[POLL] A POLL AND DISCUSSION ABOUT RANDOM BATTLE ENCOUNTERS: HOW THEY MAY BE IMPLEMENTED.

Poll

To you, which of the following is the best way to add random encounters to a game? Please read each option carefully. - Results

Old-school: Random battles are on. This means managing potions and mana as you explore dungeons.
15
39%
Encounter ring: The player has a ring or item that is worn or otherwise toggled on/off that can shut off random battles. Players warned beforehand that they may be inexperienced for a boss if used too frequently.
11
28%
Boss-kill disable: Random battles in a dungeon or area are disabled upon the player killing the boss. However, the player cannot level up further in that area after doing so.
7
18%
Level-cap disable: Random battles in a dungeon or area are disabled upon reaching a pre-determined level cap for that area. Prevents grinding for xp and gold.
5
13%

Posts

Sooz
They told me I was mad when I said I was going to create a spidertable. Who’s laughing now!!!
5354
author=Crystalgate
I do not think that you should give the player the option to shut of encounters prior to that. It makes no sense to me, the monsters are supposed to be hostile creatures that makes adventuring dangerous. You should not be able to choose whether or not you should encounter them, no more than you can choose whether or not a mugger is going to try robbing you.


I think it depends on the game. Yeah, in some games that's the setup, but imagine, say, Pokemon without repels. Also, unless you're specifically designing a resource management survival style game, you're potentially setting up an unwinnable situation for a player who's had a run of bad luck and just wants to get out and heal and try again. It all depends on the game you're making.

However, if the encounters are correctly tuned, then any option to simple skip random encounters makes far less sense. I do not see people who play first person shooters complain that it's too hard to skip fights. Ditto for the vast majority of other genres.


I think the problem is that in most other genres, the gameplay is considered the main draw, whereas with RPGs, there are more players who legit play for the story and characters, and think of the battles as obstacles to getting more of what they're really after.

Whether or not you feel this is an appropriate way to approach games, it's worth it to at least consider this audience in your game design. My argument for having an option to turn off encounters is based on that: It's entirely optional, so if you're a player who'd rather go through all the battles, grind, etc., it's completely possible for you to ignore the "turn off button" and just keep on keepin on. It's a thing that's there solely to make your game accessible to people who are Bad At Games, and I don't think it's going to have much effect on anyone who's already Good At Games.

(Granted, if your game is solely based around the battles and whatnot, then I doubt it'd attract a lot of the story-only crowd, but for the vast majority of devs here, there seems to be at least some interest in story-driven works.)

author=zeello
I believe NO GAME should use random encounters. Sure, I can probably come up with a myriad of "creative" solutions to make random encounters more reasonable, such as the solutions described in the poll, but any solution I go with betrays my belief that random encounters offer absolutely nothing and should in fact not exist.


Thank you for coming into a topic about a mechanic solely to say that you do not like that mechanic! This is definitely a useful contribution and not just complaining about things you don't like to people who like them!
author=Sooz
I think it depends on the game. Yeah, in some games that's the setup, but imagine, say, Pokemon without repels. Also, unless you're specifically designing a resource management survival style game, you're potentially setting up an unwinnable situation for a player who's had a run of bad luck and just wants to get out and heal and try again. It all depends on the game you're making.

I can not comment on Pokemon since I haven't played much of it. As for the rest, I'm afraid I'm not getting what you're trying to say. It seems to me that it's when you're setting up a survival management situation that the player can get into an unwinnable situation. It can be solved with escape to entrance items/spells though.

I think the problem is that in most other genres, the gameplay is considered the main draw, whereas with RPGs, there are more players who legit play for the story and characters, and think of the battles as obstacles to getting more of what they're really after.

Whether or not you feel this is an appropriate way to approach games, it's worth it to at least consider this audience in your game design. My argument for having an option to turn off encounters is based on that: It's entirely optional, so if you're a player who'd rather go through all the battles, grind, etc., it's completely possible for you to ignore the "turn off button" and just keep on keepin on. It's a thing that's there solely to make your game accessible to people who are Bad At Games, and I don't think it's going to have much effect on anyone who's already Good At Games.

