sabreene
Mar 24, 2014
Tiny note, and this might already be changing since it's not the final version -- but armor is spelled two different ways on the image posted. "Armour" in armor category and then "Armor" every where else.
Also, loving the look of this game!!
jack1974
Mar 24, 2014
Haha yes, I always use US language, while the coder used to write it in the UK way, so armour instead of armor, but I'll make armor everywhere
yayswords
Mar 24, 2014
I added the display of resistances on the left, since is very useful when you select the items for your characters. Will be especially useful for those crazy Nightmare mode players who want to get high resistances to defeat specific boss enemies 
Farming gear to get the right combination of FIFTEEN different resistances, while also having appropriate stats for the respective classes, is not really my idea of an interesting way of overcoming a great challenge. I hope Nightmare will be more about timing skill combos in battle than that.
In fact, I should like the following change to resistances. I realize you probably won't touch them now but anyway
condense burning/weakened, frozen/slowed etc so the two become one. That's fifteen down to eleven if memory serves. Also, make the resistances themselves less binary. Currently if you are resistant to shattered, it means it's unlikely to affect you, but if it does it does so at its full power. I would rather see it not affect the chance of the debuff applying, but rather the strength of it. For example if you have 25% resistance to the shattered ailment, you're as likely as anyone else to be affected by it, but it reduces your defense by 15% instead of 20%. This reduces RNG and it lets thieves use their moves on bosses that are typically freaking resistant to everything.
Also on the topic of inventory. Nothing stopping you from changing gear in combat in Loren. I never experimented much with that and I hope I never will have to, but you could definitely pass around the hardest hitting weapon like that for example. What would happen if you used equipment with a lot of offensive stats for your turn, and then swapped on defensive stats inbetween? What would happen if you swapped on +speed gear inbetween? I hope you will just disable combat gear swap so nobody has to mess around with this.
jack1974
Mar 25, 2014
Farming gear to get the right combination of FIFTEEN different resistances, while also having appropriate stats for the respective classes, is not really my idea of an interesting way of overcoming a great challenge. I hope Nightmare will be more about timing skill combos in battle than that.
Depends on tastes, but I am pretty sure you'll be able to win without the NEED to have elemental resistances. They have an impact, but the most important thing are the 4 base stats (Attack, Defense, Speed, Magic). And of course, the skills
In fact, I should like the following change to resistances. I realize you probably won't touch them now but anyway condense burning/weakened, frozen/slowed etc so the two become one. That's fifteen down to eleven if memory serves. Also, make the resistances themselves less binary. Currently if you are resistant to shattered, it means it's unlikely to affect you, but if it does it does so at its full power. I would rather see it not affect the chance of the debuff applying, but rather the strength of it. For example if you have 25% resistance to the shattered ailment, you're as likely as anyone else to be affected by it, but it reduces your defense by 15% instead of 20%. This reduces RNG and it lets thieves use their moves on bosses that are typically freaking resistant to everything.
No unfortunately can't do such changes right now. However, beside the hit/miss chances, also the turns/duration is affected by the resistance. And for the damaging over time conditions, the damage is also proportional to the resistance. Is already something
Also on the topic of inventory. Nothing stopping you from changing gear in combat in Loren. I never experimented much with that and I hope I never will have to, but you could definitely pass around the hardest hitting weapon like that for example. What would happen if you used equipment with a lot of offensive stats for your turn, and then swapped on defensive stats inbetween? What would happen if you swapped on +speed gear inbetween? I hope you will just disable combat gear swap so nobody has to mess around with this.
Yes, I'm thinking to disallow the combat gear swap since is totally unrealistic.
"Hey wait, I'll just change my chain mail to a full plate mail while fighting a horde of goblins with one hand!"
yayswords
Mar 25, 2014
That makes resistances very powerful though if they double dip like that. Effectively you get their value ^2. Since it's a close subject anyway, I was wondering something about stagger duration. I've always been under the impression that once you fill the target's stagger bar, they get a stagger duration partly based on how much "overkill" stagger (like 57/60 and you add 12 stagger points means 9 overkill) you gave them. Is that correct, and more importantly, is it the same in SotW?
In WoW you can only swap your weapons in combat. It's nice because shields grant a huge amount of armor (basically +10% physical damage reduction) and unlock a few defensive moves, but your attacks are weak with a one-hander - some attacks even require a two-hander or two one-handers - so it's a powerful choice letting you trade offense for defense. It doesn't feel totally unrealistic. However there should be some easy way to swap them then to have something like that in these games, because whether or not you keep any form of equipment swapping in combat, the UI is clearly not designed to make that fast and easy.
jack1974
Mar 25, 2014
That makes resistances very powerful though if they double dip like that. Effectively you get their value ^2. Since it's a close subject anyway, I was wondering something about stagger duration. I've always been under the impression that once you fill the target's stagger bar, they get a stagger duration partly based on how much "overkill" stagger (like 57/60 and you add 12 stagger points means 9 overkill) you gave them. Is that correct, and more importantly, is it the same in SotW?
