I noticed in the character creation screen you changed knowledge to willpower. Willpower is typically known as the resistance type stat and the stat of most use to the psion(perhaps to get ready to add that class in in an expansion pack?).



I'm guessing willpower will determine mana points and resistances. Wisdom will determine the strengthen of clerical spells and intelligence the strength of mage spells.



Instead for fighters, it should determine their ability to fight through the pain and determine their ability to use adrenaline rushes in battles. For mages it should enable them to do things that no ordinary mortal to do. Ocassionally, based on willpower and how heated and desperate the battle is, spells have the potential to do much more damage.



So a player with more int and less willpower would do really well against sewer rats but not so well against the sewer rat king and a player with more willpower and less int would do well against the sewer rat king but not so well against regular sewer rats.

Yes, will work in a similar way as you say. In my game texts I wrote:



Willpower influences the power of your spells, reduces spells fizzle rate and your character general magic resistance.

Intelligence influences how many mana points you gain for each level up, the vendor buying/selling prices and some special fighting moves.

Wisdom influences how many spells you can memorize at once, items identification, languages known, and much more.



so as you can see intelligence and wisdom are both good for any caster, moving away from the classic INT=wizard and WIS=cleric archetype

I was reading the class selection blog. And it seems like there's going to be a problem in the race/class balance. I'm going to pick the race/class that has the best white magic, then the next race/class that has the best black magic, then the race/class that has the best yellow magic.



There'll be no variety.



First you have to have a reson to have say two+ ice elf healers. Say for each ice elf healer in your party every healing spell heals (#oficeelfs in your party*the healing rate of the healing spell). Now you have to have a reason to have a dwarf healer versus an elf healer. A dwarf healer could make it so that each healing spell also blesses a healed opponent. So, when the elf healer casts a healing spell, the dwarf augments the spell, so that the fighter who was healed does 1.1X damage for five turns. If there are two dwarf healers it would be 1.2X damage.



You don't want to have any irrelevant race/class combinations or irrelevant party combinations.

The idea of having a multiplier if you have more than one kind of caster in your party is very cool, and could implement it (maybe not in version 1.0, but later).



There won't be the problem you mention because: there is in effect no class with best white, but several. Example:



Paladin, white magic x1

Healer, white magic x5

Druid, white magic x3



the value indicate only how faster your character improves in that skill, so is true that the healer could rise faster, but you could prefer to have a druid which also has good green/black magic values.



Also, there will be different healing spells based on race's deity.



Ice elf could have single heal of 50hp but that depletes their mana.

Dwarf could have a +5hp heal for 10 turns that leave them some mana.

Human could have a mass heal of +3 to all allies for 5 turns.



And so on - it will be practically impossible to "know" which is the "best" class/race combo because the spells will be all different (even if doing the same effect) based on the race.



Or better, in theory after playing 100 times you can know what is the best race but that's part of the game - discovering the trick.



Won't be like the classic AD&D games where you have the dwarf paladin or the elf wizard in any case

My 2 cents: on the other side, must not even be too much difficult to know at least what is a good race/class combo for healer or fighter or whatever.

I like the variety of spells: that should be enough for me.

I mean, I can play with a human cleric, an elf one, and a dwarven one and have 3 different subset of spells that do the same thing but in different way? that sounds great to me!

Well what I'm trying to do (trying, because is NOT easy) is to satisfy both casual hack'n'slash CRPG gamers, and more "hardcore" fans like Knockout that want some innovations.



I hope the final result will be as good as I have in mind...!

Well, each race having slightly different spells makes it worthwhile to try out different race class combinations. However, there's still no reason to have say two dwarf healers with that solution.



If you've ever played the computer game Mordor you'd know that you'd always want one healer, one thief, one warrior/seeker, and one mage or a sorceror. There was no reason to have two thieves or two healers and no reason to play any of the hybrid classes. One solution is to make each hybrid a specialist. For example, in that game there's a worthless scavenger class so you could give the scavenger a new skill the best scavenging ability.



