About reagents for spellcasting. Which system do you prefer?

[Darth Canoli]

I believe I already did in a different thread about 2 or 3 weeks ago, it's not my fault you're only reading your own posts.

How many games did it in a meaningful way? Meaning it add something to the gameplay instead of being another retarded feature like cool-downs?
And how many devs would be able to make something interesting out of it?

 

[rusty_shackleford]

I believe I already did in a different thread about 2 or 3 weeks ago, it's not my fault you're only reading your own posts.

How many games did it in a meaningful way? Meaning it add something to the gameplay instead of being another retarded feature like cool-downs?
And how many devs would be able to make something interesting out of it?

well gee if some devs didn't do something right everything must be thrown out because it's obviously inherently bad
oblivion did leveling bad? Better not put leveling in RPGs anymore!

 

[Darth Canoli]

And you're accusing me of providing no arguments?
You can't say you didn't earn your retarded ratings after this...

 

[rusty_shackleford]

And you're accusing me of providing no arguments?
You can't say you didn't earn your retarded ratings after this...

can you explain how that's not your argument when that's exactly what you said?

 

[rusty_shackleford]

oh and btw

Meaning it add something to the gameplay instead of being another retarded feature like cool-downs?

Vancian magic is just fancy cooldowns with a good in-lore basis for existing.
Almost like something being implemented poorly does not mean it's inherently bad. Really makes ya think.

 

[Tao]

I dislike so much how you can't use a learned spell unless you use a slot to memorize it just for one cast in the vancian system. I love everything else, hell ill even make it harder to transcribe scrolls to a spellbook. Ii even think we should remove know spell per level up. But please for the love of god let me use my shit.

And yeah i know i know: scrying, mah balance, what about sorcerer, use this subclass, make a dip, mimimimi... I don't need to hear it, i'm playing rol and wizards for close to 30 years now

 

[Volourn]

Material components that are expensive or rare. Fir example, I'm not gonna keep track of how many doses of bat dung a mage has but if a spell needs gems, golden statuettes or something of that nature, yup it matters.

 

[Cryomancer]

dependent on these otherwordly creatures

Then Wizards are merely Clerics...

Even in Conan, an very low magical setting, is clear that Sorcerers are DISCIPLES of such creatures, not clerics of such creatures.

Vancian magic is just fancy cooldowns with a good in-lore basis for existing.

No, is not. Cooldowns would be :
"you have infinite granades, but can only use once per X seconds"
Vancian would be :
"you have resources to prepare X grenades and can throw in any order that you wanna"

How many games did it in a meaningful way?

Already said many examples of reagents in this thread.

 

[Norfleet]

I hate cooldowns, they're even more contrived than actual cooldowns in most cases. I can throw grenade once every 15 seconds...WHAT EXACTLY WOULD HAPPEN if I tried to throw one in only *14* seconds, really? Why 15? This arbitrariness is worse than an actual cooldown, where something is actually physically cooling down, and it most likely will not melt into slag instantly if I fire just one second earlier.

 

[Not.AI]

I think all the normal options have been exhausted at this point: mana/no mana, sleep, cooldowns, regents/no regents, scrolls, equip special items else cannot cast certain spells.

I think there is a huge missed opportunity.

Why not make games where the spellcasting is at least as complicated as a game of Pokemon, Gwent, MtG, Yu-Gi-Oh? (Maybe not modern Yu-Gi-Oh!)

Why are wizards just the character class that, as the exception, reintroduces FPS / TPS into nominally hack-n-slash games where the lore just happens to exclude muskets and cannons and pistols, time and magical collectables standing in for ammo?

 

[FriendlyMerchant]

dependent on these otherwordly creatures

Then Wizards are merely Clerics...

A cleric is just a wizard whose restricted by the rules of a religious order and limits their dependence on otherworldly creatures to those approved by their order most of the time. In Medieval occultism, everything "magical" a wizard did was typically some form of chemistry, appeal to some accepted superstition like humors, divination (as in astrology or using divining instruments), rituals to try to form pacts with spirits described as angels, demons, nymphs, elementals, fairies--and other common terms used to refer to spirits-- in order to get a specific outcome, and even symbolism and illusions in rituals to act on people. Whereas a priest of the Catholic church was a wizard that only appealed to spirits that were approved by the Vatican in the approved manners. During the dominance of paganism, Priests would perfom magic regularly on an audience as well. In the medieval and even up to modern periods, it's called mass.

Even in Conan, an very low magical setting, is clear that Sorcerers are DISCIPLES of such creatures, not clerics of such creatures.

A disciple of such a creature that's given power by that entity is certainly a cleric, especially given that his cult is based on following the terms needed to acquire such power.

 

[Dadd]

If magic were powerful and all magic required reagents, realistically any reasonably developed society would have a massive reagents industrial complex where reagents were widely and commonly available, and states would churn out standarized mages in huge numbers regularly unless everyone living in these worlds were unbelievably retarded, which we are supposed to believe they're not.