(Granted, if your game is solely based around the battles and whatnot, then I doubt it'd attract a lot of the story-only crowd, but for the vast majority of devs here, there seems to be at least some interest in story-driven works.)

Were you to go trough the trouble of correctly tuning the encounters (which less than 10% of commercial games does), then you're probably not designing for that audience. I do also not buy the "it's optional" argument, the mere fact that the option does exist changes the context of things. If you for example try to immerse the playing with a sense of danger, that option will cause a certain percentage to snap out of the immersion. Options have a psychological effect even if not used.
Sooz
They told me I was mad when I said I was going to create a spidertable. Who’s laughing now!!!
5354
author=Crystalgate
I can not comment on Pokemon since I haven't played much of it. As for the rest, I'm afraid I'm not getting what you're trying to say. It seems to me that it's when you're setting up a survival management situation that the player can get into an unwinnable situation. It can be solved with escape to entrance items/spells though.


I think you missed my "unless" there.

Were you to go trough the trouble of correctly tuning the encounters (which less than 10% of commercial games does), then you're probably not designing for that audience.


I'm just sayin, it's possible to design your game so that multiple audiences can enjoy it. Maybe that's not your thing, but it's at least something to consider in my eyes.

I do also not buy the "it's optional" argument, the mere fact that the option does exist changes the context of things. If you for example try to immerse the playing with a sense of danger, that option will cause a certain percentage to snap out of the immersion. Options have a psychological effect even if not used.


I've literally never had a problem with this. Like, pokemon has stuff like repels and escape ropes and all, but most of my playthroughs I never bother to use them, and it doesn't really affect my enjoyment or mood. A lot of people like to opt for artificial limitations to up a challenge in games.

As for the danger thing... that's a single instance. If the entire point of the game is about making a player experience a sense of danger, then yeah, having the option to turn the danger off doesn't make sense, and I'm p. sure I've made such concessions already.

But the vast majority of games with random encounters are not a danger simulator, they're a narrative strung together with gameplay. I can't see a downside to offering people with lower interest in the gameplay versus the narrative the option to more easily get to what they came for. (In a similar vein, I'm all for skippable cutscenes, for people who want to play the game and don't give a shit about the narrative; it makes for a lessened experience either way, but as a developer, I'm focused on just making something that will be enjoyed.)
LockeZ
I'd really like to get rid of LockeZ. His play style is way too unpredictable. He's always like this too. If he ran a country, he'd just kill and imprison people at random until crime stopped.
5958
Just because you aren't affected by something doesn't mean it other people aren't. Yes, options ABSOLUTELY have a psychological effect even if not used. As you just said one paragraph later, you feel like the vast majority of games with random encounters are not a danger simulator. The reason you feel like that is because those games provide the player with options to remove the danger if they don't want it there.

Artificial limitations imposed by the player do not work on most players. Psychologically, to almost all players, it feels like the player isn't really playing the game, they're playing their own game that they made themselves. Only a small minority of players can get the same satisfaction from things like running through FF7 without ever equipping the new weapons and armor they find as they would get from a game that actually enforced that. Game developers are way more likely to be satisfied by that, though, so they always try to suggest it as some kind of legit gameplay model. But the players are like, "No, fuck you, I don't want to make my own game. I thought that was your job."
Sooz
They told me I was mad when I said I was going to create a spidertable. Who’s laughing now!!!
5354
I guess this line of argument treats RPGs in general as a lot more srs bsns than I bother with. vOv
I don't think having an item that disables random encounters is a good idea, because the entire point of random encounters is to force the player to fight whether they're ready or not.

For an example, look at Bravely Default, which has options to increase, decrease, or fully disable random encounters. On paper, it sounds good, since it allows the player to explore dungeons at their own pace. But in execution, it turns into a boring loop of:

1: Turn random encounters off or to low, search dungeon and open all chests

2: Turn encounters to 200% and run in circles to grind until your HP or MP gets too low

3: Turn encounters back to 0 and return to the inn with zero threat to your weakened party

4: Repeat steps 2 and 3 until your levels are sufficiently high


Sure, it's good to be able to explore earlier dungeons without the hindrance of weak and time-wasting enemies, but the fact that you'll never have to worry about dragging a dying party back to the inn while desperately fending off enemies removes a big chunk of challenge and excitement.

