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Anima_ Jul 16, 2013
PS: Only just learned (or inferred, rather) that Anima is again doing the statistical bits. This is very good to hear. :-)

Thanks for the confidence. Though I don't work on Seasons Of The Wolf, only the framework from Loren is reused.

The current design for Planet Stronghold has no secondary attributes, everything is primary. So we won't have that problem this time.
Seloun Jul 21, 2013

Claim: Mixing direct and indirect attributes makes the game less fun.

Consider a scenario in which STR is direct (it affects damage rolls) and CON is indirect (it affects the HP increase at each level-up).



Players Kali and Mero start with identical attributes (including derived attributes) at level 0.

Kali raises CON exclusively for 10 levels, then STR exclusively for 10 levels.

Mero raises STR exclusively for 10 levels, then CON exclusively for 10 levels.



Kali and Mero will now no longer have identical attributes. While their non-derived attributes are identical, Kali will have significantly higher HP. Thus, the attribute system not only allows for but also makes it very easy to experience wasted opportunities. Once Mero's player realises their mistake, they will probably choose to restart the game (which is "not fun").

This isn't really a matter of derived/direct/indirect as you've defined it (what you seems to be worried about based on the example is not that a stat is derived or indirect, but that the computation occurs at different times). Rather, what you seem to be referring to is path independence (or commutativity), that is, that the order of the choices made should not affect the outcome.



FWIW, your example is somewhat incomplete, in any case - having higher STR earlier (and thus higher damage) may have allowed for Mero in your example to overcome challenges Kali could have not (or the HP might have been more useful, still, in which case Mero is just really unhappy). Making attribute raises commutative is neither necessary nor sufficient to making attribute raises balanced or even fun (though it may help in making it *appear* balanced at first glance, which *may* influence fun; fun is pretty hard to measure, though). That said, being commutative tends to help balance simply because it drastically reduces the number of possible configurations at any given point in the game.



Raising attributes is not that exciting

...

Here's an alternative suggestion: everyone but the twins raises their own stats. This can be affected by three sources:

...

The third point is particularly interesting: the idea here is that the character will find out how they fit into the party and focus on attributes that are more beneficial towards their role. Here's a rough algorithm:

...

The problem with 'training' style stat raises is that it's hard to come up with one which isn't going to be manipulated to become effectively manual stat raises by anyone with a hint of powergaming (see: Elder Scrolls). Most such algorithms are also reactive, not active; I may know that I'm training Bob to be a mage, but right now all he can use effectively is a crossbow. In order to 'solve' this problem, you end up having to model a far more complicated solution that the problem really deserves.



A simpler solution if raising stats proves to be particularly tedious is to just be able to set automatic stat goal ratios and manage it that way. I'd argue that this only really proved to be an annoyance in Loren due to the sheer number of characters; levelling up wasn't so frequent that this was a huge problem that needs to have a complicated solution for. The solution of only selecting the PC's stat seems to recognize the root of the issue (which, again, is really a pretty minor issue...).



A pretty common semi-solution is to autoplace some of the points and let the user place the rest, or to have an autoplace checkbox.



[*] It would be great to have the ability to auto-use `buffs' before battles (except for ambushes and chain battles). In later stages, there is a tendency to develop a ritual of `Loren uses Rally and Apulimesho uses Regenerate and Dora uses Camouflage, and now let's see what battle we have in front of us here...', which doesn't add to the excitement; having auto-casting as a configuration option on the party setup screen would be great.

Isn't this effectively just passive skills? If it doesn't take a turn to apply, that's a change in mechanics, not just convenience. If it does, I'd question the value of it; if the buff is good enough to always be worth casting immediately or always worth spending the time to bring up, it probably is not balanced well. FWIW I don't think there were such buffs in Loren in practice.



However, what I think you are really trying to mention here (based on making an exception for ambush or chain battles) is a gameplay change where there is the possibility of 'prep' time before the battle. Which could be a cool idea (another thing that could be improved by stats => more choice dimensions => harder to balance but more fun to explore) but it's not really just 'autocast buffs'. This would be encroaching on the design space of initiative, however.
Seloun Jul 21, 2013

...Having "leveling" skills, so that you don't just unlock a skill once, but you can spend more skill points in it to make it more powerful.



