Armors in RPG's

[Draw]

Hi !

I'd like to talk about armors in RPG's.

I was thinking about it, and it seems an essential stuff. About armors slots, we have in RM, by defaut : weapon, shield, helmet, armor and accesory. Is it enough ? Or too much ? Is this useful to make only a weapon and an accesory like some FF ? Or to make more slots (helmet, necklace, shoulders, gloves, boots, etc.) like some MMO games ?

A second point is : which caracter can wear which armor type ? For exemple, if we have cloth, medium and heavy armors, a magician could wear only cloth, or all armor types ? Maybe differents types could have bonuses as reduce spell costs for cloth, like in Elder Scroll... ?

What do you think about it ?

What's the most interesting for the player ?

 

[Matseb2611]

I think as most people would say - it depends on the game.

I think if your game is more oriented to be a dungeon crawler with a lot of dungeons, enemies, and tonnes of loot, then having lots of equipment slots would be a good idea, because it lets the player have a very varied customization.

On the other hand, in a more story-driven game or a game where combat isn't such a huge part of the gameplay, fewer slots would work better.

I am not a fan of having individual armour types for different character classes. Firstly because it's restricting on what each character can wear, and leaves no room for customization. Second because it can get confusing, especially if you have a lot of classes, each one with its own armour preferences. Thirdly because it can make some armours you find obsolete. For example, if only one character in the game can wear heavy armour, and you found two nice pieces, you know you can only use one of them, and the other becomes useless and collects dust. And fourthly because I think realistically people should be able to wear whatever they want, and instead of restricting them, you could have that each armour has penalties. For example, a heavy armour could give lots of defence, but might reduce agility due to being so big and clunky, so characters that rely on agility wouldn't want to wear that kind of armour.

That's my personal opinion on this at least.

 

[Milennin]

My preference leans towards less armour slots, rather than more. Sitting in the equipment menu and scrolling through a bunch of stuff, deciding on what would be best to put on my characters isn't exactly my favourite pastime when playing RPGs, I'd rather be walking on the overworld or fighting battles.

 

[Wavelength]

It's heavily situational on the type of game you're making, the length of the game, and especially on how creative you are when actually designing your equipment.  For an "average" game I feel like one weapon, one "armor", and one to two accessories (which provide special effects beyond stats) is a good setup.

Whether to restrict armors to certain characters/classes or let everyone use everything is completely a matter of how much do you as the designer want to strictly define what each character is good at in battle.  I've made games where I want to do this, and I've made other games where I'd rather leave it up to the player.

 

[stupid enough to like FF13]

For the current project, I had a simple thought:

"Balancing three different types of armour is going to be annoying..."

So instead I removed headgear as explicitly a type of armour, leaving shields and body armour as the primary "armour" slots. And then I gave everyone three accessory slots (head, body, hands). And then I decided the two heavy-armour users will have helmets they can equip as head accessories for a straight Defense boost, so that's my logic for ya.

I do like having distinct armour types and having each character not be able to equip all items. (In the current project, there are seven party members and ten armour classes. One guy is even balanced in a way by being so hardcore, heavy armour is the only kind of armour he'll equip.) It doesn't have to be played straight with the "heavy armour warrior, skimpy robe mage" thing. You can have magicians in heavy armour or fighters that can only use light armour.

 

[Mouser]

How much of the players focus do you want to be on gear?

In an MMO, the gear treadmill is pretty front and center, so lots of gear slots and incremental upgrades make sense. Other games go with far fewer pieces and fewer upgrades (Xenosaga 2 eliminated gear altogether, though they brought it back for part 3).

What classes can use which armor depends on how many classes you have, how distinct you want them to be, and how much you care about "balance".

You can even debate what armor should do: In my games armor increases the chance of you not taking damage (ie: a 'miss') rather than reducing the amount of damage you take when you're hit. You could have armor reduce damage while shields grant a chance to block. You could wrap them all up in a 'defense' stat that reduces all physical damage.

This is just one piece of the puzzle that hopefully all fits together and makes your game a little different than all the others out there, while still familiar enough for players to enjoy it without feeling totally lost.

 

[ArcaneEli]

Mages can wear = light armor + mage armor

normal ppl can wear = light + heavy armor + mage

soldiers can wear = heavy + light

In my game though everyone can wear all armors and they do different stuff

Mage hat = less def, more mdf

Mage Armor = less def, more mp

mage shield = mag evasion, magic

Light Hat = ok defense, agility

light armor = ok defense, no agility penalties

light shield = ok defense, evasion

heavy hat =  best defense, lowers hit%

heavy armor = best defense, lowers agility

heavy shield = best defense, lowers evasion, more hp

so they can mix and match this stuff

 

[SinのAria]

For me, I am in the boat of not limiting. I do have 'male' and 'female' exclusive armor though. (Mainly because the characters themselves wouldn't wear the opposite). That isn't to say there are exceptions to that, but essentially, if the character wouldn't wear them, they can't.  On the other hand, if the character doesn't care? They can wear whatever.