Okay, here's the RPG party creation problem questions:



1) Is there one objectively best race/class combo for each ability needed to complete the quest?(ie. only need one halfling thief to open all the chests in the game)

2) Is there an incentive to use more than one character with the best of that ability in a given party?(ie. might I need two halfling thieves?)

3) Does each race/class combo have it's own unique ability that no other race/class combo can duplicate?(ie. if hybrids get all the spells healers get but slower, then it is better to play hybrids, specialists need unique abilities)

No I never played that Mordor game, but the "paradigm" is very common. Even in Baldur's gate or other AD&D, the usual party was 1-2 fighters, 1 thief, 1 healer, 1 wizard.



I don't understand why you want to have 2 dwarf healers? jokes apart, there's a reason: in my game you could want to have 2 healers (both dwarf or different) because you can then heal 2 tanks (a warrior and a paladin maybe). Simply as that, each healer heals one tank.



About the questions:

1) well hard to answer now, but I can say NO. because there won't be any "unlockable key that requires a thief". If you have a thief you can pick lock, but if you have a strong warrior you can bash it open, or in any case you'll always find a key

2) with skills, yes. Both for casters and fighters. Example, 2 identic human thieves (halflings aren't present in my game). You can specialize each one already with weapons: make one use always piercing, and another throwing. You'll have one deadly from close combat, and another from distance. Same for 2 ice-elf wizard: if you make one cast only red magic, and another only yellow magic, already in the middle of the game after some levels you'll have 2 different wizards.

3) no, so in theory your reasoning could be right - but since a druid would have much slower White Magic increase, he couldn't cast some powerful healing spells.



To explain better, each spell will have a requirement on each of the 6 "color" of magic. So we could have 1 druid and 1 healer both level 5:



Druid with white magic at 30 skill

Healer with white magic at 50 skill



A spell called "Healing Breeze" that has min. requirement of 50 white magic skill: only the healer could use that spell. Instead the druid could use variety of lower level ones of different kind.



Also consider that all races have 2 deities, each one with his own set of spells.



Right now is a bit confusing I know - but once I make some tests I think I'll be able to show you some screenshots or better clarifications

I've been following your blog too. This game looks very promising. I just saw you latest post. 180 spells seems an insane amount! even if I suspect that some are just going to be "duplicates" and not really unique spells.

Like this:



Red Magic - burning - inflicts 2 damage for 5 turns

Black Magic - death pain - inflicts 3 damage for 7 turns



but I think is fine since even the big MMORPG have "duplicate" spells like that. Beside if you have resistances for particular kind of attacks, makes sense (let's say you encounter zombies that are immune to death spells, you would be forced to use only the red magic ones).



Keep up the good work - this is going to be one of the best CRPG I'll play this year... also because there's no competition right now!

Thanks for the encouragement!

Anyway remember that I'm still in planning mode. For example now after I finished the first 24 spells, I'm not very satisfied. Why? because the spells have "no identity" - hard to associate them to a specific element or group.

I think I'm going to change the way the magic schools are presented to the player.

It makes more sense to have something like:

White Magic - White Magic is the magic of life and includes mostly healing spells.

Black Magic - Black Magic is the magic of death and focuses mostly on offensive spells.



because this way I can even have a self-defensive spell for Black Magic like "Unholy Aura". Before I was listing the spells based on the effect, and not on the element/group.

Also I can have a "Summon Skeleton", while before summon spells were only Yellow Magic. I like this new method much more.



Hop, going to rewrite some part of the code and of the instructions!

The problem with a skill system is that it encourages bad behavior. It encourages fighters to wear crappy armor so they get hit so that healers can keep casting healing spells to raise their healing skill.



It encourages fighters to weild crappy weapons to raise their weapons skill.



One solution, is to make every fight a challenge. That way if a player tries to use crappy gear to get more skill boostage they die.