Another system that wasn't mentioned in the poll is the one used in Breath of Death and Cthulhu Saves the World: the menu has a "Fights left" counter that goes down each time you win a battle. After 30 or so battles in a specific dungeon, random encounters stop completely, but you can still manually start a fight if you want to. But even that has its problems, as it encouraged me to just stand near the dungeon entrance and manually start battles until all random encounters were done with.
LockeZ
I'd really like to get rid of LockeZ. His play style is way too unpredictable. He's always like this too. If he ran a country, he'd just kill and imprison people at random until crime stopped.
5958
That's not honestly all that different from how I play Dragon Quest games - walk back and forth just inside the dungeon entrance until I've gained enough levels, then go through the dungeon fleeing from every enemy to get all the treasure chests and reach the boss.

It's one of the problems with random encounters - the player doesn't have to actually explore to encounter them. And if your game allows the player to reliably flee from enemies, the player also doesn't have to actually encounter any enemies while exploring. The exploration and combat become almost completely disconnected from each-other. These are some of the reasons why touch encounters are so popular, and also the reason why so many games make it very difficult to flee from enemies. But of course there are lots of other ways to address these problems - we have four pages of ideas so far.
Sailerius
did someone say angels
3214
author=Someoneman
I don't think having an item that disables random encounters is a good idea, because the entire point of random encounters is to force the player to fight whether they're ready or not.

For an example, look at Bravely Default, which has options to increase, decrease, or fully disable random encounters. On paper, it sounds good, since it allows the player to explore dungeons at their own pace. But in execution, it turns into a boring loop of:

1: Turn random encounters off or to low, search dungeon and open all chests

2: Turn encounters to 200% and run in circles to grind until your HP or MP gets too low

3: Turn encounters back to 0 and return to the inn with zero threat to your weakened party

4: Repeat steps 2 and 3 until your levels are sufficiently high


Sure, it's good to be able to explore earlier dungeons without the hindrance of weak and time-wasting enemies, but the fact that you'll never have to worry about dragging a dying party back to the inn while desperately fending off enemies removes a big chunk of challenge and excitement.

Another system that wasn't mentioned in the poll is the one used in Breath of Death and Cthulhu Saves the World: the menu has a "Fights left" counter that goes down each time you win a battle. After 30 or so battles in a specific dungeon, random encounters stop completely, but you can still manually start a fight if you want to. But even that has its problems, as it encouraged me to just stand near the dungeon entrance and manually start battles until all random encounters were done with.

That's not a problem with the encounter system. That's a problem with battles requiring grinding instead of strategy to win.
On optional challenges - First, there's a thing called the Oberoni Fallacy which states that a ruling is still bad even if it is optional or can be removed. It shouldn't need to be removed if it were intact. Still, I'm fond of gameplay altering settings that can provide greater or different kinds of challenges.

On combat vs. exploration - The simplest way to ensure more exploration would be to portion the dungeon into more areas/maps/regions etc. which have different encounter tables. Another is to simply make more bosses - World of Warcraft has 4+ bosses even in the lowest level instances. Beating bosses for dungeon loot rather than collecting treasure chests is both more challenging and more satisfactory. Not to mention WoW doesn't let you get xp on mobs 5 or more levels below you.
what if we removed all exploration and made the game a long straight tube?
author=kentona
what if we removed all exploration and made the game a long straight tube?


Having no sidepaths or other kind of scenery means there's no real room for random encounters - instead, fixed encounters at determined points are more sensible. It should mean you're limited in how much exp you can get like in Fire Emblem. A linear path is one thing, but I don't see any point in making the player backtrack/loiter on it.
Sooz
They told me I was mad when I said I was going to create a spidertable. Who’s laughing now!!!
5354
author=LightningLord2
On optional challenges - First, there's a thing called the Oberoni Fallacy which states that a ruling is still bad even if it is optional or can be removed. It shouldn't need to be removed if it were intact. Still, I'm fond of gameplay altering settings that can provide greater or different kinds of challenges.

On combat vs. exploration - The simplest way to ensure more exploration would be to portion the dungeon into more areas/maps/regions etc. which have different encounter tables. Another is to simply make more bosses - World of Warcraft has 4+ bosses even in the lowest level instances. Beating bosses for dungeon loot rather than collecting treasure chests is both more challenging and more satisfactory. Not to mention WoW doesn't let you get xp on mobs 5 or more levels below you.


