In games combat is a fairly hefty chunk of most of them, not all, but most. In a lot of cases a good combat system can make a game, embedding its self in the hearts and minds of gamer's for generations. (See Final Fantasy 7), Incidentally a bad mechanic will relegate a game to ever mounting pile of failed projects that company's routinely turn out from time to time. So, lets get down to the grit; What makes a good mechanic.
In my opinion a mechanic doesn't have to be particularly original, or even adventurous. those things will evolve naturally as your games develop and progress. What I believe is the most important factor to a combat mechanic. Is Balance.
If unbalanced players may loose interest if they breeze through fights with no challenge or threat, or inversely will feel slighted if they are met with a challenge that is insurmountable.
Now that's all been established; its time for the reason we are here.
How does one go about correctly balancing a game. I am currently using a Turn Based ATB system for combat, as I'm sure most of you are too. How do you balance your hero's and monsters. Naturally You'll want your hero's to initially appear superior to the common riff-raff they are liable to encounter at the beginning of the game, whether its rats, goblins or military foot soldiers. But were do you begin, what kind of numbers should you aim for, how difficult is too difficult and how easy is too easy? These are the questions we hope to answer here as a collective.
I'll lead on by saying that; In the past i have usually started by assigning all the characteristics to a hero, Hp, Mp, Attack and so on. and then using those numbers as a guide line for monsters. But I was never very good at fine tuning this and I always failed to account for the characters leveling up. Monsters were often a little too hard for level 1 characters, but barely worth the effort two levels later.
In my opinion a mechanic doesn't have to be particularly original, or even adventurous. those things will evolve naturally as your games develop and progress. What I believe is the most important factor to a combat mechanic. Is Balance.
If unbalanced players may loose interest if they breeze through fights with no challenge or threat, or inversely will feel slighted if they are met with a challenge that is insurmountable.
Now that's all been established; its time for the reason we are here.
How does one go about correctly balancing a game. I am currently using a Turn Based ATB system for combat, as I'm sure most of you are too. How do you balance your hero's and monsters. Naturally You'll want your hero's to initially appear superior to the common riff-raff they are liable to encounter at the beginning of the game, whether its rats, goblins or military foot soldiers. But were do you begin, what kind of numbers should you aim for, how difficult is too difficult and how easy is too easy? These are the questions we hope to answer here as a collective.
I'll lead on by saying that; In the past i have usually started by assigning all the characteristics to a hero, Hp, Mp, Attack and so on. and then using those numbers as a guide line for monsters. But I was never very good at fine tuning this and I always failed to account for the characters leveling up. Monsters were often a little too hard for level 1 characters, but barely worth the effort two levels later.