Yes I didn't touch that part, so is going to be the same.
In WoW you can only swap your weapons in combat. It's nice because shields grant a huge amount of armor (basically +10% physical damage reduction) and unlock a few defensive moves, but your attacks are weak with a one-hander - some attacks even require a two-hander or two one-handers - so it's a powerful choice letting you trade offense for defense. It doesn't feel totally unrealistic. However there should be some easy way to swap them then to have something like that in these games, because whether or not you keep any form of equipment swapping in combat, the UI is clearly not designed to make that fast and easy.
Swapping weapons is less weird than swapping whole armors in battle
I am not sure though I'll add this. Right now I want to try getting the 1st part of the story done by April and that won't be easy already
yayswords
Mar 25, 2014
But from a fanservice PoV armor swapping in battle has nothing but possibilities
jack1974
Mar 25, 2014
And voilà, random loot works too!
https://31.media.tumblr.com/e9b60d75bbf643c7e78cb70bb1fc7cf4/tumblr_n303pqgDvU1qhts2bo1_1280.jpg" style="max-width:100%">
That is just a test I did after the first battle, obviously in the normal game you'll never get such a good loot after a battle
The best items are highlighted with the color and the letter of the tier.
Now I have everything I need to begin coding the game FINALLY!!!!!
yayswords
Mar 25, 2014
omg sexist game, they did not split the xp evenly
jack1974
Mar 25, 2014
He got the bonus for kills
I have added a very small XP bonus percentage for the party members who kills more enemies (just for fun since I don't think will change much even in the long run).
Lonestar51
Mar 25, 2014
The picture prompts two questions:
- will some items (potions etc.) be stacked? the mask seems prepared for it.
- will 9 items (or item types, see above) be the maximum we can get in any single fight?
jack1974
Mar 25, 2014
Yes to both questions! Since the armor/weapons/jewelry will be mostly unique (as I said don't want to fill players inventory of garbage) it will apply mostly to consumables like potions, scrolls, etc.
About the 9 slots, is a limit of the GUI though, there's no limit on the engine. I figured out that 9 different item would be enough (I don't think in Loren we had ever more than 9 unique items after a single fight).
jack1974
Mar 26, 2014
Improved the item display screen by highlighting the non-zero values:
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BjpU9rDCAAAvXyf.jpg:large" style="max-width:100%">
thanks to the suggestion of a good fan/user, is much better now
yayswords
Mar 26, 2014
Yeah I was gonna say that too, but I figured once you actually have all slots filled you'll see those anyway because of the comparisons. However it seems I should have spoken up and claimed the HONOR and GLORY and...
Well let's just say it's a good change.
Actually can't you hide the zero stats altogether? That would actually leave room for perhaps a little item description (lore) or something. You could have a generic description for anything below legendary. Like a ring: Enchanted rings were once a treasured rarity, but have become more common as the world's understanding of magic has increased. You might never know how old this one is.
jack1974
Mar 26, 2014
I thought about it, the problem is that being randomly generated, I can't know exactly how many stats are going to be 0. So is a bit problematic
yayswords
Mar 26, 2014
Okay (keep trying!) but how about this. Shouldn't the columns be different. It should be Water - Frozen - Slowed, Air - Tired - Confused... you did the fire row right, earth needs fixing too though.
yayswords
Mar 27, 2014
Might want to consider one thing about Nightmare and resistances though. It's a classic problem: Some players will do ANYTHING to get an edge. If you design the game to not require that edge, it means it becomes too easy for those who bother getting it.
jack1974
Mar 27, 2014
Well even in Loren you could get FULL IMMUNITY to elemental attacks, and was much easier since it used a system with 3-4 steps. So you needed only 3 items that increased Fire resistance to gain full immunity. But still is not like the enemies would do zero damage, because luckily I can give them an array of attacks, so there'll be always one that is non-elemental (like a melee attack, or a magic missile for casters) and in that case the higher level/bonus attributes enemies get with the Nightmare level should do the trick.
Also in Loren didn't had the auto-leveling and the "timed grinding", so basically I'm sure some people did lots of city tasks to get to level 17-18 (which was supposed to be the level at END OF GAME
) and then complained that the game was too easy even in Hard mode.
I honestly think this game should be much more balanced under this aspect. During my testing I've been trying to win a battle against a Snow Tiger Alpha (optional encounter) and failed constantly for 1h then gave up. But I'm not the kind of person who plays at highest difficulty level in games anyway, indeed retried in Normal mode and managed to win. I love my enemies autoleveling system!
renke_
Mar 27, 2014
Actually can't you hide the zero stats altogether? That would actually leave room for perhaps a little item description (lore) or something.
Lore is great and fine, though the usability would be worse for me when zero values are simply left out. My "information gathering" is often visual and a fixed pattern (all possible values are shown every time) is easier for me to parse and comprehend. [Meant as a different PoV, not a hard exclusion criterion]
