#they have strengths and weaknesses that counteract each other greatly for the game of taking each other aback

[floorpancakes]

im having thoughts about gay people again

#xxxholic #douwata #listen i have a lot to think about i always think abt them theres so much to discuss #if they had one confessional conversation it would all be over doumeki would die but not literally this time #i love the rarely discussed thing which is like 'sure watanuki is a blushing tsundere nerd loser BUT he could have the upper hand' #the element of surprise....the element of actually acting on all the boldness hes acrued but never actually committed to in canon #if he had any sort of healthy natural growth that wasnt affected by The Situation itd b over for that poor man #its like an explosion if either of them act on their feelings the other will just be like a human firework tbh #i love the idea of a potential relationship of theirs being just as much about revenge game 4d chess tactics #as much as it is goofy or serious or tender #then again im the type to view positive friendships in my real life that way so i naturally enjoy it in fictional relationships #but like #you have a tsundere who was trained in the art of being a seductress #and you have a more outspoken bolder type with strong conviction in his romantic feelings but also an expectation of it being unfulfilled #they have strengths and weaknesses that counteract each other greatly for the game of taking each other aback #they already do but in a relationship itd be tenfold #they also each have enough smugness in them to propel it to the next levek #imagine them constantly trying to one each other up #he who blushes first loses (but wins the consolation prize of a REALLY cute relationship) #heh ...all the excellent fic fuel if i could write fic without getting distracted panicking abt lore inconsistencies or cringing at myself #not for the act of writing fic i just find it tricky to like my own longform writing #but i wANNAAAAAAAA

[jacobhallyear2fmp]

Battle Systems In RPGs

I wanted to use this post to take a look at some other RPG combat systems that have their own unique twists on the base of turn based combat and why I decided that the Mario and Luigi RPGs were the style that I wanted to replicate over so many other formats.

Persona 5:

Persona 5′s combat system is at it’s core the usual system, there is the player’s team and the enemies and they take turns as they progress through the combat. What makes Persona 5′s combat unique however is the ability to completely remove an enemies turn from the rotation for one turn as well as then perform a follow up.

The way this works is very similar to the Pokémon series, every playable character and enemy have strengths and weaknesses to certain attributes. Some have resistances, completely block or even heal when being hit by some affinities, most to all have neutral affinity types that means they neither take massive damage or reduced damage when hit by them, while all have at least one affinity that does increased damage as well as knock them out for a turn, wherein they take more damage and the character that hit them gets another turn immediately to perform a follow up. Both the player and enemies can utilise this ability which makes for a very in depth combat system where the player needs to realise who has the ideal abilities for each combat encounter while also not putting team members in a bad spot where they can be more easily killed.

Aside from that unique spin on the base the game primarily focuses on the main playable character Joker who, with the ability of the wild card, is able to convince some enemies who are knocked down to join their side to then join his own roster of personas that he can freely switch when in battle, who all have their own move set as well as affinities. To counteract this freedom that he grants when it comes to what you’re able to pull off Joker has a crushing flaw wherein if he gets downed in battle the player instantly loses, even if there are other team members alive. This is what makes Joker the main character as he is also unable to be taken off of the team, which means that the player needs to make sure that he is always safe.

One final element that the game utilises is truly making the player’s team feel like a unified group of friends helping each other through the toughest times. During the sections of the game where the player is able to just walk around the real world they can choose to socalise with the various members of the Phantom Thieves and get to know them better. The more the player does this the more abilities those party members will gain to aid in battle, from being able to automatically recover teammates from status ailments such as being stunned or slept, to being able to take a hit that would’ve killed another party member that can sometimes save the battle. The game makes use of the non combat sections to strengthen the allies you gain along the way in believable ways.

When it comes to why I chose the M&L style of gameplay over this one is that this combat style just appeared way too daunting to try and replicate. I would need several affinities that each enemy and player character would use, on top of the various move sets and stats they would have seperate from that. I also just find M&L’s combat more engaging in general.

