Magic discussion

Started by winkio, March 06, 2011, 01:32:42 pm

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WhiteRose

Quote from: winkio on March 08, 2011, 12:03:32 am
Pure magic?  It could have extremely powerful attacks that don't really correspond to any of the natural elements.  I like that idea too.


I agree with the pure magic idea; it's a cool concept. There's something similar in the Persona series of RPGs - in order to balance it, they make spells of that type have obscenely large MP costs. We could probably implement something similar in order to maintain balance.

[Luke]

March 18, 2011, 08:34:17 pm #21 Last Edit: March 18, 2011, 08:37:25 pm by [Luke]
Titanium shouldn't be a fuel, more like a catalyst for the magic. So for powerful spells as fireballs it would require the caster to hold a big object, like a wand (mage), but for small boosts it would work well with a ring or amulet (bard, warrior). Also titanium-enhanced weapons should be useful.

Now combining the elements is a great idea. Name the kinds of Titanium with colours to not bind them with one single element.



  • Red Titanium - Vitality

  • Yellow Titanium - Agility

  • Blue Titanium - Spirit

  • Green Titanium - Stamina



Fire = R + R
Thunder = R + Y
Wind = Y + Y
Ice = Y + B
Water = B + B
Nature = B + G
Earth = G + G
Death = G + R

Every artifact (weapon, ring, shield) has a number of slots. For example:

An Old Magical Sword has one slot.
Adding R titanium increases its attack power.
Adding Y titanium adds the statistics (DEX ang AGI) bonus.
Adding B titanium adds the MP and INT bonus.
Adding G titanium adds the HP/DEF bonus.

A Fine Magical Shield has two slots.
Adding B+Y adds the STR bonus and "Frost Ward" spell.
Adding G+G increases the shield's defence and adds "Stonewall" spell.

An Apprentice's Staff has three slots.
Adding R+R+R gives the player spells "Firebolt" (R+R) and "Fireball" (R+R+R)
Adding R+G+G gives the player spells "Curse" (G+R), "Stun" (G+G) and "Poison" (G+G+R)
Adding R+B+Y unlucks spells "Shock" (R+Y), "Freeze" (Y+B), "Stupefy" (R+B) and "Barrierbreak" (R+B+Y)
Also, the titanium boosts the stats.

Overall:
Adding titanium to a piece of equipment boost its stats and unlocks spells. Only one piece of titanium just increases the stats, but from two to four-five it unlocks useful spells.
Type of spell depends on the kind of equipment:
Weapon - attack, curse, and attack boost spells (offensive)
Offhand - shield, healing and other boost spells
Rings - various effects
Armor - physical-boost spells
Helmet - magic-boost spells

Of course "titanium slots" would be available only for metal objects, so a mage's robe can't unleash the "Stoneskin" spell.
"Magical" artifacts such as wands, spellbooks and rings should be more "titanium-able". So an Ultimate Archmage's Staff would have 6 slots and be able to hold RGRGRG combination being a call for a set of some lesser spells, "Fireball" (RRR), "Shockwave" (GGG), "Curse" (RG), "Death Coil" (RGRG) and "Breath of Death" (RGRGRG); or YYYYYY, unleashing all offensive pure-wind-based spells. IMHO the number of slots might be as well limited to 4 or 5, except you like overpowered omniscent elementalists.

What do you think about that?

winkio

Not a bad idea, but there are a few things to think about:

1.  We don't want the player to have to spend a lot of time organizing their titanium and spells each time they switch weapons or find new stuff.  Perhaps instead of equipping titanium to weapons and armor, it could be equipped directly to the character, and the weapons/armor simply determines the total number of slots.  Personally, I would just ditch the slots concept, and simply allow any character to equip any amount of titanium, but making the player have to distribute it evenly, so no party member can equip 2 more titanium than any other.
2.  I think making the skills first and assigning the titanium needed second is a better idea, just from a balance point of view.
3.  The colors might be a conflict with the animations, for example, if yellow is wind and green is lightning, which might mislead the player into configuring for different skills than they want.  By naming them after elements, we can fit our skills in anywhere we please.

AliveDrive

So.

Is there a cap to how many titanium can be equipped per person?
Quote from: Blizzard on September 09, 2011, 02:26:33 am
The permanent solution for your problem would be to stop hanging out with stupid people.

[Luke]

Idea: Stick to the titanium placed in equipment slots, but extractable ("extract all titanium" button). So the limit of titanium per character would be limited by the "magicness" of used artifacts. Therefore the mage character, who wields staff, will have more powerful spells than the others.

Now we have 2 ways to make that:


  • Ingredients list - once the character learns a spell, (s)he has to equip a set of titanium to unlock it (or maybe just make it more efficient). Place where the titanium has to be equipped can rely on the kind of spell. That works if we want to set the spell list locked for all the characters.

  • Unleashing - equipping titanium automatically unlocks the spell for the combination. That makes the spellbook more customizable - if player don't want to see another "warrior with flaming sword", he can equip the William's stuff with earth spells, making him the "tank" or air ones, making him the "blademaster".



So, now, we have four kinds of titanium:

  • Red (fire)

  • Yellow (air)

  • Blue (water)

  • Green (earth)



Spells are being unlocked by pairs of those:

F + F = fire spells (fireball, ignite, strength - depends on where it's put)
F + A = thunder spells (shock, paralyze, spark shield)
A + A = air spells (wind's fist, haste, knockdown)
A + W = ice spells (icebolt, freeze, frost armor)
W + W = water spells (geiser, antidote, healing)
W + E = nature spells (poison, entangling roots, regenaration)
E + E = earth spells (tremor, stun, stoneskin)
E + F = death spells (deathcoil, curse, vampirism)
Opposites:
A + E = darkness (fear, illusions, sleep)
F + W = holy (blessings, blindness)

Now every artifact can have any number of slots. For both methods (locked list of spells and customisable one) this works fine.

winkio

I'm still not a fan of having a complicated equipment screen.  I think it would hinder the player more than help them.

AliveDrive

Simplicity seems like it would also help us in the long run.
Quote from: Blizzard on September 09, 2011, 02:26:33 am
The permanent solution for your problem would be to stop hanging out with stupid people.

winkio

So I was whipping up a few skills so I could program them into the battle system, and had to think about what skills each character would use.  I think that magic should only be based on titanium, so it would be the same for all characters.  I think skills, on the other hand, should be character unique.  Here was what I came up with:

William: Holy skills.  Mend and Protect are the two I came up with.  I was thinking mostly support with maybe one or two 'smiting' skills.
Alice: Battle skills.  Used to exploit different attributes enemies can have (Heavily Armored vs. Lightly Armored, etc.).  For example, Piercing Strike would be good against heavily armored, and Bludgeon would be good against lightly armored.
Robin:  Music skills.  Songs that do a wide variety of things, from put the enemies to sleep, to remove status effects from the party, to causing damage, etc.
Gerald:  Mental skills.  While he doesn't have normal magic before titanium, he does learn something slightly different and unique.  Basically, his skills such as Mindshock and Psyblade use his INT stat for physical damage or defense.