Golden Sun BYOND

[Rolina]

Anywho, it sounds like a lot of fun, so long as it allows for some decent customization.  I don't wanna be stuck with canon classes if I'm playing a custom character, for example.  At the same time, though, don't let people do whatever, or you'll come across problems with tweakers.

[Kioll]

I'm not sure about Game Maker, Charon...  I do know, however, that BYOND is a bit of a hassle sometimes, but most of the important stuff is built in,  and does most of the work for ya.  And Role...  My setup will have premade classes based on build.  The currently existing classes will make a return appearance, but they will not be the only classes.  I plan on, at some point, making werewolves playable, as well as beastmen...  But not for a while, I'm afraid.

[Rolina]

So... define build.  Right now, you should choose "physical" or "magical", but then you should have a variety of weapons to choose from to make up your build.

Forgive me if I sound... brash or something, it's just, I really want to know as much as I can for mechanics about these things, that's why I was as detailed as I was when I listed it in the MMO thread.

[Kioll]

Lol, Role, I already defined build...  Right before you asked just how multiplayer the game is.

[Rolina]

Ah, Build is two different things for us then.  Build here is the equipment selection, and often is what's used to identify if they're physical or magical.  That would be their role in battle, where we tend to use terms like "The Squire", "The Guard", and "The Angel"... so I guess the confusion was based upon terminology used.

I'm gonna disagree a bit with having five stock classes... Name, Stats, and Spell Selection I could see being chosen separately.  It allows for a wider variety within the game.  First thing they need to answer is "Physical or Magical?".  GS really doesn't work well with "Hybrid" types, since... well, everyone is a spellcaster.

[Kioll]

Well, I suppose I need to explain further...  And I did put build in quotes the first time, indicating that I didn't have a better term for it at the time.  Anyways...  The four options I provided DO help choose weapon type as well, but that's not all.  What I mean in this case is this:  Felix and Isaac are both fighters and healers, basically, they're Combat Medics.  Thus, they're good at both.  But Garet, in particular, is just a Fighter, and it shows in his added physical strength; he's more of a bashie character than the two Venus adepts.  Jenna is what I call a Caster; she RELIES on casting, much like Ivan and Sheba.  I consider Mia to be a Healer...  Mind you, these are simply base options.  The Sneak is a little something extra; not everyone is a traditional protagonist.  Alex is, in my mind, a Sneak, shown more by personality than power, as we never actually get a glimpse at his psynergy list.  Choosing one of the options to specialize in makes you stronger in that aspect, but horribly flawed in the opposing aspect:  You can't be a Fighter and a Caster, it's conflicting.  You choose to specialize in fighting, you lose points in casting.  You could be a Fighter/Sneak, though, or a Fighter/Healer....  Also, you can't be a Sneak and a Healer, that's insane.  (Yes, I know my example with Alex would disprove that, but I never said he was built in this particular way....  I was using him as a character example, not a setup example.)  If you're going to be a little shady, you can't be goody goody enough to heal...  Alex is obviously beyond this; he was born into the Mercury Clan and grew up learning healing magic, so, well, he doesn't quite fall into this, although as Dark Dawn points out, any adept can learn things outside their boundaries, it just takes more work.  (Karis points out that Tyrell hasn't learned how to control the wind and thus can't use a Soarwing, yet Isaac and Garet clearly had planned on using the Soarwing, thus implying that they could, neither of whom is a Jupiter adept and thus meaning that they learned to do something beyond their element; GS 1 & 2 also imply it as Garet and Isaac trained to learn Move, a Mars psynergy, when only one of them was, in fact, Mars aligned.)  This is my reasoning behind being able to learn and master a second element in GS BYOND...

Anyways, based on the options one chooses, it determines that "physical or magical" question already:  Healer and Caster are both magical, Sneak and Fighter are both physical.  But you'll note that they are different in that, for instance, Sneak can't use an axe, but they can use swords.

Incidentally, that reminds me that I was planning on putting in a couple new weapon types.  For instance, Great Swords...  And putting in bows from Dark Dawn, that made so much sense it was uncanny.

Edit:  Also, now that I'm thinking about it, I'd like to know something.  I've been considering whether I should make the djinn limit 9 or 10.  What do you guys think?

[Rolina]

...So the generic Cleric, Wizard, DPS, Tank setup?

Go with 9 djinn - I don't even know how to approach a ten djinn setup yet.  Tri-Element and Tri-Hybrid classes are a nightmare with those.