For example you have Heal. You put one point and you can use it, and each subsequent point increases the power:

Heal 1/5 point= heal 5% of target HP

Heal 2/5 point= heal 10% of target HP

Heal 3/5 point= heal 15% of target HP

Heal 4/5 point= heal 20% of target HP

Heal 5/5 point= heal 25% of target HP



This obviously would mean that I can't have anymore different skills like Heal I,II,III since the power is defined by the number of skill points you'll add :) So will need to review the various skilltrees, and that's more extra work. I'll have to see, maybe will try with one and measure how long it takes to do that, because I really like this idea.

I'm confused why this is really any different from having the current style, where you get three different skills (unless you specifically want to disable access to the older tier skills). Well, besides presentation; you could certainly save screen real estate if so inclined.



A secondary note (though I understand that this is a not necessarily representative example) the progression outlined above is probably not a good one - first, the skill already scales with game progression (it's percentage of target HP based) making it double-dip (so it'll improve quadratically). This means that Heal 1 and Heal 5 are really quite different in nature, not that Heal 5 is just the endgame Heal 1 (the way you would use Heal 5 is very different from the way you would use Heal 1). Second, the time cost isn't noted in the example, but linear-from-zero scaling is probably bad for active abilities, since the difference in effective cost of Heal 5 and Heal 1 is probably relatively small (time is probably the main cost, and presumably the time cost is comparable). Again, I realize it's a completely made up example...just an observation.
jack1974 Jul 21, 2013

I'm confused why this is really any different from having the current style, where you get three different skills (unless you specifically want to disable access to the older tier skills). Well, besides presentation; you could certainly save screen real estate if so inclined.

Yes I wanted to introduce limitation by level, in Loren you could have Loren's dual wield III skill very early in the game which was making her the ultimate damage dealer :lol: so if that could be limited by level, it would also be easier for me to balance, since I know that skill ABC can't be obtained until that character has level X.



Again, I realize it's a completely made up example...just an observation.

Yes, I really think I'm going to use fixed numbers skills only in this game, except a few skills. But using a percentage with HP/SP as you said has a different progression from what I intended to have!
jack1974 Aug 11, 2013
So FINALLY today I could resume thinking about this game ruleset. I made some tests with the attributes (I want to get the attributes sorted out before moving to the skills). Initially I thought something about this:
[code] #HP derive
if self.charClass==Warrior:
self.att["HP"] = int(self.att["Constitution"]*7)+self.level*5
elif self.charClass==Thief:
self.att["HP"] = int(self.att["Constitution"]*5)+self.level*5
else:
self.att["HP"] = int(self.att["Constitution"]*3)+self.level*5[/code]
so in practice the HP you get on level up would depend on the character's level multiplied by 5, and then on the Constitution attribute, multiplied by a factor that would reward more Warrior class, then Thief and then Mage.

However I also thought that unless I give a lot of attributes to assign on each level up, no Mage would want to gain only 3 extra HP for each point spent in Constitution. So I'm going to have attributes caps instead, since I think makes more sense. Like the Mage can have maximum 20 Constitution attribute, Warrior can have max 60 and so on. This way if a player wants to experiment could assign the CON attributes points early and have a Mage with more HP, but of course the tradeoff would be that he'll be less powerful in other areas.

But at least with this system, it does make sense for any class to spend points also in attributes that normally aren't made for that Class, because they all get the same benefits: the only limit, is the attributes cap for each specific Class.



I think will build the game like this and have an early Alpha to test and see if my theory makes sense :mrgreen:
Lonestar51 Aug 11, 2013
Why not something along these lines:
[code]#HP derive
if self.charClass==Warrior:
self.att["HP"] = int(self.att["Constitution"]*5)+self.level*7
elif self.charClass==Thief:
self.att["HP"] = int(self.att["Constitution"]*5)+self.level*5
else:
self.att["HP"] = int(self.att["Constitution"]*5)+self.level*3[/code]
meaning: If a thief or mage puts attributes into constituion, he gets the same out of it as a warrior (or ranger, I think, you decided to call the class...) But the base HPs, derived from the Level, are dependend on the class. (For SP it would be the other way round.)



