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Noob thinks he can dungeon...

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blgarver1982
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Hello everyone!

Noob here (and I mean NOOB), with my first game idea actually starting to manifest in the physical world. I've always loved playing games of all types, but never really considered designing one with any seriousness. But it seems I've got the bug.

The idea came from playing the D&D board incarnations, in which you place dungeon tiles to create the board. At first I was super excited about them. But it didn't quite hit the spot for me. I wanted the character creation/progression of the D&D experience without the rather laborious preparation and need for a DM.

So now I'm making the dungeon game I want to play - and hopefully at least one other person somewhere will want to play as well since it's 2-4 players. :)

Right now it's in pre-pre-pre-pre alpha (possibly a few more pre's). Drawing tiles, cutting them out, seeing how the placement works. So far...it doesn't.

But I have ideas for solutions.

What do you guys think? A dungeon crawler rpg with randomly-placed board, combined with random encounters and customizable characters. Oh, and it's on hex tiles. And probably will have some type of card deck mechanic as well - I haven't quite fleshed that part out yet. Focusing on the tile mechanics right now.

Maybe my favorite thing about this is that I'm hand-drawing everything to keep the tabletop feel. The art isn't going to be very polished, but I really love the graph paper dungeon aesthetic.

Do you think it sounds too complicated? It doesn't to me, because I'm a fan of those long, kind of convoluted games. But...maybe not everyone is. Maybe it won't come out a total mess, but I've got a million ideas running in every direction so there's a likelihood that I'll go overboard at some point and have to slice a lot out.

Once I'm to prototype stage, I'm going to use The Game Crafter to get the first real-life play test copy. Lord knows how long it will take me to reach that point.

I've got a dev diary of sorts going on at my blog if anyone's interested. www.blgarver.com

I'm certainly open to any input or insights that will help me make the game I want, and make it actually playable for others. I've only been actively working on this thing for about 3 days, so I'm in no way experienced. Sage advice is greatly welcomed.

Thanks!

BLG

WCanepa
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Have you looked into games
Corsaire
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Seems like a bit of a back

Seems like a bit of a back pocket design quest for a lot of people. As in I've seen a quite a few variations of the same thought process and had a few myself.

Don't let the physical mechanics slow down your fiddling with solo playtesting it yourself.

Some Random Dude
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First off, I'd like to say

First off, I'd like to say you're spot on about the D&D boardgame. All the joy I get from D&D (well not all, but most) is how involved I get with my character and the journey. I also really like your brilliant idea to use hex tiles. The sharpie-on-a-grid-map playstyle that I grew up with is much more... organic. I never liked how everything was perfectly square and static when you played those tiles out, and with hexes it gives you a little bit more freedom to design it how you'd like.

What are your thoughts for the character creation process? To me, that's what really will make the game. The map mechanic is certainly important, and will make it very distinct and enjoyable, but I feel like having an awesome character creation tool will really set this game apart from the others. You'll probably need something quick enough to take advantage of the fact that the actual dungeon has no prep time at all, but still deep enough where you won't have all the fighters the same, etc.

What are your thoughts for random encounters? I think having everything tile dependent would be good. What I mean is, each tile could have a number and/or symbols on it, which (somehow) determines what monsters, if any, spawn there.

Is it going to be a strictly cooperative, competitive, or somewhere in between? I have an interesting way to do competitive if you're interested.

I don't think it's too complicated. There are a lot of tile-placing games out there that have in-depth strategy even though the rules aren't too complex. I think this has that too. The only difference between your tile placing mechanic and, say, Carcassonne's, is that you're using hexes. As I said earlier, that is BRILLIANT!

Leeton
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Play Length

One thing you might want to reconsider is the exact aim of your game.

You said you want the fun/creation of an RPG without the need for a DM. So in a sense, you're drastically reducing the time investment in preparation for these games. But what you could consider is equally reducing the play time of the RPG.

