Bestiary (Or Worstiary)?

[Iron_Brew]

So I've been toying with some designs for Bestiaries for RPGs (using MrT's Monster Book to prototype - go check it out, it's incredible) and I was wondering what everyone's thoughts are on Bestiaries as a feature:



Some notably good Bestiaries I can think of (that have actual mechanical function) are in the Paper Mario series, but in that series you also had to use a skill - "Tattle" (see Scan, Libra, Magic Lens) - to unlock their Bestiary entry and view their health bars etc.

That never sat right with me as it meant that I always had to use the party member with Tattle any time I went to a new area or encountered a boss, lest I lose that entry forever and end up with an incomplete save at the end of the game.

So, I figured - why not have a poll and a discussion around what kinds of bestiaries you like, and what you use them for. Right now, in my mockups I'm mostly using them as a pun-delivery system (called the Blokédex) to give the player a place to track their stats (but not weaknesses), drops, attacks and hilarious japes. Thing is, I can't decide if filling out the Blokédex should yield some kind of completionist reward, or if that's frustrating.

So, that's the thread.

I'd love to hear what you guys think!

 

[TeiRaven]

I am ALL in favor of extra pun delivery systems, I had to take a minute before I stopped laughing at the thread title long enough to actually read the poll XD

My gripe with bestiaries is usually similar to yours. Scan-type skills bother me because I have to give up one of my character's turns, and I will DEFINITELY forget to use it on a boss or other difficult-to-find enemy and wind up with "???" in my book, which will haunt my completionist dreams. If enemies are added automatically upon first victory, I'm all for it! Or if there's an alternate way to fill in unique entries that you missed, maybe some type of research quest.

The other thing that would drive me crazy is if there's any kind of RNG or particularly fussy process involved in finding all the enemies. If I have to fight 195737 little spiders while it's raining between 3 and 4 o'clock on a Tuesday with a full moon before the Big Spooky Spider will come out, that's irritating. But if it's something more like "take the well-hidden path in the cave and fight your way through a gauntlet of little spiders to find the Big Spooky Spider," that's much more reasonable. Or if I have to do two dozen random encounters in the snowy area before the RNG gives me a snow wolf, vs. just being able to see on the map "oh that looks like a wolf up on that cliff, how do I get up there?"

As long as the process for collecting the enemies is reasonable and not something you can accidentally lock yourself out of permanently, I think giving a reward for completing it is a nice touch! (Though let's be real, here, your puns are their own reward.)

I don't really use bestiaries for their intended purpose (knowing what to expect out of enemies, stats and drops and things) but I do love getting a little bit of extra lore. Especially when it comes with puns.

 

[Jragyn]

I perceive the bestiary (as depicted in your screenshot) as a means of delivery for number crunchers or treasure hunters. I found myself not really looking at them unless the game has made it valuable for me to look there (like taking advantages of weaknesses ala SMT, hunting for mats ala most crafting-centric games). The more detail the better. If you're going to make it, show everything.

On a partially related note, I've rather found that I've enjoyed reading through more comprehensive "journals", that often have bestiaries embedded in them, but also lots of other more interesting data (lore/encyclopedia/quests/etc). Such as ones you find in the trails of cold steel, bravely default, star ocean 4/5, etc.

 

[sunnyFVA]

I'm not the type of player that especially cares to fill them out, but my instinct is that it should not come with external motivation. The player that cares to see all the fields filled in will likely see it as its own reward. Adding an external prize on top of it seems like it would just be an annoyance for those who don't find it innately satisfying. Maybe something like changing the bestiary menu icon to a flashier version upon completion would be the best of both worlds?

FFX's monster arena has elements I'd variably praise and object to. It involves using special weapons to defeat monsters in order to capture them. There's more to the whole system, but relevant to this: capturing all members of a species or area group unlocks a special boss fight that can be repeated for good rewards.

The idea of special fights unlocked by seeing all members of a category sounds just fine to me, even with the mechanical rewards. But, having to backtrack and defeat them all in a particular fashion undoes my enjoyment. So, I think it really does come down to what the player has to do in order to contribute to the bestiary's completion.