Or possibly give warriors a constant bonus to the hitpoints (though that might be overpowered early on, and meaningless for experienced characters).
jack1974 Aug 11, 2013
Yes that was another thing I considered, but this way I would basically force the player to have high level Warrior always have more HP, reducing a bit the freedom. For example some players might want to put more points on other attributes to make a Warrior more fast or with more SP instead. Not saying that it will be a good move, but I think players would like it, they can always "follow the standard path" or experiment a bit :)

Anyway as said will experiment a bit more with my system and see if works. I have the following attributes:

"Strength","Wisdom","Skill","Agility","Will","Constitution"

each one will influence a thing on the battle, though the first two will be probably the most important (STR=HP, WIS=SP) but if I manage to balance it well maybe not (a Mage might have few SP, but have spells much more effective).

It's very hard to do it properly, but I'm trying :)
Seloun Aug 11, 2013
However I also thought that unless I give a lot of attributes to assign on each level up, no Mage would want to gain only 3 extra HP for each point spent in Constitution. So I'm going to have attributes caps instead, since I think makes more sense. Like the Mage can have maximum 20 Constitution attribute, Warrior can have max 60 and so on. This way if a player wants to experiment could assign the CON attributes points early and have a Mage with more HP, but of course the tradeoff would be that he'll be less powerful in other areas.

But at least with this system, it does make sense for any class to spend points also in attributes that normally aren't made for that Class, because they all get the same benefits: the only limit, is the attributes cap for each specific Class.


There's a couple of issues here. First, the value of HP is already different for the different classes (or at least different roles). 1 HP is much more useful to a warriors with high mitigation (1 HP is more of a single hit) and high threat (more likely that 1hp will be useful). For the mage who never gets hit, and even if they do get hit they die in 2-3 hits, raising HP ends up being a non-choice.



This would suggest that mages and ranged should get -more- hp than warriors in general per point of constitution, though this may end up looking unintuitive to your average player (likewise for will/wis to SP - people who do not benefit in other ways from will/wis should get more SP per point). One solution that's commonly used is diminishing returns, either absolute (e.g. sqrt of your stat is what's actually used for computation) or level scaling (e.g. you get full benefit upto stat == level, get half upto stat == level*2, get quarter beyond that); this can often effectively lead to the same results (better scaling for people who value the stat less) without looking arbitrarily inverted ('why is my warrior getting less hp per con?' even if that makes sense from a balance standpoint).



Second, HP (and SP) is almost always less useful that the multipliers (mitigation, damage, or other effectiveness measures) because more HP and SP doesn't reduce the time it takes for a battle (in general; you could argue you do save *some* time by not having to heal or pot as much, depending on the style of the game). It's way better to do double damage than it is to have double the longevity; in both cases you can deal the total net damage, but doing it faster is almost always better. In many cases it's probably better to do even just 10% more damage than it is to be able to do the damage twice as long (again, this is contextual with the nature of the game) since you always benefit from doing more damage; you typically only benefit from an extended pool for a very small subset of encounters. This is another reason to argue for diminishing returns - it provides a way to somewhat automatically handle the scaling. Otherwise, there's always a point where more HP/SP become effectively worthless (though it may happen at scales the game can't reach).
jack1974 Aug 11, 2013
In this game I plan to have attack do less damage than in Loren - you won't see the 120dmg each hit. So I'm going to tweak the HP gain to see at which point will be worth it even for Thief/Mages, maybe will be more than 5HP each attribute. If a hit on average does 10-12hp of damage (average, of course) then 10hp more can make some difference. Also I plan to have the long range attack miss more if you try to hit the second row characters, so that should balance the fact that mages stay back.

But in any case I think is normal in RPG, and has always been, to have some "preferred stats" for each Class. I don't want to spent too much time making every single attribute having an impact for every single Class, since I think I should spend the time to make the battles more balanced :wink: as long as the player has a choice should be fine. For the Mages you might want already to spend more point in Agility (boosting speed) or Will (increasing spells power). I mean as long as there's ENOUGH choice I think will be OK.

But I'll try to make spending point to increase HP worth it (or at least not totally worthless!) also for Mages! :)
jack1974 Aug 12, 2013
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BRdf398CEAATL8o.jpg:large" style="max-width:100%">

made some good progresses today! is cool to see immediately the effect of your choices with the attributes.
Lonestar51 Aug 12, 2013
Althea as druid looks really good, and its good to see progress being made on the game.



