Alternative way to "usual" party members recruiting?

[ovan66]

Hello everyone, so, let me explain a little more my predicament...


Most of the time, new party members join the party because of the history or the game progression, but i really cant think of something more dull than that... at least in my opinion it is.


Wanted to think of an exciting and entertaining way of getting new companions to fight alongside the hero(es) and even find a script that allowed the user to "combine" minions(and use them in your party)  but is rather buggy and the author of said script has not been active for a while now...also the thread i opened in script support didn't get any replies..


So, scratching that script out i came to realize that i cant really think of other way, at least so atractive, as a fusion system...got any ideas? and how do you deal when it comes to get new party members? 


Hope everything's clear anyway, my english is a little rusty xD

 

[Kes]

The reason that new party members joining is so often dull is because various questions have not been asked, so what the game ends up with is actors joining for no discernible or interesting reason.  Even if you go with the fusion (or other) idea, I think that the following questions still need to be asked.


1) Why is this character in this place, at this time? (this applies to all characters.)


2) Why the heck should this character go along with the party?  What do they get out of it?


3) Why does this character stay with the party when it's clearly a dodgy prospect for a long life?


4) In what way(s) does this adventure/quest/whatever change how the character sees their life and what they want from it?

 

[Dr. Delibird]

Tbh, theoretically anyways, a character fusion system could be possible without the use of a script/plugin though it would be a lot of tedious work. If you want me to explain how I would theoretically do it let me know.


As for other systems that make character recruiting interesting. Hmm I have yet to tackle this myself in my current project but I am unsure if I will need to as my game is heavily story based so I am thinking I will not really use a system personally.


You could try to mercenary recruitment system where you could pay currency to recruit a temporary member that is randomly generated at the time of recruitment.

 

[ovan66]

The reason that new party members joining is so...

Ahh i didn't explain that point : In some point, sooner or later, there'll characters that will join up with the hero for his own benefits/background, meaning they'll be in the party for certain time but as the story develops you and this characters split and you are left alone with the minions/demons/mercenaries/whatever. Maybe in the late game the player will have to choose which side he is more supporting of his ex comrades,  the minions still taking a role only battle wise.

Tbh, theoretically anyways, a character fusion system could...

Mhh yeah, indeed i've come across some posts that claim that this is possible to do with use of variables and such and i've tried to do it  with no luck, sadly variables are not my strong suit lol , read some tutorials here and there but i feel i'm not totally understanding the basic idea..


A Mercenary recruitment its my last resource i guess...but i would anyways appreciate if you could explain a little how a character fusion will be possible

 

[Dr. Delibird]

Well I don't have very many spoons left today so I will have to keep this as short as possible @ovan66.


The basic principle is that you would have 2 variables for each stat (Attack A, Attack B ect.). All of the "A" stats represent one character while all of the "B" stats would represent the other. After selecting the first character (A) you would set all of the A stat vairiables to the corrorsponding stat of character (A). Then when you select the second character you do the same but with B stat variables. Iirc there is a few ways to select characters but none of them are easy (my memory is kinda bad though so I could be wrong). 


Next what you do is you math the stats together however you want. You could do simple things to combine them which would take no extra variables to do or you could do more complex math that requires more variables. It is totally up to you.


The only hard part about a fusion system whether it be evented or scripted is the character graphics which is more a pain in the backside than anything else as the only option is to have ALL possible combinations of graphics which can fast become too much to deal with.

 

[ovan66]

The basic principle is that you would have 2 variables for each stat ...

Mhh, what if i were more simple, and lets say :


Character A + Character B = Character C ( who has his own stats , indifferently from the mixed character stats ) 


Thank you for the help in advance man

 

[Dr. Delibird]

Oh okay so like A + B always = C but (for example) D + E would always = F?


If so then you basically just chop off the parts I spoke about involving variables. You would need to basically just check if A and B where selected and then remove A and B and add C. You could do this by having a variable for each character (A, B, C ect) OR by having one variable. It is up to you. The double variable option is the cleanest but you need to have really good documentation in like a txt file to make sure you keep track. The variable for each character method is easier to keep track of but uses up more variables and requires far more work to setup.


If you are doing the double variable method what you need to do is write/type down somewhere what each number other than 0 would be in terms of each individual character. You only need one list but you will use the same list for both variables. Variable A will be the first character chosen. Variable B will be the second character chosen. Then all you need to do is add both numbers. Now you also need a second list. This second list will determine what character you will get from a number combination.


So let's say Var A is Tom and Tom is number 12 on your first list. Var B is Jerry and Jerry is number 8 on your first list. Let's say you want the combination of Tom and Jerry to = Tom&Jerry. This would mean that the character Tom&Jerry would be the number 20 on your second list.


You would need to do what I did above for EVERY character combination so this will be tedious. The other method is 10x more tedious but if you want me to explain it I will. Also Yanfly has a plugin for MV called "Common Event Menu" that would make such a system look better but it is not needed for the system to function.


If you have anymore questions feel free to ask.

 

[Harosata]

Let's just go over ways to get new characters:


We have ones from the story, ones you simply ask like in the Saga games (some with requirements), you can recruit via Disgaea or have a Gatcha to give you a random hero, and you can capture them like Pokemon.  We also seem to be thinking about Fusion to change two characters into one, evolution to change one Pokemon into another, summoning to add or replace the party.


---


Okay now you got me thinking about a necromancer dancing to summon and improve dead heroes...and now I am thinking that you could recruit people by serenading all of them with a mariachi band.

 

[ovan66]

Oh okay so like A + B always = C but (for example) D + E would always = F? ...

Welp, first of all sorry for the late reply, for now i just know how to display character names in a list, from there i dont know how to keep going...this variables are giving me a headache, it would be much to ask for a basic example of what to insert in the event? A screenshot or something like that would do, if it is too much (and im certain it is) please feel free to leaving me to my luck xD , im such a hassle...i'll try a liitle more anyways and see what i can do, thank you very much for the help.