Without the preparation and detailed plans of a DM, your games are naturally going to be shorter. You can only make so much up on the spot in comparison to planning it all out. The randomisation of placed tiles will alter the game speed, too. So perhaps you should keep this in mind with your development.

Battles and exploration would be more quick-fire, so you may need to incorporate this into the design.

I've actually started work on a similar idea but in a different direction. Where yours appears to be limiting (or removing) the need for a DM, mine is doing so and simplifying RPGs to make it more easily engaging for new players. It has a similar idea with card decks and tiles, though. I've found so far that the key is to really detail what you want the game to be. Set the limitations and directions you want to take, then work from there. :)

Leeton
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Play Length

One thing you might want to reconsider is the exact aim of your game.

You said you want the fun/creation of an RPG without the need for a DM. So in a sense, you're drastically reducing the time investment in preparation for these games. But what you could consider is equally reducing the play time of the RPG.

Without the preparation and detailed plans of a DM, your games are naturally going to be shorter. You can only make so much up on the spot in comparison to planning it all out. The randomisation of placed tiles will alter the game speed, too. So perhaps you should keep this in mind with your development.

Battles and exploration would be more quick-fire, so you may need to incorporate this into the design.

I've actually started work on a similar idea but in a different direction. Where yours appears to be limiting (or removing) the need for a DM, mine is doing so and simplifying RPGs to make it more easily engaging for new players. It has a similar idea with card decks and tiles, though. I've found so far that the key is to really detail what you want the game to be. Set the limitations and directions you want to take, then work from there. :)

blgarver1982
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Characters...

Well, thank you! Nice to see that sort of enthusiasm. I appreciate it, really.

I've kicked around the character creation just a little in my head, but haven't actually done much development. Several possibilities have come up, but none have really slapped me in the face with awesomeness. I would love to have a classless system (because Elder Scrolls), based on skill points that you spend into different attributes/abilities/skills, which would be modified by your race selection. I like the idea, but at this point have no clue how it would function in game play - but I will certainly test it.

Another possibility is to do deck-based classes combined with a race choice. For instance, I might choose the race ogre, which gives me some sort of racial modifiers, and then take the Ranger deck. I would then be an Ogre Ranger. With this idea, the decks would be composed of common cards with actions/abilities/items that apply to all classes, plus a number of class-specific cards. Say it's a 60 card deck. Maybe there would be 40 common cards and 20 Ranger cards. Something like that.

I also really love modular equipment. As I was play testing some tiles last night, I had the idea to use a hex as the character card as well, and use five of the edges and the center for equipment slots (helmet, torso, right and left hand, legs, boots). I have been in love with equipment slots since the first time I played Diablo. Regardless with what I come up with for the character creation part, I will probably use this hex idea for the equipment slot representation.

This toolset is some time out. I want to get the tile mechanics smoothed out first - they are pretty simple, so hopefully I'll have it ironed out in a week or so, then I can start really devoting some energy to the character engine.

Leeton
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blgarver1982 wrote: I also

blgarver1982 wrote:

I also really love modular equipment. As I was play testing some tiles last night, I had the idea to use a hex as the character card as well, and use five of the edges and the center for equipment slots (helmet, torso, right and left hand, legs, boots). I have been in love with equipment slots since the first time I played Diablo. Regardless with what I come up with for the character creation part, I will probably use this hex idea for the equipment slot representation.

That sounds really cool! I'm also in love with equipment slots and not enough games represent this.

However, you should bear in mind that such a system might prevent you allowing players to unlock extra slots, unless you want them to connect a chain of equipment to their character.

blgarver1982
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Leeton wrote:The

Leeton wrote:
The randomisation of placed tiles will alter the game speed, too. So perhaps you should keep this in mind with your development.

Battles and exploration would be more quick-fire, so you may need to incorporate this into the design.

This is exactly what I found last night while running through a bare-bones test of the tile placement. The dungeon was revealed very quickly. We weren't fighting or looting or anything at this point, but still...I don't want it to be so fast that it edges on casual. I think the combat will help pace things more to my liking, which i won't really find out until working up some stats and trying it out.