Like a prince wouldn't wear princess clothing simply because they need to dress up in a manner that suits a prince. So they are restricted to prince type clothing.

On the other hand, if the prince was sneaking into a place in disguise, he could wear princess clothing.

Like for me, mages can wear whatever they want. Your spell costs/strengths will be affected accordingly though.

Like heavy armor (metal), you might not want to use lightning magic, fire magic might not be the best idea, water... try to avoid that. Expect a heavy penalty for cast speed and costs.

Cloth armor? Avoid that fire magic. Seriously.

Light armor (leather)?, you should be able to get away with essentially any spell, but be prepared for the cast speed penalty.

For melee, they can wear whatever they want, just...

Heavy armor? Expect penalties for rolling and speed, but very strong defense.

Light armor? Fairly normal all around.

Cloth? Expect a speed boost, but do be warned that skills that can push you around might be more effective.

For ranged? They can also wear whatever, but...

Heavy Armor? Expect some penalties to your ranged damage.

Light? Normal.

Cloth? Normal, but don't be surprised to get an accuracy penalty during high winds.

 

[Hoppy]

I do a little experimentation, I have 2 characters that can use dual shields (one with massive defense and magic defense for covering allies and next to no speed and another with very light shields for a speed-defensive hybrid type).

 

[Razoir]

[SIZE=14.666666666666666px]Using only one or two equipment slots, when well designed can also deeply increase strategical thinking when preparing characters ( it isn’t “equip your best armor” anymore ). You can observe that phenomenon in Pokemon were the holded item is a tremendously important part of the competitive scene.[/SIZE]

 

[Sysen]

Default Armor System works the best for me

Each character can only use armor that's made for them

That way, it adds more story to the character (can be seen from item description)

or having side quest to get the character's strongest armor

and the joy finding the treasure chest that's containing the armor of my favourite or strongest character on the unit

i kinda dislike the game that's using free for all armor... usually it ended up all character using same armor because it's "the best compared from the rest"

 

[Zoltor]

In my game, I have more equipment slots(since equipment its self is where a lot of the skills come from)

Every character is going to have a weapon slot

A Shield/a suitable piece of equipment equal to such

a armor slot

a cloak slot

and 3 accessory slots(every char is going to have a Jewel slot, and a ring slot. For the 3rd slot, each character is going to have a unique accessory slot, for special accessories types only usable by a specific character).

 

[Razoir]

i kinda dislike the game that's using free for all armor... usually it ended up all character using same armor because it's "the best compared from the rest"

Well i actually totally agree with you on that point, to me, the interesting thing about letting any character use any equipment piece is that it allows far more liberty for the player to customize his characters. Your Mage is too squishy ? Give him a heavy armor that'll rise his defense. Though you'll have to be ready to sacrifice attack speed ( and perhaps skill damage ? ). Believe your Paladin already has far enough natural HP and defense ? Give him lighter clothes to cope with his speed shortage.

What's fun for the player here is that what usually doesn't ask for any kind of thinking ( I replaced my +40Def armor with a +60Def armor, next time i'll buy the fancy +90Def armor ) suddenly becomes a strategical decision. ( Do i want to empathize this character's strengths and buy this +90Def -30Spd armor, is it better to cope with his weaknesses and buy this +20Def +30Spd cape or shouldn't i take any definite direction and buy this +50Def Light Armor ? )

 

[SinのAria]

Yes, I agree that it is easy for 'free for all' armor to become very much so a 'everyone wears the same gear' type situation.  The hard part is really setting it up so that everyone CAN wear every armor (except maybe a select few), but where you might want to wear different armors depending on the situation and playstyle.

Do I focus on extra speed so I can get an extra turn? (Some games give you an extra turn if you have enough speed).

Do I focus on armor piercing so that each turn is more valuable?

Do I focus on heavy defense so that I can last longer?

Do I focus on Regenerative or special statuses for a different style of gameplay?

Do I go for the armor that gives me great stats all around and is essentially the best armor in the game, but in exchange drains my hp and mp and tp each turn as well as making me weak to poison/bleed/slow/etc.?

If you can balance all that and more while making armor available for all classes...

 

[KawaiiKid]

I think it really depends on what your game focuses on.

If fighting is fun in your game, then having more armor would be more incentive to fight more battles.