[Griever]

GS multiplier? This is cool.
Role every game (MMO) so far has the "generic" classes lol. Wonder how the healing class will be ... I usually play those >_<

If you need help with classes, character setups (stats and such) and maybe even a little spriting (NOVICE spriter lol) please let me know.

[Rolina]

That's a BAD thing where I'm concerned.  I tire of those classes, and one of the big things about the potential with GS is that you've got a lot of things you can do with it.

While yes, there are a few base setups, there's many things you can do with those base setups.  There'd be four or five different "fighter" stat layouts, and four or five different "spell layouts" for each element.  This would let you keep the basic gist of the role of "Fighter", yet at the same time, you'd not be stuck with GS's system crippling build variance.  In most MMOs, they have branching paths, yet in this game you'd have naught but alt-classes.  As such, I suggest having the stats for the alt-classes be determined by your stat layout choice, and spells by the spell layout choice.  This allows for a nice variety of characters.

Also, I'd like to point out that DPS doesn't work in turn based combat.  I suggest Attacker, Defender, Wizard, and Healer for the base four instead.  Just... make sure you have that varied selection of each, otherwise it'll be four of the exact same thing for each element, which... well, that gets boring.

[Charon]

You know it'd actually be pretty cool if you could use djinn to make it so that each character could effectively sorta be each one of those classes... but dunno how you can implement djinn yet. I would align an elemental djinni's element with a certain fighting style (Venus = Attack, Mars = Defense, Mercury = Recovery and Jupiter = Magic), and since you can only have 9 djinn active at a time... you could align yourself to be an attacker, or maybe later be a healer if you really needed it, or perhaps a jack of all trades (but you'd be fairly weak then). It's not exactly like Golden Sun but there's a point where you need to accommodate the new format lol.

I'm going to set this topic sticky just because this is something I can see the whole community getting on board with. :)

[Aile~♥]

@Kioll: I honestly think that allowing a Fighter/Caster would be doable: you'd end up as a glass cannon, with high-powered Psynergy and attacks, but little HP, PP, Def, and Luck. Basically, you hit hard in close or at range, but you can't keep hitting for very long before you burn out. You'd get EPAs like Planet Diver/Planetary, and Psynergy like Fume or Dire Inferno, high-power but high-cost series.

A standard Fighter has low PP, but his EPAs and Psynergy also tend to be on the utilitarian and low-cost end of the spectrum. Casters have very high PP, which enables them to spam high-cost Psynergy without worrying too much. But a Fighter/Caster has neither of those perks: Psynergy is high-cost, and max PP is low.

[Kioll]

I'll look into the possibilities of a 10 djinn setup, if I can figure it out, I'll make a post on it...

And I like the idea of aligning elements to fighting styles, but you got Earth and Fire mixed up.  Earth is more defensive, Fire is more offensive.  And one of my ideas, although I wasn't sure about it yet, was to allow players to choose their two strongest stats and randomize the rest, which would effectively decide their sub-class.  As for the generic role thing...  What can I say?  I started on Tabletop games rather than video games, and my coding style reflects that.  I was figuring that most of the class variation would be in djinn setups...  Not even necessarily djinn elements, but specific djinn, like attack djinn...  Class names wouldn't be much different, but stats would vary greatly, allowing for different types of roles...  Certain djinn raise PP, allowing for stronger casting abilities, for instance...  And I suppose opposites mixing could result in a mediocre character, but I've always played every game under the assumption that PC's are exceptional members of their peergroup.

I don't know what DPS means, but I assume you are referring to the Sneak...  And this is how I planned on it working in turn-based combat...  I plan on giving them psynergies that allow them to "hide", for instance, things such as Haze in basic effect, albeit with a chance of failure, with high PP costs, and it would be a two-turn attack, allowing them to have a chance to surprise their opponent with increased damage if they don't fail to hide...  If they fail to hide, they take increased damage.  They also receive unique utility psynergy.

Charon, I am surprised but pleased about the sticky; thank you tremendously.

Right now, the best way people can help is providing me with as much information on game mechanics and possible code improvements as possible.  Also, Role, I love your ideas, I will be doing my best to try to work them in with my existing ideas...

[Tetsuya the Azure Blade]

I don't know what DPS means, but I assume you are referring to the Sneak... 

DPS means Damage Per Second. DPS classes tend to be like Ninjas, Thieves, Archers and that. They also tend to have low HP but have good Agility in return. They have fast attacks, but because of their low HP, you should always do quests with a party, usually like DPS, Tank, Healer.

