HOW OFTEN DO YOU RUN FROM BATTLES?

Yeeeahh, agreed.

When i play a game for a long time straight, there's always a point when i can't be assed and i start running away. This is usually a bit before i turn it off.

I will run from battles when they get too frequent or when they are pointlessly hard. One thing many game designers seem to overlook is that, unless you are fully healing the player after each battle, the enemies shouldn't be on EXACT PAR with the players. That is to say: they shouldn't be able to withstand the same number of hits or spam effects that last after battle, et cetera. One thing that annoys me a great deal is when poison is worthless for the player to use because it sucks in battle but then it lingers afterward, causing the player to have to waste MP/items healing it. It just makes the balance swing way to far toward the monster. I am pro challenging battles, but they should be decisive and short and the designer should realise that part of the challenge of random battles is the fact that they wear the player down, in addition to being difficult in themselves.

The best dungeons are ones where, as you approach the exit, you are short on items, low on HP, and out of MP. If anyone has ever said "THANK CHRIST" out loud when they see that exit onto the worldmap at the end of some dungeons, you'll know what I mean. The worst dungeons are ones where you suffer all of those symptoms I listed, but you're only halfway done the damn dungeon, meaning you're terribly underleveled. I always try to balance my game for about 1.2x difficulty based on how much experience someone running through the game will get. This, hopefully, keeps people from running from all but a few battles, although I have other incentives to keep people fighting (so for example the game is based on the assumption you'll be on level 12 where someone who is rushing through the game will only be on level 10).

It's very hard to balance a game well enough to ALWAYS have the encounters line up with the characters, so it's best to leave in the run option in case the player runs into unforeseen consequences.

Let's see here...

From general, common jrpgs and RM games, I tend to run away from about 40% of battles...maybe a little more. Usually, the times I run is either because the enemy is too difficult or I simply don't want to fight at that moment.

However, I've been playing Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door recently (yes, for the first time ever) and I've, so far, only run from about 3 battles. No joke.

Now, in a game like pokemon, I fight EVERY single trainer I find. Of course you can't run from trainer battles, but it is possible to avoid contact with them...essentially meaning you're running away from the challenge.

I start running from battles constantly if the game is throwing thousands of random ones at me, and I am for some reason still playing it. Some times I run from battles to keep myself underleveled so the game is actually challenging.

i seem to recall you couldn't run in legend of the philosopher's stone...
that pissed me off, seeing as the enemies got pretty trivial after a while.

bob, I like that - a really challenging monster that you SHOULD run from but that you can take on if you dare. See: Geondun.

post=105386
Yes. This is so cathartic.

Then you die on the overworld because you didn't use a tent!

Whoops. Remember: don't put really hard enemies right after bosses. Your players won't forgive you.

post=105592
The Dragon Quest series has an incredibly boring battle system so I run a lot.

But games like Chrono Trigger and romancing saga I play almost every battle.

I really don't get how CT and DQ's battle system is different gameplay-wise.

I really don't get how CT and DQ's battle system is different gameplay-wise.

They have HP, MP and the attack command, that makes it SO SIMILAR.

basically i run from battles when i'm trying to get somewhere and not trying to train.