My concept right now is this:

Tile placement is determined by two key rules: The Pillar Rule and Line of Sight.

When you move into a hex, you pick a direction that has an open line of sight (a hex edge without a wall), and draw a dungeon floor hex, then place it off the edge towards which you are facing. Pillars are at each corner at the end of a wall edge. Columns must be touching existing columns when placing tiles, and no wall must cover the edge through which your character is looking (because you wouldn't be able to see through the wall to reveal the new hex).

Once placed, the player who revealed the tile, then rolls some dice to determine what is in that new space, if anything. Monster spawner, loot, or ? (random event/item). Some tiles will have two items and/or events to place in them. At that point, the player decides whether or not to move into that revealed tile, or to turn his line of sight toward another opening and reveal another tile. This counts as movement and will cost an action/movement point. The dice roll again, and it repeats until player is out of action/movements.

As long as there are monster spawners on the board, each player rolls the Spawn Die with his roll to determine if the existing spawners produce another monster. If a player enters a tile where a monster is already spawned, combat begins and the action phase is terminated, regardless of how many action/movement points he or she has left.

I think this will keep the dungeon randomly generated while still based on some form of logic, and still leave the player with an element of control over his fate. I might have to modify the Monster Spawn thing if it proves to be overpowered. I want the adventurers to be pressed, but not hopelessly outnumbered.

I'm also toying with the idea of mission cards, much like Risk implemented if you chose to use them. With goals like "kill this certain boss" or "slay this many of that", etc.

Does that sound like it makes sense?

Leeton wrote:
I've found so far that the key is to really detail what you want the game to be. Set the limitations and directions you want to take, then work from there. :)

That's kind of what I'm doing. When I first had the idea, the parts that excited me were the randomly-revealed dungeon and using the custom characters. I feel like I'm on the right track. My main goal is to keep the same feeling of a D&D adventure, but to remove the complications of finding a DM and a bunch of people with the same schedule. That is what always prevented me and my buddies from actually getting into a game. Either our normal DM was tired of running a game and just wanted to play a character, or nobody consistently had the same free time to play. We're all fantasy writers, too, so whenever any one of of us tried to start a campaign it always spiraled way out of bounds into something that was more of a novel than a game, and we would rarely actually play anything. LOL.

So, with this, I just want to have an evening with friends and be able to open the box, shuffle a few cards, and get started.

Corsaire
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Chain of equipment, hex

Chain of equipment, hex slots, interesting... Has me thinking that you could also get crazy with smaller hex based skill trees that attach to a character.

blgarver1982
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Leeton][quote=blgarver1982

Leeton][quote=blgarver1982 wrote:

However, you should bear in mind that such a system might prevent you allowing players to unlock extra slots, unless you want them to connect a chain of equipment to their character.

How do you mean "extra slots"?

Right now, in my head, the slots are fixed, but you can alternate what you put in them. Like...if you find a better helmet, you can switch it with whatever you have in the helmet slot.

I'm still trying to decide about what to do with inventory/loot. I wouldn't want to play a fantasy rpg that didn't have looting. But I also don't want to have pointless loot. Like a giant pile of gold you can't spend. And what happens if you throw down the junk? Does it go on the tile floor? Is it consistent so another player could pick it up later? All things I have to figure out.

Right now, I have a merchant area outside the entrance of the dungeon (the player starting area) where traveling traders often set up their wagons to make money off the many adventurers who come to that site. The presence of traders and the type of trader will be random as well, but I'm not sure yet how it will be determined. Maybe some kind of "chance" card or something that says "A new trader has arrived." My intention for these traders is to give purpose to the looting. Players can go back and trade at the weapon seller, for instance, if they aren't having luck finding a better sword while looting.

blgarver1982
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Corsaire wrote:Chain of

Corsaire wrote:
Chain of equipment, hex slots, interesting... Has me thinking that you could also get crazy with smaller hex based skill trees that attach to a character.