Cris Tales:

Cris Tales is in many ways a typical RPG, the player has a basic attack, a skill list, a party of characters to level up and the battles are turn based, but the key thing that the game uses to switch this up is the ability to control time.

In both the overworld and battle the player can invoke the power of two crystals, the Future Crystal and the Past Crystal. Using them can either age the enemy your fighting greatly or make them much younger, making them weaker and more fragile in the process. This by itself is already an interesting premise that shakes up the traditional RPG combat, but it’s when the game gets more experimental with this system that it becomes a real game changer. A good example is if the player is fighting a mechanical enemy such as a robot, or maybe someone in armour. If the player was to hit that enemy with a water attack and then used the Future Crystal, that enemy’s body/armour would rust and become much easier to defeat. Another example is that say an enemy spawns some extra enemies, if the player uses the Past Crystal then not only will those new enemies no longer be present, if the player defeats that enemy which spawned those extra enemies then goes back to the present, those new enemies will be permanently gone. It’s a super interesting system with a lot to play around with and is fully realised in so many ways.

Aside from the time element of the combat, the game also has some elements more similar to the M&L RPGs, with the ability to do more and take less damage with well pressed button inputs. This is a system that makes the combat more engaging for me as it means I need to be constantly paying attention in battle instead of just clicking one button every so often. This system sadly isn’t quite as realised as the original M&L games however and is actually closer to the style of the Paper Mario RPGs as there isn’t a way to completely dodge or even counter an attack in a clean, fluid motion, you just need to time a button press to a specific moment just before/as the character is hit.

That’s the main reason that I decided to go with M&L’s style of gameplay over this game, the game with it’s timing focus on combat was nearly there, but I felt that M&L’s combat is just more engrossing and enjoyable when it comes to timing attacks and dodges and with the elements of manipulating time I just couldn’t think of any new or unique methods of utilising it that hadn’t already been done by this game.

EarthBound: 

EarthBound is one of the most rudimentary RPGs, with the usual assortment of a player party, enemies in combat, a variety of abilities to use in combat and the classic turn based combat.

The main things that set this game apart and make it stand out are it’s greater focuses on a more free flowing world. Unlike many other games at the time enemies are not randomly encountered as the player walks around, instead they can be found all over the overworld and need to be walked into in order to fight. If the player walks into an enemy from behind they gain the benefit of a guaranteed first turn, but this also applies to enemies who can walk into the player from behind guarantying them the first strike. Another element of this combat engagement system is that as the player grows stronger weaker enemies that the player comes across actually get defeated on contact, completely skipping the battle phase.

Aside from that element of starting battles a cool feature of the actual combat is that when a player character gets hit they don’t instantly take the damage, instead the damage is gradually reduced from the HP bar in real time, with greater damage numbers or multiple attacks from enemies on a single character reducing that number quicker. This actually allows the player to save their characters from otherwise instant death if they are able to heal the injured party member before the HP ticks down to 0. It’s a really interesting element that I haven’t really seen anywhere else before.

The main reason for not using this combat style over M&L’s is that just like Persona 5 and Cris Tales before it I just don’t find this style of gameplay as investing, but I do find it’s element of HP reduction really cool and it is something I might try to implement if I have the time.

Slay the Spire:

Slay the Spire is a bit of a different style of RPG compared to the other games in this post, with it being a deck-building rougelike where the player must build up their roster of attacks, buffs and other various abilities.

Slay the Spire still has many of the traditional RPG elements that I’ve mentioned across this post and others, there’s a turn based battle system, a set of playable character’s with varying stats and attacks and a large roster of enemies the player needs to fight through. The main difference is the card system, with the cards the player collects in each level of the Spire dictating how the player fights, with multiple “builds” being able to be made with each new attempt at the Spire. The rougelike element means that no 2 attempts at the game are the same, with different enemies, cards and rooms being present in different combinations each time the player tries to climb the Spire.

This gameplay style is really interesting and I do find it very enticing, but when it came to deciding what style of combat I’d rather do this game wasn’t particularly high on the list due to just how many elements I would need to make. From all the various cards, the the playable character and the enemies, I just didn’t feel that it would be that investing and interesting to make.