 May 2003
Posts: 1626
Location: Decatur, IL, USA

PostPosted: Wed Apr 27, 2005 7:10 am    Post subject: [quote]

janus wrote:
Nephilim wrote:
Verious wrote:
Couldn't all of the monsters attack a single character and wipe them out before the player had a chance to heal them, if the monsters all get to attack at once?


I think what he's saying (and correct me if I'm wrong in this) is that in RPG's where you have a combat system where the "good guys" all attack, and then the "bad guys" all attack, then you can cut down the time spent in battle sequences if the "bad guys" all attack at once. The net effect would be the same; you just wouldn't be sitting there waiting through the attack animations for each monster individually. (This is particularly a good idea in those battles where you're fighting a lot of little wussy monsters - they pose little threat, but you still groan when they show up because you know you're in for a long haul.)

Even if you had a turn-based system that interspersed PC and monster attacks, you could still time-collapse it by having monsters all attack at once if they would normally attack in succession. In other words, if you have a combat order of PC - monster - monster - PC, you could collapse that to PC - two monsters - PC.
Wouldn't that cause lots of problems with status effects and such that alter the effect of attacks? For example, if a monster casts Defense Down and then another monster attacks, having all monsters attack at the same time would break this and make it behave differently.


If you think about it, there is STILL an order of operations that HAS to happen here, cause theres no way to simply have all monster's attack exactly at the same time...well, you 'technically' could, but the code would get real messy faster than you can say 'I'.

So, if you transparently calculate the outcome of all monster's actions before you animate the actions, then you can simply apply the end result after the animation, and presto, no time lost.

so like,

/*player's turns */
/* calculate ending result of each monster's actions */
/* animate all the monster's */
/* apply preclaculated result to targeted character(s) */
/* player's turns again */

something like that.

Even Final Fantasy X2 ~ where all the NPCs, and PCs can attack simultaneously, there is still a speed-attribute that determines who gets the next strike. which would allow proper statuses and crap.


After more thought about it, I like the idea, and I'll be applying it to the next game I write.
:)
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