Another way would be for easy encounters to get more challenging over time. Let's say a player tries to improve it's skills against a rat. The rat warlord might hear the lengthy battle and charge over there to take advantage of a weakened player.



Another way would not be a time limit but a time penalty. If the user decides to spend time taking advantage of the skill system, the monsters begin to get tougher, the gear gets more expensive, etc.



I think the best way would be to always make sure that the monsters are challenging. I know you said that you wanted to appeal to "casual" style players too.



One way would be instead of a difficulty setting you could have difficulty options. You could have level-scaled monsters clicked on or off. Time penalties clicked on or off. Breakable gear on or off.



Now one thing to remember is risk versus reward. In a lot of games if you do the easy settings you get no risk but all the rewards(you get to experience the entire story and gameplay experience).



Rewards can be online high scores, a special secret ending, etc.

One way would be instead of a difficulty setting you could have difficulty options. You could have level-scaled monsters clicked on or off. Time penalties clicked on or off. Breakable gear on or off.

Wow great...! that's really a good suggestion! Indeed, I'll do exactly as you said. In options you'll have several on/off values like you said, and each one will have a reward.

Example if you put breakable items off - you won't get some very powerful weapons towards the end of the game.

Or if you put level scaled monsters off, you won't be able to reach some part of the game, and so on.



That way casual player can enjoy the easy setting, and maybe later replay the game at hard ones, while expert players can start directly with hard settings

From the latest blog the spell list looks good. Of course, it might be nice to have a different name for each spell based on class. Instead of a druid casting heal he might cast empower with nature.



I'd actually reccomend getting rid of the druid, necromancer, and shaman classes for this version because they seem like specialty classes. It might be better to call them like Green Mage, Black Mage, or Red Mage. Because I have very specific ideas of what a druid, necromancer, and shaman should be. Whereas something generic sounding like Green Mage I'd be willing to accept him doing whatever.



With all this work on spells, what's going to happen to the melee classes? I think of rogue's too as a specialty class that has unique traits, maybe that could be put in next version because I think having a rogue be a fighter who disarms traps would be short changing the nature of the rogue.



Also, I'm really worried about potential abuses of the skill system. Just read the GameFAQ for Elder Scrolls Oblivion where it reccomends doing crazy things like jumping to raise the acrobactics skill.



In the game, people might keep running under traps to get the healers to keep using the healing skill.



How are you going to keep skill system abuses in check?

I'd actually reccomend getting rid of the druid, necromancer, and shaman classes for this version because they seem like specialty classes. It might be better to call them like Green Mage, Black Mage, or Red Mage.

Yes you could be right, but for "marketing" purposes I think is better to keep those names. Sorry but necromancer sounds much better than "Black Mage"



Instead the skill abuse system is a good question. I don't really know, I can add checks of course. But in my game since is (obviously) smaller than Oblivion, there should be less cases. The one you mention indeed could be possible - this would be balanced from the fact that with traps your equipment gets damaged too, and maybe you would also lose precious time.



I guess in "casual" mode (without breakable gear, time limit, etc) is hard to find any motivation for not doing it... but when I'll program it I'll see, maybe I can add a check "if healer heals injured played by trap for more than 2-3 consecutive times = cheat".



But indeed, rules are easy to evade using human intelligence to cheat...

I have an idea: just make skill increase for such things like healing work only during combat. So if the healer heals a party member during fight, skill increase x5, if outside 0 or x1 (very smaller) so people wouldn't be motivated.



For other skills like making potions instead is fine - the skill raises indeed by practicing, no?

I'd actually reccomend getting rid of the druid, necromancer, and shaman classes for this version because they seem like specialty classes. It might be better to call them like Green Mage, Black Mage, or Red Mage.

Yes you could be right, but for "marketing" purposes I think is better to keep those names. Sorry but necromancer sounds much better than "Black Mage"

Well in marketing purposes it's false advertising. I mean necromancer, shamans, and druids are all worthy of their own expansion pack. I don't want them to be shortchanged. This is a roleplaying game after all. And I want the names to fit their role. I don't want to play a druid that can't control nature or summon animals and that doesn't wear green robes and wields staves of nature.



