Full Games List
Featured Games
New Games
Reviews
Media
Images
Blogs
Game Updates
Images Feedback Summary
Game Design Highlights
Tutorials
Articles
Scripts
Utilities / Plugins
Resources
Engines
Engine Bulletins
What is Makerscore?
Past Events
Achievements
Misaos
Forums
Post History
Chat
New to RMN?
Full Store List
RMN Music Pack (free)
THOUGHTS ON HIGH-LEVEL ENEMIES & BALANCING... WHAT DO YOU THINK?
Posts
Pages:
1
LuciusThorne
View playlists
Close
Strak
1560
Honestly, I've always struggled with creating engaging bosses, simply because turn based RPG's typically have a lot more restrictions than real time battles or FPS games where you can have specific target spots. As a result, a lot of my bosses turn into damage sponges.
My favorite boss in Bloodstained Hands was one that has three phases. As he hit HP requirements he'd change attack patterns, but also demoralize the party. As a result, the entire party would tag out except the party leader, and you'd continue the fight with the new party until the next phase, where the first party would switch back in.
Another one was inspired by Yunalesca, which was a boss that had an attack that changed how your allies would resist elements. Damaging Light and Dark moves would suddenly heal you, but your healing spells would now damage you. You could reset the status any time by using Defend, but every now and then the boss would use a massive area damage spell of either light or dark element, encouraging you to keep the status on at least one ally.
In my newest demo for Thrall, the main boss changes elements every time it drops 20% HP, causing you to reprioritize attacks and be wary of different elements to defend against. Another boss I have planned is one that actually has a specific weakness that needs to be targeted to actually kill the boss, but it can't be hit unless it enters a state where its damage is significantly buffed as well, so you have to play both offensively and defensively.
There's a great channel on YouTube called DesignDoc as well, and he's got phenomenal videos on boss fights and how to make them engaging. However, I will quote one thing in particular from his videos that I think is often overlooked.
"Once you've figured out how to beat them, a good boss with do one of two things. Throw additional hooks, or...
END."
Too many devs (myself included) seem to think that long boss fights are good boss fights. But if you find yourself repeating the same turn patterns over and over and not getting much variety or challenge, it's not really a test of strength at that point. It's a test of patience and endurance. How long can you last before you A) run out of resources, B) run out of time, C) run out of patience or D) run out of fun. Eventually you'll kill the boss, but there gets to be a point where it's not fun anymore, just boring. Short, engaging boss fights are exponentially better than long drawn out slug fests. There's nothing wrong with having a boss fight that is challenging and keeps you on your toes, but maybe only lasts a couple minutes.
I will say, one of my favorite bosses from a AAA game was against Ganondorf in Zelda Twilight Princess. Final form, his Gerudo form. He was not challenging. The fight lasted maybe 5 minutes. There weren't really a huge number of gimmicks that made the fight interesting. But the idea of two swordsmen dueling it out, one on one to see who the superior fighter is, was an incredible set piece. It was a beautiful and solemn climax to a great story.
From a mechanical side, however, I would say my favorite boss fight was against Metroid Prime. From uh... Metroid Prime. In the first form, you have to constantly switch between different weapon types, dodging a variety of attacks, using morph ball to escape in some situations. In the final form, he's invulnerable until he deposits pools of phazon that you need to immerse yourself in to enter hyper mode and deal ridiculous damage, keeping in mind that he'll phase out of visibility and you'll need to use your various visors to target him. As a mechanical challenge and test of skill, it was a great boss fight.
Anyway, that's just my take. I'll see if I can get the links to the videos from DesignDoc about boss fights. He's got like four of them.
EDIT: Actually, he's got a lot more than four. He's got a whole playlist.
My favorite boss in Bloodstained Hands was one that has three phases. As he hit HP requirements he'd change attack patterns, but also demoralize the party. As a result, the entire party would tag out except the party leader, and you'd continue the fight with the new party until the next phase, where the first party would switch back in.
Another one was inspired by Yunalesca, which was a boss that had an attack that changed how your allies would resist elements. Damaging Light and Dark moves would suddenly heal you, but your healing spells would now damage you. You could reset the status any time by using Defend, but every now and then the boss would use a massive area damage spell of either light or dark element, encouraging you to keep the status on at least one ally.
In my newest demo for Thrall, the main boss changes elements every time it drops 20% HP, causing you to reprioritize attacks and be wary of different elements to defend against. Another boss I have planned is one that actually has a specific weakness that needs to be targeted to actually kill the boss, but it can't be hit unless it enters a state where its damage is significantly buffed as well, so you have to play both offensively and defensively.
There's a great channel on YouTube called DesignDoc as well, and he's got phenomenal videos on boss fights and how to make them engaging. However, I will quote one thing in particular from his videos that I think is often overlooked.
"Once you've figured out how to beat them, a good boss with do one of two things. Throw additional hooks, or...
END."
Too many devs (myself included) seem to think that long boss fights are good boss fights. But if you find yourself repeating the same turn patterns over and over and not getting much variety or challenge, it's not really a test of strength at that point. It's a test of patience and endurance. How long can you last before you A) run out of resources, B) run out of time, C) run out of patience or D) run out of fun. Eventually you'll kill the boss, but there gets to be a point where it's not fun anymore, just boring. Short, engaging boss fights are exponentially better than long drawn out slug fests. There's nothing wrong with having a boss fight that is challenging and keeps you on your toes, but maybe only lasts a couple minutes.