Precisely. :) You are my kind of crazy...

blgarver1982
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Holy crap, you guys...I think

Holy crap, you guys...I think you just gave me an idea.

I'll draw up something tonight for this...but let me see if I can describe it.

Equipment slots on the edges of the character hex card, with a skill chain extending off of each to represent weapon or armor proficiency. Just a bare glimpse of a concept right now...but...that excites me.

So maybe the character card itself is a hex shape on a bigger rectangular car to allow for the skill tree graphic.

TwentyPercent
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Classless System

Hey BLGarver

Your post is particularly exciting for me to read, as I've been developing an tactical RPG board game myself the past year (but took the past 5 months off for my Professional Engineering exam and the holidays). Like you mentioned, I also went with hexagon spaces, as opposed to squares, as I feel this provides more options (and thus strategy) when it comes to the combat (which is the focus of my game).

Anyways, I'll tell you how I'm doing my classless character creation system; it may spark some ideas for you as well.

Each players will create one character (optionally, two players could each create two, for a party of 4, or one player could create multiple for a solo game). Every character starts with a pool of health, gets one magical skill (broken into fire, earth, air, water, and arcane), one manifestation (at character creation, can only choose target or evocation, but other options later are AoE: Cone and AoE: Burst), and two other Trained Abilities.

Trained abilities are broken up into four categories: melee combat, ranged combat, stealth, and magic. Each category has 6 skills each, which could be active abilities (require Action Points to use in combat, as opposed to Standard and Move Actions in D&D), passive, or triggered. When characters level up, they simply get one new ability and some extra health. By the end of the game, characters have around 5 selected skills, plus the initial manifestation and magic skill. With the number of skills, you can quickly see that you could play the game 10,000 times and never make the same character twice. This is exactly what I was going for, and it seems like something you are seeking too.

Originally I had decided to use experience gained from quests and combat to level up. However, after a couple playtests (and how I have my random encounters and quests set up), players could easily be behind/ahead of each other in experience and levels, which caused tension. Instead, I switched to players gaining levels every few weeks (each week is made up of 7 actions, representing a day, where they could explore a cave, travel, train, visit the marketplace, etc).

The idea for using equipment slots is great idea; you should run with it. It reminds me of FF7 and their materia system.

Anyways, keep us informed on your progress and if you have any questions. For me, looking at other games was a big inspiration, so always be checking out other games to generate your own ideas.

Best of luck,
Twenty Percent

Leeton
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One problem you might find

One problem you might find with the hex pieces for equipment, skills etc. is that you could get carried away and suddenly every player needs a table or relatively big space to place all their tiles. It would also be confusing and time consuming to set it back up after the first game. This'd be your "pop out and play" attraction is reduced after the first few games.

It's definitely an interesting idea though and I think with enough ironing out you can find the right balance to make it work! It definitely appeals to me. I faced a similar problem as your group (we were just starting out, so I'm yet to have a proper game under my belt). I was being the DM but it was very hard to get a time where everyone was free. After putting a good few hours into the story, it grew disheartening very quickly that it was too complicated to set up a game.

WCanepa
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blgarver1982 wrote: Another

blgarver1982 wrote:

Another possibility is to do deck-based classes combined with a race choice. For instance, I might choose the race ogre, which gives me some sort of racial modifiers, and then take the Ranger deck. I would then be an Ogre Ranger. With this idea, the decks would be composed of common cards with actions/abilities/items that apply to all classes, plus a number of class-specific cards. Say it's a 60 card deck. Maybe there would be 40 common cards and 20 Ranger cards. Something like that.

If you go this route, why not have a 20 card Race deck?

I like your equipment/skill tree idea formation. I had similar ideas when working on my present game.

I've settled on sliding cards under the sides of a character stat card to "equip" items and abilities. Imagine square cards divided in half, representing two different items, or two different levels/stats of the same item. (You may have a weapon that functions differently based on character skill, a right/left differentiation, a skill that has 2 options, etc.)

