THE UNBEATABLE BATTLE.

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Unless you are cursed to play a game that uses autosave,
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
Yeah, using up your items is a real problem. To try to combat that, the unbeatable battles in my game fully heal you before they start, and the enemies don't do anything for the first three rounds, then insta-kill your character on the fourth. So you have no reason to heal.

Since the only combat-usable items in my game are healing items, I think that pretty much takes care of the problem. Hopefully? If anyone can think of a way it would still be a problem, let me know. If my game had items that granted buffs or dealt damage, then it would obviously still be a problem, but fortunately it doesn't.
benos
My mind is full of fuck.
624
Well you know you gonna fight something like OMEGA WEAPON in a game like FF and get your ass handed to you. So you might as well learn the fate of failure. If your fighting a boss that turns out to be the final boss in the game but you fought him eariler and lost, that's the whole point.
Would it be possible ( I haven't used the rpg maker enough to know off hand) to store items used in a particular battle with variables so that at the end of an unbeatable battle those items could all be restored to the user? This way you can have your unbeatable battle without pissing players off immensely and still retain all the feel of it being an actual battle?

If this was already said I apologize. I mostly skimmed through the middle of this topic. (Sorry.)
author=LockeZ
Yeah, using up your items is a real problem. To try to combat that, the unbeatable battles in my game fully heal you before they start, and the enemies don't do anything for the first three rounds, then insta-kill your character on the fourth. So you have no reason to heal.

Since the only combat-usable items in my game are healing items, I think that pretty much takes care of the problem. Hopefully? If anyone can think of a way it would still be a problem, let me know. If my game had items that granted buffs or dealt damage, then it would obviously still be a problem, but fortunately it doesn't.


my game also makes sure the player is fully healed before the unwinnable boss battle but this is mostly because I plan on having a way to heal completely before every boss fight both to let the player no a boss is probably in the next room and to keep him from having to backtrack all the way to the shop at the beginning of the dungeon

I plan on taking away all the consumabe items after the boss battle is over and giving the player a ton of money to get more in the location he finds himself after the cutscenes are over that way it doesn't matter at all if he used up everything in a vain attempt to survive
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
author=Hoddmimir
Would it be possible ( I haven't used the rpg maker enough to know off hand) to store items used in a particular battle with variables so that at the end of an unbeatable battle those items could all be restored to the user? This way you can have your unbeatable battle without pissing players off immensely and still retain all the feel of it being an actual battle?

It's possible, but might be too much of a pain in the ass to code if that's the only thing you're using it for. A much simpler method would be to disable the item command for that battle.
author=LockeZ
author=Hoddmimir
Would it be possible ( I haven't used the rpg maker enough to know off hand) to store items used in a particular battle with variables so that at the end of an unbeatable battle those items could all be restored to the user? This way you can have your unbeatable battle without pissing players off immensely and still retain all the feel of it being an actual battle?
It's possible, but might be too much of a pain in the ass to code if that's the only thing you're using it for. A much simpler method would be to disable the item command for that battle.


That does sound a lot simpler. Won't that clue the player into the fact that it is a cheat fight though? I thought it might be a nice way to continue fooling the player but still not infuriate them when they realize they were never going to win anyway and so lost all those items. Though I suppose if done right it disabling items would just make it seem like a hard boss fight... hmmm...
well like i said my idea is to just take all the non essentia items away after the fight and give the player a ton of money to buy new stuff in a new location

though i guess not everyone has a convient cutscene that ends with the player character being somewhere else where he can buy stuff
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
Hoddmimir:
If the player figures out that the boss isn't beatable, I don't really... see why it's a problem. I mean, who cares? They're going to lose in a few seconds anyway whether they figure it out right now or not. The battle doesn't matter, so I don't see why it's a problem for them to not care about trying to win it.


Yoshio:
that idea only works in a very, very specific situation. 99.9% of the time it's just going to piss me right the hell off to take away everything I've earned. Giving me a fresh pile of money doesn't matter. What matters to me is that the time I spent gathering my old stuff, and the tactical effort I spent not using it up before now, was not wasted.

However, in certain scenarios, it could work. It would be like the end of the game and the start of a fresh new game. And if your game's items are done in a way such that it's extremely easy to refill them all (like if you can only hold 10 items total, and enemies drop them very commonly), then emptying the player's inventory isn't really a big deal. But on the other hand, in any situation where these things wouldn't be a big deal, wasting items in battle wouldn't be a big deal either, so I kind of feel like your solution doesn't really do anything useful for this problem.
LockeZ:
Do you not feel that the illusion is important than, or just not for unbeatable battles?
Unbeatable battles are so overused that you will know when they come.
benos
My mind is full of fuck.
624
Obviously, it's part of the cliche. Should stay in some games. Not like your gonna fight Alkdlasdkl THE ANCIENT evil with a stick, and think you can beat him easily.
I do not think sealing the item bag is a good idea. It solves one problem, but creates another. I do know that some players, when facing an unbeatable battle, chooses the "go down fighting" route instead of just going for efficiency. Some players also want the game to preserve the feeling of a desperate battle and sealing the item back will kill immersion.

