EXP curve and stat curve.

[Byron]

I was going to post this in the RPG Maker section, but the more I thought about this, the more I decided that actually, this is more of a general RPG problem.
I've never know how to go about deciding upon the parties base EXP/Stats...
I know it generally depends on what type of class you're going for, like, Warriors don't really have that much MP or Speed, but they have a lot of Attack, Defense and HP where as a theif class has a load of Speed/agility and luck, but not that much HP or Defense. A mage obviously has a lot of MP and magic related stats are high but their hp and physical stats are low too.
What are your opinions on this. How do you decide your stats and stuff.

I shouldn't really post this after having that thread about ditching levels (which was an awesome idea) but I doubt anyone will be working on that for a while, and this is something really quite important.

 

[Daxis]

What are your opinions on this. How do you decide your stats and stuff.

Set arbitrary amounts, because in the end, the first initial battles/fights/levels/scenes/percentage of the game, you can greatly control how a battle should go. As a matter of fact, you should be able to predict the level, damage, and power of any player, given whether they do this or that.

So, generic rpg fight number one: you meet two enemies. You have a fighter and a mage. Your fighter can do 40-60% of the enemy's hp, your mage does 30-40% BUT a spell can do between 60-75. How many times do you allow the mage to cast a spell before using a potion, before finding a checkpoint, IF THEY NEED to worry about this.

THIS is the kind of things you need to worry about, not specifics like whether to do 50 damage or 500, WHICH I UNDERSTAND is not exactly what you're talking about, but it's related.

Controlling how the player levels and reacts is what this question seems to really ask, and it ties into much more than just leveling and stats. It ties into whatever items you make, however much items the player finds, any stat debuffs work, the interaction between spells and weapons, and basically how you design the game in terms of what the player can do.

So, what kind of game is it? Does the player gain massive stats per level? Does the player find so many weapons and items that stats are arbitrary beyond what you find/equip? Etc. etc. etc.

 

[Byron]

I dunno. I don't think you should control the player too much. Like you should be able to let the add a few points to their characters stats. I've noticed that at the start of any RPG the fights are more gray. You will never be able to outright destroy an enemy but you won't be outright destroyed yourself whereas in later game the fights are more "You're going to win" or "You're going to lose."
Am I the only one that's noticed this?
Shops would be an early thing and I'm not exactly expecting to just hand out super powered weapons, but at the same time I know that in many newer RPGs where money/equipment is rare, I'll be under equipped.
The stats are one thing, what are good base stats, but also, how much equipment should increase stats and things like that are important. Also stat increasing items are important to account for. I'm not saying control the player to the point where I'm deciding how their battles go, but it's important to control certain elements so that the player isn't going in some place under/over leveled but rather, they are going into a place that will be challenging.
If you are going into a big dungeon, you'd want the player to be at a level where they can defeat the enemy, but they get hit a few times, that way as they progress through the dungeon their health gets lower and lower. Now that's not accounting for potions and healing spells, but there isn't much you can do to control those. I dunno.
Am I chatting bullshit?

 

[Xilef]

What I do is test out each battle as I create them and set the party i'm testing with to the stats that the script expects the player to be at in that moment of the game, from there when I test run the game, if my stats are higher than the script expects from a speed-run style play-through I lower the EXP the monsters dish out in the last section of the script I just left.

So to put in brief: I define what level I expect the party to be in at certain points and tweak the monsters around that.

Requires a lot of testing, but you do end up with a very playable growth curve.

EDIT: Oh and starting this off, my first couple of battles are scripted so the battle plays out to teach mechanics in a safe environment without a tutorial, so I have to slide the starting stats of both the party and the monsters of that first battle until it sits right with the battle script, after that the method I described above takes over to grow the party throughout the game.

 

[Daxis]

Like you should be able to let the add a few points to their characters stats. I've noticed that at the start of any RPG the fights are more gray. You will never be able to outright destroy an enemy but you won't be outright destroyed yourself whereas in later game the fights are more "You're going to win" or "You're going to lose."
The stats are one thing, what are good base stats, but also, how much equipment should increase stats and things like that are important. Also stat increasing items are important to account for.

I mentioned this. Dude, when designing (at least for purposes of this example) an (generic) rpg game, you have to be able to account for everything the player does, what they can do. You have to understand roughly where they are, what they can do.

The stat increasing items? YOU DESIGNED THAT. You made that, you put that there. When the player gets into a fight in an area where they have used these items, you have to account for
1) did they use it?
2) did they not use it?
3) what effect does this have in the battle/game?
And then this extends to EVERYTHING in the game. (Well, stat enhancers are more cumulative than anything, but w/e)

You give the player the OPTION to do things, and you must understand the EFFECT of what this does on the battle, right? Do you really expect the player to do something you didn't know could happen in an rpg, at least considering outside of a sandbox game.

I'm not saying control the player to the point where I'm deciding how their battles go, but it's important to control certain elements so that the player isn't going in some place under/over leveled but rather, they are going into a place that will be challenging.
If you are going into a big dungeon, you'd want the player to be at a level where they can defeat the enemy, but they get hit a few times, that way as they progress through the dungeon their health gets lower and lower. Now that's not accounting for potions and healing spells, but there isn't much you can do to control those?

YOU DO decide how their battles go. You set player stats, you set enemy stats, you let them have at it. You give the characters to find, use, and equp certain things.

And remember what I said about know everything a player can do? SPELLS/POTIONS COUNT. You have to know exactly how many spells/potions the user CAN use, and then develop the game at that instance around this. THERE'S SO MUCH you can do to control this. How many spells does the player have? Dude, you control that, at any given point. How many potions does the user can find? YOu control that too, although obviously the player has to find money to buy some outside of dungeons.

You have to control what the player can do at any given point in time and keep the game 'fun'. Stats are kinda arbitrary in this (refer to the previous takes 2-3 hits to kill an enemy - you decide how this goes). You have to figure out the balance between easy, hard, fun and not fun, and whether this can happen, how easy it can happen, if the player uses it, etc. etc. etc.

Balancing ain't easy.