Tank is a close combat type with good HP, Attack, Defence, that acts basically like a meat shield, protecting weaker (in terms of HP and Defence) party members, distracting enemies by getting up close to them while Casters prepare their spells and DPSs use their long range attacks on the enemies. Tanks are usually Knights, Paladins, Barbarians (WoW Death Knights count, too) and other warrior classes.

Wow, that took longer than I expected to write.

[Misery]

I'll look into the possibilities of a 10 djinn setup, if I can figure it out, I'll make a post on it...

You're not limited by rules of Golden Sun's class system, so 10 djinn per character is certainly possible if you want. By the sound of it, you're going to make some changes to how the game works anyway.

And I like the idea of aligning elements to fighting styles, but you got Earth and Fire mixed up.  Earth is more defensive, Fire is more offensive.

I think that's a good approach too, GS already does this indirectly. About Earth and Fire, in GS canon Fire gets the more defensive classes and traits while Earth is the strongest element offensively. But Fire is generally considered to be the number one element for offense, at least from what I've seen.

Anyway, I really like the direction you're going in with this. I can't get very in-depth with it at the moment though, I'll have to get back later with some more constructive feedback. At least I can direct you to this document, which describes some of the mechanics and formulas you can't see in the editor. While it does explain the class system, it only does so to the extent of what is used in the original game. It will still save you a lot of questions if you haven't read it already.

[Kioll]

Rofl, I understood Tanks...  Damage per second isn't going to have anything to do with this...  I don't know where anyone got that idea from.  Personally, my favorite and best characters are usually the thieving types, so I like to include that kind of thing.  As for tank...  I suppose you could call fighters that...  I'm not really too worried about it at the moment.

I want to keep the game as close to the original system as possible, while still expanding it to be multi-player...  One of the ideas I'm toying with is a separation between story mode (follow the original storyline, possibly even with the original characters....) and Multiplayer mode...  But that would require a lot of extra mapping (then again, mapping isn't all that hard...) and a bunch of extra code (which wouldn't be too hard, really), so it may wait for a bit.

[Rolina]

I figured that the djinn would act kind of like an additional set of equipment - however, instead of being a set of gear to boost your stats, it's a set of abilities that assist your build.  Now, to prevent it being broken, djinn would need some kind of value.  You'd be limited to how many of each value you can use, and the class system further limits attempts at broken setups.

For example, let's say that djinn are ranked:

You can have as many C Rank Djinn as you want, up to the max of 9.
You can have up to 3 B Rank Djinn.
You can have up to 2 A Rank Djinn.
If 10 Djinn classes, then there's also 1 S rank you can have.

The rank is determined by the type and power of the ability.  The stronger abilities have stronger ranks, and harder quests to obtain them.  Djinn can be traded between players, but only djinn of the same rank can be traded - you cannot trade a C rank for a B rank, for example.  You can also part ways with djinn you no longer are interested in, so if you have 8 C rank and want more B rank djinn, you can.  I think we should also have some kind of limit for how many djinn they can have.  Perhaps based on level - the higher the level, the more slots open up for djinn.  Since this is a massive multiplayer game, that'd probably be a necessity.

@DPS:  You had Fighter and... Sneak, I think.  Something like that.  Fighter gives off a Tank like image, while the other one you said was more about speed... well, speed/stealth based physical types are typically DPS.  That's why it gave off a DPS impression, especially with the name you used.  Warrior and Defender might be better names for them, as they're more clearly attacker and defender.

As far as GS trends go, while Misery is accurate in saying that Venus is more attacking and Mars more defensive, keep in mind that you should allow for a bit of flexibility.  Mars shouldn't always equal tank, after all.  I think build and element should be separate.  While element does have a little bit of influence in stats, the influence is far stronger in terms of spell and class selection than statistical layout.  Build should be the major factor as far as stats are concerned.

@Jamie:  Everyone is a caster in Golden Sun.  Fighters have a smaller mana pool, as well as physical damage output.  Mages have a larger mana pool, but on a whole tend to trend faster.  I imagine he's gonna tweak it a bit, but how I'm not too certain.  Still, everyone can cast spells in GS.




Also, one more thing - PvE, or PvP oriented?  It's a pain in the @#$ to do both and have it be balanced.  I lean more towards PvE, but... that's just me.

[Kioll]

Actually, I was considering non-adepts as another option...  But anyways, the djinn rank thing I can sorta see, it would need a lot of tweaking, though.  The reason I won't call Sneak "Defender" is because it's not a defensive character, more of an evasive one.  As for stats, base stats will not be affected by elements:  The only stats determined by element will be elemental power and resist.  All others will be randomized, with the possible choice of two specializations, as I mentioned before.