I don't understand though why anyone would want to fool the player into believing the battle is beatable. Obviously, the opponent has to be vastly superior in order for a battle to be unbeatable. If the opponent isn't superior, the battle has no reason to be unbeatable. If the opponent is superior, the characters would notice and by extension, so should the player.
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
For the sake of immersion, "holy shit I'm getting my ass kicked oh my god oh my god" is probably a better reaction than "oh, an unbeatable battle, time to just defend every turn until this fake fight ends"

However that's basically almost impossible to do without causing problems, so personally I prefer to just end the battle as soon as the opponent takes its first turn.

author=benos
Obviously, it's part of the cliche. Should stay in some games. Not like your gonna fight Alkdlasdkl THE ANCIENT evil with a stick, and think you can beat him easily.


Yeah except this is exactly how way too many games work, teenage kids from fishing villages fighting and winning against major military groups and ancient world-destroying powers is a pretty common theme
author=LockeZ
Hoddmimir:
Yoshio:
that idea only works in a very, very specific situation. 99.9% of the time it's just going to piss me right the hell off to take away everything I've earned. Giving me a fresh pile of money doesn't matter. What matters to me is that the time I spent gathering my old stuff, and the tactical effort I spent not using it up before now, was not wasted.

would having it happen at the begining of the game be one of those situations?

also the way my game works is that there are no random battles and battle intitiating enemy sprites don't respawn meaning it is very easy to backtrack to the shop (there are numerous shops in these dungeons) to refill your items, but the game expects you to this and the battles are designed around you using items during these fights, so you know if you want to try to save them well...good luck with that
I just feel like one of the most important things a game can do is keep the player immersed. Maintain the illusion. As best as possible, a game should make a player feel like they are the character. When a battle occurs, it shouldn't be a character in a game that goes into battle, it should be the player. Unbeatable battles, unless done really well break the immersion. If the player realizes they can't win it makes them step back from the game, see it as a game, and cheat it by allowing themselves to lose without wasting items. I don't like that. And an unbeatable battle that ends after a single turn might as well just be a cutscene because there isn't really any point to the player actually fighting anyway. That's just how I see it at least.
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
author=Yoshio
author=LockeZ
Hoddmimir:
Yoshio:
that idea only works in a very, very specific situation. 99.9% of the time it's just going to piss me right the hell off to take away everything I've earned. Giving me a fresh pile of money doesn't matter. What matters to me is that the time I spent gathering my old stuff, and the tactical effort I spent not using it up before now, was not wasted.
would having it happen at the begining of the game be one of those situations?

also the way my game works is that there are no random battles and battle intitiating enemy sprites don't respawn meaning it is very easy to backtrack to the shop (there are numerous shops in these dungeons) to refill your items, but the game expects you to this and the battles are designed around you using items during these fights, so you know if you want to try to save them well...good luck with that


Yeah, it sounds like it would work fine in your game, since it has no grinding, and especially near the beginning of the game, since the player will not really have had any chance to hold onto their items. Any game that actually has RPG style progression is ill-suited for it, though.

And an unbeatable battle that ends after a single turn might as well just be a cutscene because there isn't really any point to the player actually fighting anyway. That's just how I see it at least.
Yeah, that was my point with the one-turn thing, they should essentially just be cut scenes. The only reason it's not literally a cut scene is because people like it when games are actually interactive. It makes you feel like you are being beaten, instead of some guy on the screen being beaten. Also, I guess in a lot of games, animations and battle effects are much easier to make look good in battles. (Think of when Cecil is attacked by Golbez in FF4 cut scenes. It looks pathetic.)
I've done it - though on this occasion you had to survive ten turns and then a new member would join your party in-battle and, having him broken the monster's armour in his entrance, you'd then be able to defeat the boss. I did however program in what happens if your party is unexpectedly levelled way above anything resembling sanity for that part of the game and manage to somehow deal enough damage to him (9999 HP seems a lot to handle at level 10, but when its shaved to 1000 after an interlude that's a lot more managable) to lead to an early kill. I think for an unwinnable scenario to work it needs to make good plot sense and not seem forced. In FFX there's a sequence where Tidus is stopped by a monk with a gun, after having defeated HUGE mechanical monsters and hordes of the same, it just doesn't make good sense why this one monk would stop him dead. The unwinnable battle scenario gives you a chance to throw spells, etc at something and see them not working, and adds more credability to the plot interlude than just stopping the heroes of a game on the spot.
...Plunges.

Plunges were horrible in The Way. They were so horrible that I turned Plunge Cheat on the whole time after episode 1. Why were they horrible? It wasn't the system-- it was because I lost the first three, which were totally unwinnable anyways. The experience was so traumatizing that I never picked up plunges ever again.

So. If you have some sort of quirky minigame... make sure it's winnable the first time around, or the player isn't going to stick around.

I feel that unwinnable battles however, are okay if
1.)you get owned so quickly its painless (a la Golden Sun Saturos and Menardi the VERY first time)
2.)you can steal awesome items from them (a la Beatrix FFIX) while not being compelled to waste your own, not taking too much damage
3.)you have to survive X number of turns before you get help (Zuu FFX)
4.)it's plot related AND obeys one of the ones mentioned previously
5.)it's actually winnable (Daxinger from Vacant Sky)
6.)it's avoidable (Daxinger from Vacant Sky)

...Which is pretty much what everyone else has just stated.
In The Way there were victory conditions for the plunges, in the first episode, they didn't have the enemy getting defeated, more you getting a bonus for having lasted a while. If I remember rightly. Rhue is meant to be a n00b at plunging though so it makes sense...