However, I would like to have more Attribute points I can give to my char, having more room to customize her (or him).
jack1974 Aug 12, 2013
Well there are 6 attributes already, so twice Loren's attributes. Besides I am not sure what other attributes I could add? considering here we don't have PS1 dialogue style with skills check, so anything related to non-combat situations like Charisma, Medicine, etc can't be of any use...

..However if I manage to implement crafting, I guess I could add 3 more: Blacksmith (Weapons/Armors), Fletcher (Bow/arrows) and Alchemy (Potions). But considering the small amount of time and the fact that I wasted 45 days of work because of real-life issues, I am not sure I'll manage to add this. If I add it would be cool though :)
Pace675 Aug 12, 2013
@Lonestar51 I see 5 attribute points at level up...how many more do you want? To my knowledge that seems above par for most games. We do not even know how Wolf will even do the points distribution yet, you might get some more points to for a skill tree ect. Heck we do not even know what the base cap is yet. I do not mean to sound snappish just stating that old Jack is just giving a sneak preview, and with that everything is still fluid, as in nothing is set in stone yet....Heh he has to balance the game ect xp per level so many things are left out of that screen shot that would give you more to go on.



@Jack such a tease.....want now! *Cracks the whip*



*edit typo
jack1974 Aug 12, 2013
Ahh you mean the attribute points count!! I thought the number of attributes instead !

Well yes 5 is just a test, I'll need to test/tweak a bit to see about the right number. I might make higher, since right now 1 point = 10hp and is a bit unbalanced maybe vs other attributes. For example let's say you have 25 levels cap, if you spend the 5 points every time on Strength you would get 125+ Attack skill, or if you spend all in HP you'd get 1250HP :lol:

So yeah, need to tweak it a bit :oops:
peregrin Aug 12, 2013
Hi,



Thanks for the update! Althea still looks depressed to me. Looks like a fair amount of space for character development, based on what little has been teased so far.



Will we get hover-information about the attributes? (I don't think I'd be able to guess what the difference between Wisdom and Will, or between Skill and Agility is, game-play wise.)



Two minor nitpicks: (a) "twins" should have an apostrophe after it (though I am under the impression that "twins's" is technically permissible, too, even though nobody uses it), and (b) the spacing of the icicle font (cf. ATTR[IB]UTES) needs some affection.



-- peregrin
jack1974 Aug 12, 2013
Don't understand, Althea looks depressed as facial expression? that's the "neutral" face :) Or if you mean in the videos, yes both the main characters don't talk much in them, also the text change depending who you play, not sure as who I was playing when I recorded them. Anyway, surely living with a iron-fist father didn't help much!



The attributes description are missing, since I'm planning this game to be ported on touch-devices (well, Android in practice) from the start, info on each attribute will appear in the blank space under the two frames when you click on their names or in the arrows to assign the points.



Going to change twins and also tweak the spacing since I used an image based font and some letters are wrong indeed!
Valorous_Roland Aug 12, 2013
I have to agree with peregrin about the spacing of the word "attributes". It does look a little off. And to add to the twins/twin's/twins's/twins' thing, I think that the correct one is " twins' " (that would be pronounced the same as twins, while twins's would be more like twin-siz... And I think the rule is if it's plural like that, it's without the extra sound). But I'm not a grammar expert or anything, so...



Anyways, that costume is gorgeous. Great job! I can't wait to play this.



EDIT: Oops... And he's already there.
peregrin Aug 12, 2013
Hi,


EDIT: Oops... And he's already there.


He does tend to do that, yes. I am beginning to suspect that he is a lupine message board ninja.



And to be clear, I do agree that a lack of particular cheerfulness in the twins (at least initially) is consistent with what we know of the backstory so far.



Looking forward to this one,



-- peregrin
jack1974 Aug 12, 2013
Fixed the twins and also the spacing on the letter "I" in the frozen text font.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BReGC0gCMAEwKDZ.jpg:large" style="max-width:100%">

note the NIGHTMARE difficulty option! You'll be happy now :mrgreen:
P_Tigras Aug 12, 2013
Average "won't pose much treat"? But I want lots of treats! :? Oh well, hopefully hard and nightmare will give us more treats. :mrgreen: