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Red_Nova
Sir Redd of Novus: He who made Prayer of the Faithless that one time, and that was pretty dang rad! :D
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Prayer of the Faithless
On the brink of the apocalypse, two friends struggle to find what is worth saving
On the brink of the apocalypse, two friends struggle to find what is worth saving
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Swap in 3 Middle with Who?
In case anyone's interested, I'm about to start streaming these games on Twitch. Drop by if you've got the time: https://www.twitch.tv/annoyednova
Swap in 3 Middle with Who?
*stumbles over finish line* I got it! https://rpgmaker.net/games/12634/
It was the first game I ever made in MV, so I couldn't do anything too fancy, but I'm pretty happy with what I ended up doing. Big thanks to Delsin7 for making a fun project to start with!
*dies*
It was the first game I ever made in MV, so I couldn't do anything too fancy, but I'm pretty happy with what I ended up doing. Big thanks to Delsin7 for making a fun project to start with!
*dies*
I hate white mages
I think I found the answer! I was going to respond to a lot of the good points that were brought up, but they've all given me so much to think about that responding to them all would take a novel. That's on me for not replying to this topic sooner. Oops.
I've been playing Etrian Odyssey Nexus, and I can point to the Arcanist class and say "Do this. This is cool!" Arcanist class is not a dedicated healer, but they can be built to both contribute to damage and supporting the party at the same time. See, the main function of the Arcanist is to drop one of a variety of magic Circles down on the field. At the end of each turn, the Circle will attempt to inflict a status ailment like paralysis or poison on all enemies and provide decent healing to the party until it wears out or is replaced by another Circle. For added flexibility, the Arcanist has skills that consume the Circle prematurely to either damage enemies or heal allies.
The Circle solution solves just about every problem I had with white mages listed in the original post. Not only will the Circle take care of healing automatically, but they can still contribute to the fight directly by applying status ailments and damaging enemies by consuming the circle if it isn't needed anymore. This extra step not only requires just enough thought from the player to keep them from falling into a monotonous slog without requiring battles to be overly challenging, but gives the class breathing room to have more utility in battle without sacrificing their role as the healer. In my mind, this makes the healer architype an interesting and fun class to use.
In addition to the Arcanist, there are a surprising number of classes in Nexus that can perform healing as a sub function without sacrificing their primary roles. I picked out Arcanist specifically because it's the next closest thing to a white mage other than the actual white mage class, but I highly recommend looking at Etrian Odyssey Nexus in general because there is a lot of cool ideas condensed into one game.
I've been playing Etrian Odyssey Nexus, and I can point to the Arcanist class and say "Do this. This is cool!" Arcanist class is not a dedicated healer, but they can be built to both contribute to damage and supporting the party at the same time. See, the main function of the Arcanist is to drop one of a variety of magic Circles down on the field. At the end of each turn, the Circle will attempt to inflict a status ailment like paralysis or poison on all enemies and provide decent healing to the party until it wears out or is replaced by another Circle. For added flexibility, the Arcanist has skills that consume the Circle prematurely to either damage enemies or heal allies.
The Circle solution solves just about every problem I had with white mages listed in the original post. Not only will the Circle take care of healing automatically, but they can still contribute to the fight directly by applying status ailments and damaging enemies by consuming the circle if it isn't needed anymore. This extra step not only requires just enough thought from the player to keep them from falling into a monotonous slog without requiring battles to be overly challenging, but gives the class breathing room to have more utility in battle without sacrificing their role as the healer. In my mind, this makes the healer architype an interesting and fun class to use.
In addition to the Arcanist, there are a surprising number of classes in Nexus that can perform healing as a sub function without sacrificing their primary roles. I picked out Arcanist specifically because it's the next closest thing to a white mage other than the actual white mage class, but I highly recommend looking at Etrian Odyssey Nexus in general because there is a lot of cool ideas condensed into one game.
I still love RMN
Prayer of the Faithless
Thanks so much for the kind words, iddalai! Yeah, 7 years is a loooong time to be working on a single project. I'm just glad it's finally over.
And yeah, I try to make demos for my games when I can. I think it's important to be upfront with people about what kind of game it is.
And yeah, I try to make demos for my games when I can. I think it's important to be upfront with people about what kind of game it is.
i know you can't nominate commercial games for Misaos, but if i could, i'd nominate "Prayer of the Faithless" for the Not Dead Yet Award. I mean, holy crap, 7 years in the making and it turned out brilliant. What an achievement.
I'm flattered you'd nominate it for a Misao if you could, but it is what it is. If commercial games are allowed to be nominated, I don't want the whole site policy to change just to accommodate me. For now, a comment/download/review on the game would be worth ten nominations.
I'll happily accept a nomination for "dead developer" though, because I still feel like a ghost even three months after releasing it.
I'll happily accept a nomination for "dead developer" though, because I still feel like a ghost even three months after releasing it.
I hate white mages
Swap in 3 Middle with Who?
Same, Ozzy. I had a clear stopping point that I wanted to get to, but couldn't. I hope I left enough open at the end for whoever picks up my entry can take it in whatever direction they want.
I hate white mages
Good stuff, all of this.
Personally, my two favorite ideas to fix the class are position-based healing and converting excess health into armor. I'm not sure how to implement this in RPG Maker, but I'm sure there is a way to cast healing spells in a small AOE instead of either one target or the whole party. It would also encourage players to put some thought in the position of your party. Labyrinth of Refrain: Coven of Dusk had specific healing skills that targeted either front row allies or back row allies, so maybe something similar could be implemented in RPG Maker? Overhealing into armor sorta combines the healing and buff problems into one, but the more granular nature of the armor buff means that healers will always have something to do.
I haven't played FFXIV, so the closest thing I can compare it to is Xenoblade. Healers in Xenoblade don't have overly strong healing, but are vital to outpace the damage being done to the tanks. Maybe with a different balancing goals in enemy encounters the same effect could be replicated with turn-based fights? To make the transition easier, maybe most healing spells could be replaced with a regen spell instead? That could free up the healer to do other things while healing is already being taken care of?
Personally, my two favorite ideas to fix the class are position-based healing and converting excess health into armor. I'm not sure how to implement this in RPG Maker, but I'm sure there is a way to cast healing spells in a small AOE instead of either one target or the whole party. It would also encourage players to put some thought in the position of your party. Labyrinth of Refrain: Coven of Dusk had specific healing skills that targeted either front row allies or back row allies, so maybe something similar could be implemented in RPG Maker? Overhealing into armor sorta combines the healing and buff problems into one, but the more granular nature of the armor buff means that healers will always have something to do.
I haven't played FFXIV, so the closest thing I can compare it to is Xenoblade. Healers in Xenoblade don't have overly strong healing, but are vital to outpace the damage being done to the tanks. Maybe with a different balancing goals in enemy encounters the same effect could be replicated with turn-based fights? To make the transition easier, maybe most healing spells could be replaced with a regen spell instead? That could free up the healer to do other things while healing is already being taken care of?
I hate white mages
I can't think of a more boring job in a classic Final Fantasy-esque RPG than a white mage. At least warriors, for a simple as their game plan is, give you the satisfaction of killing an enemy to progress. What does a white mage add to the party dynamic? Healing and buffing.
I was reading through Darken's topic about fixing thieves, and I caught myself having similar thoughts about white mages. Problem is, I'm not sure white mages can be "fixed" because they fulfill their fundamental role so perfectly that adding more diverse abilities essentially graduates them from the white mage class. Therefore, I'm using this topic to call the fundamental role itself into question instead. Much like Darken's topic, I am assuming the game in question features a mostly standard turn-based battles like what you see in default RPG Maker projects or classic Final Fantasy-esque games.
Healing skills
For one thing, the idea that you need a dedicated party member just to heal feels like a waste of a member slot to me. Most RPGs already have items that can fulfil that purpose, and they can be used by anyone, not just white mages. Taking dedicated healers out of the party forces the player to think about which offensive unit should give up their action to use the item to heal themselves or the party, creating interesting micro choices throughout an entire dungeon crawl. If you're just hoarding your recovery items and instead using your white mage to heal, that costs MP that can only be restored via ether or other mp-restoring items. Either way, you're using items, so why not just skip the middleman and use the healing items instead? Ethers, from my experience, are generally rarer and more expensive than potions, so it's wild to me that white mages have somehow tricked players into consuming more ethers to restore a white mage's MP than using the healing items to restore HP.
I'll back up that last claim with an example from Prayer of the Faithless, my latest game. PotF heavily encouraged healing items over skills by 1) only having 2 healing skills in the entire game, 2) having those skills only be cast by the primary damage dealer, and even then cost a lot of MP and extra actions to be able to use, and 3) limiting the stack of healing items that can be carried so players are more likely use them to make room pick up more out in the field. However, when watching playthroughs, I noticed that people still kept using the skills anyway to heal, costing them more health and resources overall in battle since extra turns are used to set up and cast the healing skill. What this tells me is that players feel like MP is a more disposable resource than items, and will resort to using items if there is absolutely no other option.
Also, in general, I find skills that fully heal the entire party to be a bit of a cop-out. It feels like a "get out of jail free" card that you can play at any time to negate any tension or strategy to get your party out of a dangerous situation. It's not that I'm against "get out of jail free" cards, but having them be spells that you can replenish with a quick gulp of ether or a visit to an inn means that you will likely always have a comfortable stack of these cards to negate any tension that could have been found in a dungeon crawling session.
Buffs
Regarding buffs, I want to propose the idea that maybe they aren't needed as much as you think. Think of each stat in an RPGMaker database and ask yourself this "why can't I just raise this stat's base value permanently instead of relying on skills to buff it temporarily?" Buff attack to see big numbers and end the battle quicker? Why not just have the attack stat of warrior classes higher so you can ALWAYS see big numbers? Buff defense to take more damage? Why not have higher variance in equippable armor to encourage mixing and matching to a player's preference?