IDK a lot of this (and a lot of posts in general) seems like it assumes there's only one kind of player, and a single answer for how to engage them. For example, I find exploration fun for its own sake, and am much more satisfied finding a cool item or just a neat-looking area than I am beating bosses. (For bosses my main satisfaction is "Welp, I never have to do that again!")

While you don't need to cater to every play type (Lord knows most of my planned solo games would bore the hell out of combat fans!) it's good to remember that the variety exists, and to avoid treating gameplay like there's only one available design. Otherwise, you just get a situation like the AAA industry, where every game is pretty much the same.
Dudesoft
always a dudesoft, never a soft dude.
6309
Love the ring idea. Lets you speed run, level up at your leisure, and find treasure without encountering a slime and/or bat at every fracking corner.

That said (and voted for), the classic approach is acceptable too.
The last option would be the most logical way of making encounters. I personally like random battles and I also use random battles for my games so far (although I would like to have something like a Migrant Seal kind of system so you can skip battles if you don't want to a certain degree (the Wild ARMs series did a lot of things right actually)).
At the moment, I have an Item which lowers the chance of fighting monsters. I don't want to fully disable encounters because I want to give some small enemies something like a 1% chance of a very rare drop so you can grind the hell out of it (Not really 1%, but something not to high for maybe a Trielemental Negator Ring for fire, ice and thunger).
Making enemies visible is in my opinion kinda boring. I'd just make a lowlevel run then because why should I bother? Also its quite hard to make movement patterns in order to make those things at least semi-logical. If there are enemies, they would most likely want to surprise you, right? xD Sometimes it surprises you more (AMBUSHED!!), sometimes you were two steps ahead (Preemptive Strike!!) and sometimes you turned around just in time (Normal). Seeing enemies on the map would completely ruin it unless running into them from behind results in a preemptive strike and getting hit by them from behind results in an ambush.
But you will definitely need a pattern because otherwise, it is just meh to make...

But thats just why i like random encounters. I voted for the last one, since it is the logical thing but if you wanna have something to grind on your monsters. Otherwise... oldschool.
Punkitt
notorious rpgmaker 2k3 shill
3341
Honestly, I hate random encounters in traditional RPGs. Earthbound and Mother 3 had the right idea with the on-map enemy encounters, where you could actually see them. They moved fast enough that if you were in the wrong spot they'd catch you, but if you really didn't want to fight you could maneuver your way around. As far as traditional RPGs go, on-map encounters are the way to go, in my opinion!

In traditional RPGs like older FF or Dragon Quests, players have a choice with a lot of their actions. Do I want to go to that town? Do I want to open that chest? Do I want to get in that cool lookin' ship? Yeah, let's do that! Players can make their own choices, whether it be equipping loot or participating in minigames or exploring outside the town. However, random battles usually interrupt that, making them a slight annoyance or even an entirely frustrating mechanic unlessthe player specifically has grinding/trying to grab loot/just fighting in mind. If you just want to get out of the cave, you're constantly hindered by having to fight something you couldn't have determined. If you want to grab a certain material from a specific enemy, you have to run back and forth until the Random Number Gods bestow upon you an encounter with the Flaming Metal Goopking+. With an on-map encounter system the issues are usually lessened! Not saying it completely fixes the problem, but it eases it and makes it less annoying for players. With the power of skill or just being a manipulative, smart player, you can exit that cave without having to fight Standard Goopslime another ten times. If you want that specific item, you can scout out which enemies are which so to weed out the ones you don't want.

Though random encounters being annoying all depends on the game's design itself. In Undertale, no one really minded battles because they weren't too frequent and constantly threw new things at you that made you excited to fight them, because "Hey, new social puzzle to navigate and a new bullet hell experience!" They require skill and smart thinking to successfully beat instead of a standard system where you just throw your numbers at some other enemy's numbers and hope yours overpowers theirs, and hope and pray a critical hit doesn't strike you down. In more standard RPGs without a unique battle system, though, random encounters can be lessened in the annoyance factor if you make your encounters nicely spaced so there isn't constantfighting. If your enemies have variety, that spices it up as well because nobody wants to fight the same rotating three encounters with the same rotating enemies. If you make your enemies memorable (Like Earthbound's) or fun to fight in some way the random encounter fatigue is significantly lessened.