I had also toyed around with the idea of a token skill tree. Either 1" hexes or squares with a symbol on them to denote the skill. Players would then build skill trees somewhere in their play space for their characters. I abandoned this idea very early on, when I switched from a cooperative game where players each controlled one creature to a competitive game where they controlled multiple creatures. Space became an issue on the table, components were becoming to numerous, and then there was the constant referencing of skill token symbols to what the skill did in the game. Too much hassle for a game I wanted to play more quickly. :)

I'm excited to see your ideas evolve.

blgarver1982
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Leeton wrote:One problem you

Leeton wrote:
One problem you might find with the hex pieces for equipment, skills etc. is that you could get carried away and suddenly every player needs a table or relatively big space to place all their tiles. It would also be confusing and time consuming to set it back up after the first game. This'd be your "pop out and play" attraction is reduced after the first few games.

This is definitely one of my main concerns. I'm testing 60 tiles on a standard square card table from Wal-Mart. I'm guessing most people who are into gaming have at least that kind of space available, or make available.

Redesigning the columns to work better with the Column Rule right now. Hopefully I can get the new ones printed and cut out to do a little testing before I have to go to bed. Stupid sleep patterns.

I also just realized my dungeon doors violate my Line of Sight rule. So...more debugging to do.

rene.shible
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Wow, there's quite a lot of

Wow, there's quite a lot of feedback here... lucky guy! I guess everybody's got something to say about dungeon crawling :)

Well, to say nothing about the genre, this game features a novel dynamic hex-based tile-laying mechanism that you might enjoy.

http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/138614/relic-expedition

Tom Vase takes a comprehensive look at it here if you just want to see how the tiles play out.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hg6a4KGUxno

Hope this helps!

Jarec
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This is highly relevant to my

This is highly relevant to my interests, and you seem to have a knack to make things happen.

What dice mechanic are you going to use. Just the standard D&D or something else?

Have you think about (what many Diablo-like games are doing nowadays) putting your character skills onto the equipment, so they could be swapped easily?

blgarver1982
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Jarec wrote:This is highly

Jarec wrote:
This is highly relevant to my interests, and you seem to have a knack to make things happen.

What dice mechanic are you going to use. Just the standard D&D or something else?

Have you think about (what many Diablo-like games are doing nowadays) putting your character skills onto the equipment, so they could be swapped easily?

I've only thought about dice mechanics in a very general way. I'd love a d20 engine (because what dungeon crawler doesn't love a good d20)...but I'm not sure if all that will be necessary. I'm spanking new at this, so I'm trying not to overwhelm myself at this point. Tile placement first. Once I have that working I'll really start thinking about the next phase...which will be character creation. I've had several ideas about dice rolls pop up, but they're all just loose threads right now. I know I want to use action or movement points to determine the lengths of turns. Maybe players roll some dice and add an initiative score to determine how many AP they generate each turn?

Regarding the equipment...do you mean making the equipment have some magic or special effect that alters the PC's base stats, instead of having the player spend points into developing the stats and skills? I had not considered that yet...but I like it. Gonna put that in the back pocket.

blgarver1982
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rene.shible wrote:Wow,

rene.shible wrote:
Wow, there's quite a lot of feedback here... lucky guy! I guess everybody's got something to say about dungeon crawling :)

Well, to say nothing about the genre, this game features a novel dynamic hex-based tile-laying mechanism that you might enjoy.

http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/138614/relic-expedition

Tom Vase takes a comprehensive look at it here if you just want to see how the tiles play out.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hg6a4KGUxno

Hope this helps!

Wow, that game looks cool. And the tile placement is very similar to what I'm trying to achieve. Mine will have more limitation on how many new tiles a player reveals when moving to the next hex. Good to see the design of those jungle hexes is quite like what I'm doing...with my dungeon pillars on the corners and walls along the edges between, so that then they are placed alongside each other it matches up and (hopefully) creates a nice visual. Maybe I'm on the right track.