If you absolutely have to have buffs in your game, fine. However, do you really need a dedicated white mage just to apply them? How about attack skills that also buff the user? Or giving buff skills to other party members instead? A warrior/paladin would get a lot of mileage out of any skill that buffs their defense, especially if they have a cover skill to guard against weaker party members who wouldn't benefit much from a defense buff anyway.
Inflexibility
Finally, (and this is the biggest issue I have with them) white mages are so inflexible in their role that they are completely useless in any other situation. Trash mobs? Warriors can dispatch them quickly, thieves can steal from them to get items, black mages can cast spells to hit their weakness. What's a white mage going to do? Heal the party? Buff allies? Neither of those things are needed. All that white mages can do is bonk an enemy with their staff to maybe deplete some health that a warrior can inflict tenfold. Giving them a Holy-esque skill might solve the problem, but those are usually mid-late game skills that cost a lot of MP.
----------------------------------------
All in all, I fail to see any component of a white mage that wouldn't be better off taken away and added to a different job class. What are some solutions that you have done/would like to do to address these issues? If you disagree that what I laid out are even issues in the first place, please explain why. Thanks for reading.
I was reading through Darken's topic about fixing thieves, and I caught myself having similar thoughts about white mages. Problem is, I'm not sure white mages can be "fixed" because they fulfill their fundamental role so perfectly that adding more diverse abilities essentially graduates them from the white mage class. Therefore, I'm using this topic to call the fundamental role itself into question instead. Much like Darken's topic, I am assuming the game in question features a mostly standard turn-based battles like what you see in default RPG Maker projects or classic Final Fantasy-esque games.
Healing skills
For one thing, the idea that you need a dedicated party member just to heal feels like a waste of a member slot to me. Most RPGs already have items that can fulfil that purpose, and they can be used by anyone, not just white mages. Taking dedicated healers out of the party forces the player to think about which offensive unit should give up their action to use the item to heal themselves or the party, creating interesting micro choices throughout an entire dungeon crawl. If you're just hoarding your recovery items and instead using your white mage to heal, that costs MP that can only be restored via ether or other mp-restoring items. Either way, you're using items, so why not just skip the middleman and use the healing items instead? Ethers, from my experience, are generally rarer and more expensive than potions, so it's wild to me that white mages have somehow tricked players into consuming more ethers to restore a white mage's MP than using the healing items to restore HP.
I'll back up that last claim with an example from Prayer of the Faithless, my latest game. PotF heavily encouraged healing items over skills by 1) only having 2 healing skills in the entire game, 2) having those skills only be cast by the primary damage dealer, and even then cost a lot of MP and extra actions to be able to use, and 3) limiting the stack of healing items that can be carried so players are more likely use them to make room pick up more out in the field. However, when watching playthroughs, I noticed that people still kept using the skills anyway to heal, costing them more health and resources overall in battle since extra turns are used to set up and cast the healing skill. What this tells me is that players feel like MP is a more disposable resource than items, and will resort to using items if there is absolutely no other option.
Also, in general, I find skills that fully heal the entire party to be a bit of a cop-out. It feels like a "get out of jail free" card that you can play at any time to negate any tension or strategy to get your party out of a dangerous situation. It's not that I'm against "get out of jail free" cards, but having them be spells that you can replenish with a quick gulp of ether or a visit to an inn means that you will likely always have a comfortable stack of these cards to negate any tension that could have been found in a dungeon crawling session.
Buffs
Regarding buffs, I want to propose the idea that maybe they aren't needed as much as you think. Think of each stat in an RPGMaker database and ask yourself this "why can't I just raise this stat's base value permanently instead of relying on skills to buff it temporarily?" Buff attack to see big numbers and end the battle quicker? Why not just have the attack stat of warrior classes higher so you can ALWAYS see big numbers? Buff defense to take more damage? Why not have higher variance in equippable armor to encourage mixing and matching to a player's preference?
If you absolutely have to have buffs in your game, fine. However, do you really need a dedicated white mage just to apply them? How about attack skills that also buff the user? Or giving buff skills to other party members instead? A warrior/paladin would get a lot of mileage out of any skill that buffs their defense, especially if they have a cover skill to guard against weaker party members who wouldn't benefit much from a defense buff anyway.
Inflexibility
Finally, (and this is the biggest issue I have with them) white mages are so inflexible in their role that they are completely useless in any other situation. Trash mobs? Warriors can dispatch them quickly, thieves can steal from them to get items, black mages can cast spells to hit their weakness. What's a white mage going to do? Heal the party? Buff allies? Neither of those things are needed. All that white mages can do is bonk an enemy with their staff to maybe deplete some health that a warrior can inflict tenfold. Giving them a Holy-esque skill might solve the problem, but those are usually mid-late game skills that cost a lot of MP.
----------------------------------------
All in all, I fail to see any component of a white mage that wouldn't be better off taken away and added to a different job class. What are some solutions that you have done/would like to do to address these issues? If you disagree that what I laid out are even issues in the first place, please explain why. Thanks for reading.
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