 

[laclongquan]

Too valuable and players would hesitate to use them at will.

And what is the problem? Powerful spells like AD&D stoneskin needs to have the player hesitating to use it hence needs to cost something like Diamond Dust.

Speaking like true dumbass.

Players' mentality is such that a thing if too valuable, too one-time-use, would be hoarded to end of time. There's no difference between a rock and a scroll of Stoneskin when they both get stored in your inventory, dust covered and not used. In which case why would you need to carefully design and playtest a Stoneskin effect?

Mininuke in Fallout 3/FNV is valueable but people dare to use them because they can always buy back, or find more. We dare to use them because while it's expensive, it's not unique, thus not trigger our hoard-it mentality.

Same deal with Morrowind's spell with high soul cost. They are expensive in term of soul point so we have to use them where it count, not where we want. But they are restorable, so we not afraid to use them~

Useablity is an important feature of an item~ Expensive is entirely different from Unique (rare to find). Uniques are for packrat who hoard things. Expensive items are for players who use things~

 

[Cryomancer]

too one-time-use, would be hoarded to end of time.

This is not truth when the game knows how to handle risk/reward. Examples? Gothic 2 scrolls. When you are an circle 0/1 caster, an scroll of the 6th tier fire rain is incredible valuable, when you are circle 4/5 is a bit valuable and at circle 6 is worthless as you can cast the same spell at will with an rune.

In case of stoneskin, it is not "one time use", is simple that each use has an monetary cost and money is ideally an scarce resource. So if you spam stoneskin in every fight, you will not have money to do other stuff.

Medieval occultism

Medieval occultism is heavily inspired by the Christianity; but look to other myths about casters around the world, Fuegians, an native tribe of Argentina had legends of casters transforming entire rivers into blood. In Japan, Abe no Seimei appears in myths able to create powerful forcefields and enslave "yokai" to do its bidding and to kill with mere glare.

Zhang Jiao in Chinese "myths" learned most of his spells from books and could do incredible things like creating cyclones.

given power by that entity

The disciple is not drawing power per say. The relation of Conan's Thot Amon and Set is more akin to Vader and Sidious than to a priest and his deity. The master gives knowledge, not power per say.

 

[FriendlyMerchant]

Too valuable and players would hesitate to use them at will.

And what is the problem? Powerful spells like AD&D stoneskin needs to have the player hesitating to use it hence needs to cost something like Diamond Dust.

Speaking like true dumbass.

Players' mentality is such that a thing if too valuable, too one-time-use, would be hoarded to end of time. There's no difference between a rock and a scroll of Stoneskin when they both get stored in your inventory, dust covered and not used. In which case why would you need to carefully design and playtest a Stoneskin effect?

Mininuke in Fallout 3/FNV is valueable but people dare to use them because they can always buy back, or find more. We dare to use them because while it's expensive, it's not unique, thus not trigger our hoard-it mentality.

Same deal with Morrowind's spell with high soul cost. They are expensive in term of soul point so we have to use them where it count, not where we want. But they are restorable, so we not afraid to use them~

Useablity is an important feature of an item~ Expensive is entirely different from Unique (rare to find). Uniques are for packrat who hoard things. Expensive items are for players who use things~

No. You don't use items because you end up not needing them. In TES games, you end up with entire inventories of potions you never use because you never actually need to use them. Whereas in a game like Dungeon rats, you can try to save all your bombs, nets, etc. for later, but there are a good number of fights before later you will need to use those items so you use them because you have to use them and you're going to be unlucky enough in one of those fights that you have to use them.

 

[Norfleet]

and you're going to be unlucky enough in one of those fights that you have to use them.

Don't be ridiculous, I'm not going to use it now, I might need them later!

 

[Norfleet]

I think all the normal options have been exhausted at this point: mana/no mana, sleep, cooldowns, regents/no regents, scrolls, equip special items else cannot cast certain spells.

I think there is a huge missed opportunity.

Why not make games where the spellcasting is at least as complicated as a game of Pokemon, Gwent, MtG, Yu-Gi-Oh? (Maybe not modern Yu-Gi-Oh!)

I don't know what half of those mean, but the last attempt to make an MtG game that wasn't just an emulation of the card game crashed and burned miserably, and it was still mostly driven by cooldowns, only now what button does what is randomly scrambled!

Other alternative casting systems tend to be too involved for a game that DOESN'T just center around being a wizard. Like I remember there was this magical duel game which didn't use mana, cooldowns, reagents, or anything like that, but instead, was simply a duel between two wizards that cast spells by performing sequences of gestures, and whatever hand wiggles you made cast whatever spell that resulted whether you wanted to or not. It was turn-based and each wizard would select how he wished to wave his hands that turn and what to do with the resulting spells. Very involved, very complex, very wizardy. But it leaves no room for any non-wizard-based gameplay, so it was just about duelling wizards.

 

[Nifft Batuff]

The best should be to have different schools of magic with different rules (reagents, runes, memorization, summons, etc.) In the same game, like in U8.