Looks like the Relic Expedition uses roll-based action points too. I think I like that idea. Thanks for the links!

blgarver1982
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WCanepa wrote: If you go this

WCanepa wrote:

If you go this route, why not have a 20 card Race deck?

This, I love. Perhaps ability/action subdecks for class and race that combine to form a single character deck. Draw from this for your hand, then use action points in order to play something from your hand...

This might be better suited for a card game, the more I think of it. But I'm going to explore it for sure.

blgarver1982
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Update...

Successfully play tested an entire game's worth of tile placement! It works!

Had to tinker with some rules, of course, and fiddle with the design, but it's smooth.

Two questions that came up that I wanted to ask you guys:

1) The placement was somewhat dictated by the edge of the table in late game instead of any internal mechanic. Do you think this is a problem?

2) The players won't necessarily be moving in the same areas, but the game board will be visible to everyone, even if their character is across the dungeon. So they may take actions based on something that is revealed several spaces away by another character, and wouldn't be in their character's line of sight. For instance, a quest goal might pop up on another player's turn, prompting others to race for it. Is this a game breaker, or do you think people will suspend their disbelief for the sake of the game?

Thanks!

Some Random Dude
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blgarver1982 wrote:1) The

blgarver1982 wrote:
1) The placement was somewhat dictated by the edge of the table in late game instead of any internal mechanic. Do you think this is a problem?

2) The players won't necessarily be moving in the same areas, but the game board will be visible to everyone, even if their character is across the dungeon. So they may take actions based on something that is revealed several spaces away by another character, and wouldn't be in their character's line of sight. For instance, a quest goal might pop up on another player's turn, prompting others to race for it. Is this a game breaker, or do you think people will suspend their disbelief for the sake of the game?

Thanks!

1) I don't think it's a problem necessarily. And more importantly, I don't think there's a way to limit it without some sort of artificial mechanic (map is only so many hexes wide, for instance), which would take away from the flavor of exploration.

2) How are these things (quest goals, etc.) revealed? Are they printed on the tiles? If you can make them hidden somehow (face down cards, for instance) that would more or less eliminate that issue.

blgarver1982
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Some Random Dude wrote:2)

Some Random Dude wrote:

2) How are these things (quest goals, etc.) revealed? Are they printed on the tiles? If you can make them hidden somehow (face down cards, for instance) that would more or less eliminate that issue.

Hmmm...that might work. Originally the idea was to print the event triggers right on the tile, then choose an event from a corresponding deck (trap, loot, monster, etc).

Keeping it hidden somehow could be incorporated, though...if I'm smart enough. I'm gonna go think on that.

thanks for the suggestion!

schattentanz
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Just read your thread and got

Just read your thread and got excited :)

I'm always in for a good dungeon crawl :)

Say, do you happen to know the MMOG Guild Wars?

GW basically is a Fantasy CCG:
You build your character by collecting skills, which you can either buy, obtain via quests or extract from slain Bossmonsters.

Your equipment is secondary at best: Each player can obtain the "best" equipment for his character with very Little effort.
The focus lies on the skills you've got: No matter, how many skills you actually possess, you may only ever equip a selection of up to 8 skills which may not be changed during a mission.
So choose wisely!

Just some food for thought for your game :)

Kind regards,
Kai

blgarver1982
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schattentanz wrote:Just read

schattentanz wrote:
Just read your thread and got excited :)

I'm always in for a good dungeon crawl :)

Say, do you happen to know the MMOG Guild Wars?

Kind regards,
Kai

I do know GW! I have a handful of characters in GW2, though it's been a while since I've played. I never thought about that kind of skill system. My original idea started to mutate into its own deck-builder very early, so I pulled it and set it aside to develop as its own thing. I like the idea of physical attributes governing the skills, sort of like in Elder Scrolls. Actually, a lot like in Elder Scrolls.

This part could easily spin far out of my control because I love the leveling system so much and always have some flash-in-the-pan idea to add. I have to make sure to keep it intuitive.

More to ponder...

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