Lonestar51
Apr 19, 2014
Want!
Want! Want!!!!!111eleven 
Ahem...
Yes, looks very promising. Though I will force myself to give you the time necessary...
One question though: All the figures have a counter on a blue background to the lower left of the portrait. Is this an effect of the battlefield?
jack1974
Apr 19, 2014
Yes exactly, in the video the effect is "Cold". I am thinking to simply remove the counter in that case (for practical reason I just assigned them an effect with 99 duration, though I guess I can skip displaying the text in that case since is permanent).
So far I've also never used the turn limit, but could have it later in the game (win the battle before turn X, or more realistically, kill specific enemy in X turns).
OtterFace
Apr 19, 2014
So how is the game going to be distributed? Are we going to be able to buy the seasons separately?
jack1974
Apr 20, 2014
No no, you buy it all at once. But I'll finish each season separately so for THOSE WHO WANTS to play/test early, they can play as soon as possible. But you can just wait and buy the final game once is finished of course
Franka
Apr 20, 2014
Is it possible that you could remove the "EMPTY" in the battlefield boxes that aren't occupied? I think that looks rather distracting.
jack1974
Apr 20, 2014
Yes removing it is no problem
jack1974
Apr 21, 2014
I've coded 2 sidequests, now will do the third and then finish up the main plot. As said before, since you play only 3 characters and there aren't romance dialogues, doesn't make sense to make this season very long. Besides if you play to grind, could last already 2-3hours
Rather happy also about the grinding mechanism. If you play at Easy level you can just go home and fast-skip the days, since you'll win the next battles anyway. In Hard mode instead you need to do the best every day to gain XP with the various semi-random encounters, otherwise you can't win in the toughest battles (like the Huge Kodiak one).
jack1974
Apr 22, 2014
https://31.media.tumblr.com/bccc480ea702b68e5c45386713a6b202/tumblr_n4fby14vT51qhts2bo1_1280.jpg" style="max-width:100%">
moved a quest that takes place in an underground catacomb to the 3rd Season, since as said in the past doesn't make sense to add a lot of content on the first Season because you control only 3 characters in it. To compensae, I still added a smaller one written by me, so don't worry the texts will be checked/proofread in the final game
Lonestar51
Apr 22, 2014
We already knew the first season takes place in and around Ninin. Now we know the third season takes place there as well. Soon the whole plot will be spoilered
But from what the captain said, it might fit better into the third season. A Necromancer is not what is the average entry-level enemy looks like... more like a boss for the experienced party.
so don't worry the texts will be checked/proofread in the final game
Don't worry, proofreading will be our job
jack1974
Apr 22, 2014
Actually no, the 3rd Season doesn't take place there
but the quest was generic enough that I can change a few characters and will also work in that... "other place"
And the necromancer is actually the replacement quest I just wrote (is a minor necromancer obviously). They're sidequests, so NOT NECESSARY to do them, but I want to leave there as challenge, in particular Hard/Nightmare mode. In Easy mode the word challenge has no meaning
jack1974
Apr 22, 2014
I just added the possibility to win a battle by killing a specific enemy.
I was going to add also a time limit... when I realized looking at the code that is really not possible to calculate "a turn"
since there aren't fixed turns but it all depends on the various party / enemy speed, which effects/conditions they have, and so on.
So I'm afraid but no time-limited battles
Already having the "kill a specific enemy" makes more interesting though.
Lonestar51
Apr 22, 2014
I was going to add also a time limit... when I realized looking at the code that is really not possible to calculate "a turn" since there aren't fixed turns but it all depends on the various party / enemy speed, which effects/conditions they have, and so on.
You could always add a "soft" time limit, that everyone - friend or for - takes x HP each round. And find an explanation why a faster figure takes the damage faster (stepping more often on the spikes or whatever). Of course you would claim "the battlefield environment did it" and specifically select enemies which have lots of HP but other disadvantages (so same level, more or less, but better suited). This way the player would want to win, and win fast, but could survive even a long fight with lots of potions.
Already having the "kill a specific enemy" makes more interesting though.
Assuming I win by killing a specific enemy, will I get full XP, or just the XP for the enemies killed?
jack1974
Apr 22, 2014
I can have damage dealing debuff at beginning of battle, so probably will do that, but not as a generic "you need to survive 8 turns" like I was doing before.
And yes you'll get the full encounter XP even if you kill just the target, otherwise wouldn't be fair
yayswords
Apr 22, 2014
You could always just have higher speed victims take less damage from it. But I sure hope the mechanic won't be used often, if at all.
renke_
Apr 23, 2014
when I realized looking at the code that is really not possible to calculate "a turn" since there aren't fixed turns but it all depends on the various party / enemy speed, which effects/conditions they have, and so on.
I don't see the problem, one turn are imho n actions, with n=number of participants. This would mean that a turn can end before all participants take part but this is a logical consequence of your speed dynamics. Place a small marker (with a turn counter) at the order column on the right side of the combat screen and the current turn should be transparent for us players.
jack1974
Apr 23, 2014
Well I made some tests, but was resulting a bit weird. I mean maybe for me, the coder, you, etc is clear. But I can imagine already many people getting confused "what, that enemy hit me two times and I just cast a fireball!". Is hard to explain well how it works to everyone, even more casual gamers. Also, playing it a bit, wasn't really fun/working as intended.
I managed to add pre-existing conditions on the battlefield though:
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Bl6VMLqCQAA2AoE.jpg:large" style="max-width:100%">
in this case is a bonus for the player, all enemies start with a bleeding condition. I can add any kind of condition at the beginning, I'm sure I'll find some good uses to it
Lonestar51
Apr 23, 2014
in this case is a bonus for the player, all enemies start with a bleeding condition. I can add any kind of condition at the beginning, I'm sure I'll find some good uses to it
Why do I get the feeling that usually it won't be the enemies who get bleeding/poisoned/frozen condition?
gamesempie
Apr 23, 2014
Another option you could try for the turn counter is if the reason for the time limit is because a mage is charging up for a powerful spell or a specific unit is about to escape you could use their turns for the counter so killing them before the turn limit is an unmentioned exploit and in harder modes you could give the other units a priority to keep that unit under the guard ability to make that harder.
jack1974
Apr 23, 2014
Yes but I wanted something simple to add, since from now on I want to concentrate on finishing the game. So if is something simple/quick to add I'll do it, otherwise will save the idea for another game
OtterFace
Apr 24, 2014
So when's the estimated release date then? :D