PvE.  Tolbi colluseum and other arenas will be the only PvP areas.

Djinn would be separated into types, Attack/Damage, Defense/Resist/Evade, Healing/Status Inflicting, Spell/Buff.  These types will end up affecting specific stats based on their type, creating added customization to the character.  Want a Caster who can kick some @#$?  All attack Djinn will give you some decent Attack, but your Psynergy won't be as useful as if you had taken all Spell djinn instead.  Also, Standby Djinn will, as in the games, not affect stats.

As for the Venus/Mars thing, I see earth more as forming a barrier, thus more defensive; I suppose if the game has them typically more offensive, I will look into it, although from what I've been able to tell (I always play mono-elemental classes), most of the Mars Adepts aren't very defensive unless you mess with their djinn settings.

[Rolina]

Well, in GS the canon trends are:

Venus:  Attack (A steel blade)
Mars:  Defense (A firewall)
Jupiter:  Agility (An agile warrior)
Mercury:  Luck/Ailment Resist (...I got nothing).

You can take that into consideration if you want, but... it's probably a better idea to use it in regards to spells, not to stats.

[Kioll]

I see...  Well, in that case...  Ah, it's not important right now.  What is important right now is that I start defining the class list so I can get all the planning done...  So I suppose I should start with base classes; feel free to help out, guys.

Classes are separated by element and build:  Fighter/Mars = Guard, for example...  (I only want one for each combination for base classes, except in instances where it might vary by gender;  It is easier to code a single base class and then allow the character to customize their class from there, including possibly customizing their base class with the right in-game items (not class items, but one-use items to change base class) if you get the idea.)

So, build options are Fighter, Sneak, Caster, Healer, Combat Medic (Fighter/Healer), Assassin (Fighter/Sneak), Swords and Sorcery (Fighter/Caster), Warlock (Sneak/Caster), Rogue Healer (Sneak/Healer), Acolyte (Caster/Healer).  These are preliminary names to give some sort of description, not final names or anything.  I just haven't come up with better ones.  If you guys come up with better names for the mixes, please, share, and I'll edit them in.  But for the moment, we have 10 builds and 4 elements.  That should result in 40 base classes and thus a wide variety to choose from...

Whoops, almost forgot what we've already got...

Squire = Combat Medic + Venus
Guard = Fighter + Mars
Wind Seer = Caster + Jupiter
Water Seer = Healer + Mercury
Mariner = Combat Medic + Mercury
Flame User = Caster + Mars
Miko = Caster + Venus

Ummm...  I can't think of the rest...  I'd put Pirate down, but I have no idea how that would be an actual base class, I'd suppose that I'd have to make that more of a customized class...

[Rolina]

Actually, as far as I'm concerned, Mariner is just the mercury approach to a traditional Squire.  Hell, DD even calls it "Aqua Squire".  It's the exact same class as Mariner, just with a different name - same stats, same spells, etc.

Basically, trends here tend to be:

The Squire - a primarily attacker based class, but has healing on the side.  It's like an offensive oriented paladin.
The Guard - a tank. Slow, but with great defense and respectable attack.
The Sorcerer - a support unit.  It's fast, and has many offensive abilities, but the main perk of the role is support - buffs and debuffs, basically.
The Angel - a traditional fantasy healer.  They've got both ST and MT healing, as well as ailment recovery and/or revival.
The Justice - the Mage's answer to the Squire.  Gets MT healing instead of ST healing, has respectable physical stats as well.  Though it has the lowest magical stats of the mages, it can fall back to attacking far easier than they can.  Closest thing to a Red Mage/Magic Knight as you can get.
The Miko - an offensive mage, the primary role is magical damage.  They may have a buff or two, but unlike the Sorcerer, their main focus is dishing out damage, not support.

There's also:

The Pirate - this class is a knockoff of another class.  Example, making a magic version of a physical class, or physical version of a magical class. It shares most of the signature spell lines as the other classes, but as a whole is deemed unoriginal and disappointing, and tends to be frowned upon.
The Prince - the is even worse than the pirate.  It actually is another class, down to the last detail, just given another name.  It's like they didn't even try.


Builds are not restricted to element, and often times when some of us are trying to make a class, we'll reference the build to give a better example of what we want to do with it.  For example, DCrisis has a Jovian Squire build, and a Venusian Angel build.

Edit:  Why is this topic pinned?