If it's more story driven, I think that having too much armor would just be tedious to make.

 

[M.I.A.]

I just responded in another thread about skills/levels..

In my current/favorite project, the equipment slots aren't for equipment (armor, robe, relics), rather I use all the Equipment slots (other than Weapon) for Actors to customize their signature skill.

For example:

Weapon:

Targeting:

Damage:

Element:

State:

So if Anise's signature skill was "Flare" and she equiped

Weapon: Staff

Targeting: 1Foe 2x

Damage: 20% Boost

Element: Frostbite

State: Ka-POW

Then she would be equiped with her staff.. and her Signature skill would be

Flare - That Targets 1 foe and hits twice, with a 20% DMG boost to it's base DMG, and changed to add Ice DMG, with a chance to stun that foe.

I believe traditional Equip Scene's are obsolete. All the defense and resistances can be handled via Class/Actor scenes and balanced DMG formula.

 

[Omnimental]

What the setting of your game is matters a lot as well. For instance, in my current project, it's a modern urban fantasy setting. So the actors wearing armour doesn't actually make much sense. So I've removed the default armour options and went entirely with accessories.

 

[gstv87]

-> focus on specific bonuses that you don't want to share between classes. <-

call it light and heavy armor, call it "officer uniform" or "recruit shirt", call it "exosuit" or "bioshield".... it really doesn't matter.

bonuses.

present and absent bonuses, and actions and inabilities.

it all works down to that.

everything else, is just artwork.

 

[Siddiq]

It would depend on the the game mechanics I guess, but I just went for a classic rpg-esque equipment slots:

So simlply in order: Head, Body, Weapon, Off Hand, Hands, Neck, Ring, Ring, Asccessory, Accessory and Feet. It can also vary by the characters class, for example, there is no need to say, give a mage like class an off-hand equipment slot as they generally can't/don't use shields and the like. It keeps things simple, and allows customisation of miscellaneous items with bonuses, given you have five slots to customize with items like necklaces, rings, charms, etc, to add more to the customization aspect of things.

As for armour types, I'm not worrying about that at all really, and as a preference, I don't like being restricted to one armour type. In my own game, there is only three types, General, Magical and Heavy. Pretty much any character can use any armour type, because in reality, there really is nothing stopping a mage from wearing heavy, bulky armour, but considering there are three types, they come with their ups and downs. For example, Magical Type armour would not have as much defense as say, Heavy or General, but as an added incentive they usually increase the wearers Magical ATK and DEF, and sometimes give bonuses to Luck or better defense against a specific element. General would be not as strong as Heavy, but as an added bonus, may add extra agility to the character, or increase their HIT or EVA capabilities. Finally, Heavy is heavy, that goes without saying, but provides the most protection, a fair bit more then both General or Magical. But as a downside, it generally lowers your EVA, HIT and your agility. Combine this with an ATB system, and what it allows is the player to decide based on their class what they want them to be equipped with, and given they have five to four primary armour slots, they can mix and match the three types to their liking.

For example, for a mage character, they would use a mix between General and Magical, or just Magical. For a class which they want to attack quickly, they may switch all out to General Armour. Or say, if the had a tank like party member, give them all heavy armour and have them act as a shield for the rest, a character like this might have an ability like taunt or something, focusing the attacks on them. By mixing and matching, you can get  variety of effects. Personally, I like it when Armour is done this way, hence it's how I am dealing with it in my game.

 

[KoldBlood]

As others have said before me, it is highly dependent upon the type of game you are making and mood/experience you are trying to achieve.

Personally, I love equipping my characters with different gear loadouts and trying to find awesome combinations of gear so not surprisingly in my game I went with several equip slots with some reasonable customization choices (though nothing too complex). I have a Weapon, (a WIP magical bracelet), Armor (body), Head, Hands, Feet, Utility (off hand), and 3 Accessory slots. Each character class can only equip certain equipment types but there is some slight overlap between two of the characters.

There's nothing too special going on, except for my 3 Accessory Slot layout which I feel is something worth mentioning. We all know what the Accessory slot items do but as an added twist in my game I've increased the slots to three and took the Elemental Resist, State Resist and Stat Increase charms and split their power creating an system where you can get extreme protection against a single element, split it evenly among three of them. Go heavy on one, light on another, stack attack or defense rings for increased stats, completely resist a single state or moderately resist three. The combinations are just about endless and end up creating a pretty cool trade off system where the player has to actively think about what they want to achieve with their accessory layout. Plus, it rewards strategic players who pay attention to the enemies/characters and equip themselves properly for any given situation. Probably not the first one the do something like this but it has been a fun system to play with during my play tests.