You could explain it with exposition in the storyline. Maybe there's a story reason why Druids can't control the weather or summon animals and can wield mighty warrior weapons. And then in an expansion pack you can fix it.



You can use adjectives that let people know that this isn't your normal Druid, like Druid of the West, Necromancer from the Abyss.



Let's say you release a psion expansion pack. If you release Druids as they are basically warrior/mage hybrids, then people will go: "There'll be nothing cool in the expansion pack, psions will just be a derivative class."



However if you name the Druids as now as Green Mages and release a psion expansion pack people will say: "Wow, psion sounds like a cool class. In AD&D, the psion always got it's own books! This will be a great expansions!"



So in marketing terms it's better to label the classes as they are.

Well in marketing purposes it's false advertising. I mean necromancer, shamans, and druids are all worthy of their own expansion pack. I don't want them to be shortchanged. This is a roleplaying game after all. And I want the names to fit their role. I don't want to play a druid that can't control nature or summon animals and that doesn't wear green robes and wields staves of nature.

I was referring mostly to spells. There will be class exclusive items. There will be a Death Staff with a nice skull on the top usable only by necromancers, and so on.

But in my small roleplay (small won't mean not fun, just that I don't have a team of 8 artists, 3 programmers, and so on) I don't think have enough "power" to put so much differentiation on the classes, expecially since is going to be mostly an "action" rpg.



I could however save some classes for expansions... but the problems for spells still remains, because spells are based on deities (and I don't want to change this again).



So a psionic class wouldn't be possible, because they should have yet another spell system not based on deities...



For now I'll make it this way, I know isn't going to be perfect roleplay game, but as I said - I have to take into account my capabilities, expecially after the lesson I've learnt with USM2.



"Better finish a smaller game, than attempt a big one and never finish it"

I know someone is going to kill me... but as a woman and more "casual" rpg player, I love the semplicity of Magic Stones. In my point of view I think you have already a great collection of class/spells as it seems right now.

Beside, after playing MMORPG like Everquest or DAOC, I don't see the classes so much differentiated even there honestly... unless the difference between a Druid and a Necro, is that the first summons a dire wolf, the second a giant skeleton

Like KnockOut, I would love to see a proper Necro or Druid - the specific items jack1974 mentioned is already a good start. However I realize also that he has limited means at his disposal, and what anita says is also true - many million budget MMORPG just change the kind of pets they summon and a few spell to make 2 different classes...

I think leveling spells is a great idea as long as you do it right. As I think, is the concept of each class getting fewer spells but each spell being levelable. There are only a few spells as you have categorized damage to a single entity, damage over time, damage to groups, haste, bless, shield, slow, curse, heal, summon meat shield, summon creature that does a lot of damage, charm, terror, boost parties mind effect resistance, etc.



I'm a bit perplexed on the use of a summon food spell.



Fewer spells means also means more time on unique items. Shamans are wild mages according to AD&D, their spells can be more powerful or they can fizzle. Their unique items should reflect that. You could have unique items that require two dwarve healers in the party. Six ice elf thieves. Etc.



Levelable spells also leads to a great potential for abuse. Let's assume there are finite monsters. I could save before each encounter and then try to cast firebolt so it does the fewest amount of damage each time and save until I get the minimum damage per battle.



If you make the rate based on the amount taken by firebolt then I'll play the battle until I get the maximum xp on firebolt per cast.



You can have weapons and spells always do the same amount of damage per level but only accuracy is affected by random chance. Of course members of the party who miss would not get their spells to go up as much. But then you'd want to get hit by your opponents so you could cast heal more so your healers gain more heal xp.



I can't think of good ways to prevent abuse other than of course the ways we already mentioned breakable items, time limits. Maybe breakable spells?