 

[Dadd]

I think all the normal options have been exhausted at this point: mana/no mana, sleep, cooldowns, regents/no regents, scrolls, equip special items else cannot cast certain spells.

I think there is a huge missed opportunity.

Why not make games where the spellcasting is at least as complicated as a game of Pokemon, Gwent, MtG, Yu-Gi-Oh? (Maybe not modern Yu-Gi-Oh!)

Why are wizards just the character class that, as the exception, reintroduces FPS / TPS into nominally hack-n-slash games where the lore just happens to exclude muskets and cannons and pistols, time and magical collectables standing in for ammo?

Nox's wizard class was inspired by Magic: The Gathering. The wizard can cast counterspells, walls, mess with the opponent's controls, teleport to markers, make custom traps with your spells, etc. The hand gestures you see in the video below were originally intended to be manually input by the player. OpenNox brought back this system, letting you input the gestures manually with a numpad or keys of your choice.

Spoiler

There used to be a great wizard vs wizard pvp video but I can't find it anymore.

 

[Mr. Magniloquent]

I think all the normal options have been exhausted at this point: mana/no mana, sleep, cooldowns, regents/no regents, scrolls, equip special items else cannot cast certain spells.

Very untrue. The only solution is to make spellcasting dangerous. Typically refered to as "backlash". Spells can be used at will, but with a chance the magic fails in proportion to its power against the skill and ability of the caster. This way magic becomes self-regulating both mechanically an in lore. It returns value to mundane methods in addition to restoring some of the mystique and thrill for magic being unknowable. It allows magic to be powerful and glorious, rather than just sparkly ranged DPS. Developers are far too cowardly for this solution though.

 

[FriendlyMerchant]

and you're going to be unlucky enough in one of those fights that you have to use them.

Don't be ridiculous, I'm not going to use it now, I might need them later!

Now I see why you haven't gotten off the first map yet.

 

[Not.AI]

I think all the normal options have been exhausted at this point: mana/no mana, sleep, cooldowns, regents/no regents, scrolls, equip special items else cannot cast certain spells.

Very untrue. The only solution is to make spellcasting dangerous. Typically refered to as "backlash". Spells can be used at will, but with a chance the magic fails in proportion to its power against the skill and ability of the caster. This way magic becomes self-regulating both mechanically an in lore. It returns value to mundane methods in addition to restoring some of the mystique and thrill for magic being unknowable. It allows magic to be powerful and glorious, rather than just sparkly ranged DPS. Developers are far too cowardly for this solution though.

Good point. But backlash in spellcasting is usually equivalent to requiring reagants/consumables to spellcast. The main exception is in games where spells are cast infrequently.

Why. Because action gameplay loops turn any probabilities into certainties. The player does something again and again.

My counterspell to the TLDR reaction curse is the SPOILER button

So if backlash means the spell hits the caster instead of the target sometimes or fails with some probability, and the probability is 5%, all seems fine, until it is realized the player casts 100 times in a few minutes of play. The spell is certain to fail. Health is certain to steadily decrease. Chance is gone. Along with it any mystique.

What happens next is the player prepares health potions or casting success potions to regularly consume while casting in the fight fight fight shishkebab portions of the game. So any place outside any town.

The issue is that gameplay is usually a fast loop, unlike chess. Even in turn-based games: most creatures and opponents in the game have plenty of health. (Larian ...)

Games have to have fun loops to succeed: if what the player does most of the time isn't fun a long game isn't fun. These loops have to be small and fast enough to "cover" most of the game with fun. Otherwise, again, it's possible that most of a game isn't fun.

If the player does not use potions in this case, even worse. Because people have come to expect reactivity. If they press a button and the effect isn't instant, they feel controls are bad and ragequit. Followed by a one star review. Followed by joining the Codex and complaining about the game. Same problem as fancy long windup animations, when it's the player doing those. Players would feel the game is nonreactive and sluggish and blame it when they lose. That is whym if there are any long animations, the effect or damage is applied almost instantly and the player is given a couple invincibility frames and is allowed to instantly exit the animation at any point. (It becomes like a 90s action movie where the badguy with the sword stands still and waits for Segal to whip around and knock it out of his hands as soon as Segal starts stretching and winding up and getting ready to kick.)

 

[Mr. Magniloquent]

Not.AI Computers have problems with true random numbers, but that's not a big deal. Change the seed every time the PC rests or every time combat begins. I agree that re-loading kind of makes backlash moot, but good design shouldn't be forgone due to save-scumming cowards. Backlash mechanics give the player agency, because it's now up to them how much risk they accept. It can be scaled, so that casting Sleep might entail some negligible risk for an apprentice, but casting fireballs are of no consequence to the archmage. Make spells or abilities that allow the player to manage risk, or even increase risk on enemy mages. There is so much that can be done with it. I also love how it explains why wizards and magic are not everywhere. Settings always struggle with why magic is taboo or hasn't solved all of the world's problems. Backlash is the perfect answer to why mages are reclusive, don't occupy all seats of power, and haven't solved world hunger.