I will say, one of my favorite bosses from a AAA game was against Ganondorf in Zelda Twilight Princess. Final form, his Gerudo form. He was not challenging. The fight lasted maybe 5 minutes. There weren't really a huge number of gimmicks that made the fight interesting. But the idea of two swordsmen dueling it out, one on one to see who the superior fighter is, was an incredible set piece. It was a beautiful and solemn climax to a great story.
From a mechanical side, however, I would say my favorite boss fight was against Metroid Prime. From uh... Metroid Prime. In the first form, you have to constantly switch between different weapon types, dodging a variety of attacks, using morph ball to escape in some situations. In the final form, he's invulnerable until he deposits pools of phazon that you need to immerse yourself in to enter hyper mode and deal ridiculous damage, keeping in mind that he'll phase out of visibility and you'll need to use your various visors to target him. As a mechanical challenge and test of skill, it was a great boss fight.
Anyway, that's just my take. I'll see if I can get the links to the videos from DesignDoc about boss fights. He's got like four of them.
EDIT: Actually, he's got a lot more than four. He's got a whole playlist.
Mary 4D
583
I personally think that negative status effects are a criminally underused mechanic in many RPGs. In some games, they're either too weak or wear off quickly enough for them to not be particularly worrisome. On the other side of the coin, the party is usually unable to inflict these effects on enemies - or perhaps the spells and items for this do exist, but immunities and/or success rates are too high/low.
It's not something I made, obviously, but the Persona series is insanely good at making status effects not only a viable strategy, but also something you want to cure immediately if your party is affected. And likewise, bosses shouldn't necessarily be immune to these effects - or at least not all of them. Final Fantasy X also has some of the best usage of status effects I've seen - especially the normally negligible poison is scary in that one, because it will kill you in four turns if you don't cure it - since it always hits for 25% of your HP.
And it's not an RPG example, but I feel like the Guardians in Breath of the Wild are a good example of this done right. They're scary early on and will one shot you if they manage to hit. However, even as you grow in strength, they remain formidable for the rest of the game, as they have high mobility, and will change their tactics. If you cut off some of their limbs, but not all of them, they will gain alarming speed and try to get away from you so they can blast you from a distance. If you cut off all their legs, they become stationary, but will instead fire their laser more often. So even during the endgame, it's best to treat them with caution.
Another thing to consider is limiting the amount of power a player can gain via plain old level grinding. Plenty of games (like Shining Force and Paper Mario) have diminishing experience gain based on the level difference between the enemy you killed and yourself, until you get nothing at all, essentially forcing you to move on while keeping the difficulty curve even. Also, unless you severely muck with the default database values, RPG Maker actually has exorbitantly high experience requirements between individual levels, which is pretty good to work around, as it's another way to limit the grind (Final Fantasy IV also does that). Alternatively, you could just set the regular enemies to run away if your level is too high.
And lastly, if you're using a maker that has scripting compatibility, you can set enemies to grow stronger with your own level - although I personally never liked that method, as I feel like this negates any progress you made, although it can also encourage alternate strategies, such as purposefully staying at a low level.
So in the end, there's plenty of possibilities. Anything that doesn't involve constantly spamming the regular attack is a good step into the right direction.
It's not something I made, obviously, but the Persona series is insanely good at making status effects not only a viable strategy, but also something you want to cure immediately if your party is affected. And likewise, bosses shouldn't necessarily be immune to these effects - or at least not all of them. Final Fantasy X also has some of the best usage of status effects I've seen - especially the normally negligible poison is scary in that one, because it will kill you in four turns if you don't cure it - since it always hits for 25% of your HP.
And it's not an RPG example, but I feel like the Guardians in Breath of the Wild are a good example of this done right. They're scary early on and will one shot you if they manage to hit. However, even as you grow in strength, they remain formidable for the rest of the game, as they have high mobility, and will change their tactics. If you cut off some of their limbs, but not all of them, they will gain alarming speed and try to get away from you so they can blast you from a distance. If you cut off all their legs, they become stationary, but will instead fire their laser more often. So even during the endgame, it's best to treat them with caution.
Another thing to consider is limiting the amount of power a player can gain via plain old level grinding. Plenty of games (like Shining Force and Paper Mario) have diminishing experience gain based on the level difference between the enemy you killed and yourself, until you get nothing at all, essentially forcing you to move on while keeping the difficulty curve even. Also, unless you severely muck with the default database values, RPG Maker actually has exorbitantly high experience requirements between individual levels, which is pretty good to work around, as it's another way to limit the grind (Final Fantasy IV also does that). Alternatively, you could just set the regular enemies to run away if your level is too high.
And lastly, if you're using a maker that has scripting compatibility, you can set enemies to grow stronger with your own level - although I personally never liked that method, as I feel like this negates any progress you made, although it can also encourage alternate strategies, such as purposefully staying at a low level.
So in the end, there's plenty of possibilities. Anything that doesn't involve constantly spamming the regular attack is a good step into the right direction.
Pages:
1