Another example for a random encounter system done (sorta) right is in Pokemon. In Pokemon, enemies are exciting to fight against sometimes! Sometimes it's the promise of finding a new Pokemon to fight and capture, because that offers something new to experience! In Pokemon, on the overworld at least, the encounters are limited to little patches of possibility you can head into and fight if you so choose, and trainers, who you can see and prepare for. Occasionally the game will make you haveto progress through that grass, but that's good because it's asking you to risk it this one time instead of every step you take having the potential for a fight to occur. It adds in a nice sense of danger. Trainers you can see on the map and occasionally avoid given the circumstances, or if not, let you spot them out before you fight and let you prepare for a forced battle, removing the frustrating randomness of a lot of other battles in other games. All in all, the way the overworld is handled in Pokemon works very well. Now, caves and water on the other hand are total bullpatoot.Even then, though, the game offers repellent to lessen the annoyance factor, and it does that better than having the option to just switch off the random encounters completely.

I guess it just all depends on the way your game works and what you do with it that makes it fun!...

...Jeeeesus, that was a doozy. Gonna take a break from writing for a bit after that!
Ratty524
The 524 is for 524 Stone Crabs
12986
@Punkitt: The only thing I'm hard pressed to stop you on is the way you've described Dragon Quest. At least in the first game, the entire point of the game is to grind-to-win, with the addition of some of its other exploration factors. If you are not playing that game with the intent of fighting things, you are kind of doing it wrong?

Another thing is that Dragon Quest actually handled it's encounters with relative competence. For starters, if you were at significantly higher levels compared to enemies like slimes, there was an increased chance of the enemy running away right at the start of the encounter, so you wouldn't have to waste time fighting things that offer no reward to you at your current level.

Regardless of your level, especially during your early to mid stages, using the "run" command was also surprisingly more reliable compared to other RPGs I've played. While it didn't stop the encounters from happening, it at least allowed you to avoid fights when you wanted, which REALLY helped in desperate situations where you are low on health. I think your encounter frequency and the type of enemies you face also depended on the tile you were standing on. If you are travelling on mountains, you fought some of the hardest enemies in the area, but travelling on the main road lowered the frequency and you fought weaker enemies.

Heck, DQ had a repel item before Pokemon did it (I think it was the holy water?). It just wasn't as readily accessible by comparison.

Sorry, but that game had a lot of attention to detail that kind of got overlooked by future RPGs to come.
Punkitt
notorious rpgmaker 2k3 shill
3341
Sorry about that! I've only ever played the first little bit of the first Dragon Quest, so I can't say I'm in a good position to exclaim all that. I was just trying to find a really standard, older RPG and I thought FF and the first Dragon Quest seemed to fit the bill.
Punkitt
notorious rpgmaker 2k3 shill
3341
Wow, DQ had a lot of cool stuff in it from what I'm hearing! I guess it deserves more credit that I initially gave it!
Craze
why would i heal when i could equip a morningstar
15150
dragon quest, like final fantasy, evolves with every installment. dq is just a bit more subtle about it and keeps the same general setting (sometimes very literally, with 1/2/3 and i THINK 5/6?), so it's harder to tell without looking.

DQ1: the quintessential old(est)school jrpg
DQ2: oh my god party members
DQ3: class system, upgrading characters to new classes
DQ4: changing the main character for the first half of the game before finally unleashing you into the full world (see: Hero's Realm)
DQ5: PLAYABLE MONSTERS, marriage, multiple generations of heroes
DQ6: idk it was really pretty? never got into this one
DQ7: psuedo-3D maps
DQ8: full 3D, a "real-sized" overworld (most memorable overworld ever imo), voice acting, orchestral music
DQ9: visible equipment, enhanced the original DQ3 style
DQ10: was an mmo or something?

i suggest the snes version of dq3, the ds version of dq4, or the ps2 version of dq8 if you're looking to try a real dragon quest. i've heard great things about 5 but it really never hooked me.