The Paper Mario bestiaries really are great to look to for inspiration as far as what makes them worth reading. That style of comedy is definitely shining in your screenshot, and I think many would agree that pages and pages of what you've shown there would be well worth seeking out. Special acknowledgements to CthUwU and CthOwO.

edit: Echoing @Jragyn : If there are things I need to know about the enemies, make sure I'm able to know it somewhere handy. Not exactly related to completionism, but definitely key.

 

[RCXGaming]

So I've been toying with some designs for Bestiaries for RPGs (using MrT's Monster Book to prototype - go check it out, it's incredible) and I was wondering what everyone's thoughts are on Bestiaries as a feature:

View attachment 228133

Some notably good Bestiaries I can think of (that have actual mechanical function) are in the Paper Mario series, but in that series you also had to use a skill - "Tattle" (see Scan, Libra, Magic Lens) - to unlock their Bestiary entry and view their health bars etc.

That never sat right with me as it meant that I always had to use the party member with Tattle any time I went to a new area or encountered a boss, lest I lose that entry forever and end up with an incomplete save at the end of the game.

So, I figured - why not have a poll and a discussion around what kinds of bestiaries you like, and what you use them for. Right now, in my mockups I'm mostly using them as a pun-delivery system (called the Blokédex) to give the player a place to track their stats (but not weaknesses), drops, attacks and hilarious japes. Thing is, I can't decide if filling out the Blokédex should yield some kind of completionist reward, or if that's frustrating.

So, that's the thread.

I'd love to hear what you guys think!

I know I already commented my thoughts on your profile but here's a better stage for it (and I'm also not limited by a word count):

I love bestiaries with all of my heart, even if they're just boring "lists only the stats" ones like you'd see in Final Fantasy and the like.

It's a good way to see all of the enemies you've encountered across your journey without needing to re-fight them again, as well as keep track of drops & the like if you feel the need for that.

Re: The scan thing. I already have it so they're instant cast, so you don't use up a turn scanning enemies for information, and have plans to have it be a skill you can learn via. putting little materia stones onto your equipment so it doesn't take up vital accessory slots. So no matter who you bring in, you should always be able to have this function without it impacting your battle capacity.

Me, on the other hand, my favorite flavor of Bestiary has to be one that keeps track of everything by section.

Example from me:

I have things split up in the following categories -
* Celestial
* Undead
* Humanoid (people-shaped people)
* Construct (robots & golems)
* Nature (everything that can be classified as a beast, aquatic creature, fairy, etc.)
* Rare Enemies
* Bosses

Complete with individual enemies having their species listed, since that's kind of a big deal in regards to both the lore & gameplay. (Gameplay in the sense that there's specific skills that do more damage against certain enemies)

Certain enemies have cards that, if you buy them or pick them up, you can get their information without needing to fight them.

@TeiRaven made a good point about enemies that are annoying to find -- I'm not really a fan of secret hunting like that anymore, so if I have enemies that are more hidden than normal it usually doesn't take long to find them or aren't that cryptic.

Defeating an enemy should always be more than enough to register them in the bestiary, to be honest. If you don't do this, you're either making a Pokemon fangame or you are a stickler for this particular outdated design method.

 

[kirbwarrior]

• A completionist's dream
• A horrible nightmare

Yeah, I feel both of these are accurate. Just seeing a monster should be enough to add it to the bestiary* (I also feel the same for blue magic!). To further expand on "horrible nightmare", just look at Pokedex completion in Pokemon games; Legendary pokemon continue to be rng-fests on if you're allowed to catch them and mythical pokemon don't even show up in the game.

*I thought you were making a pun by calling it "best" instead of "beast" but no, I was wrong about the spelling.

I'm mostly using them as a pun-delivery system

A definite reason for me to complete it.

 

[NamEtag]

Things I want Bestiaries to have:

• Rare Loot that I potentially did not get
• Resistances that I can look up whenever I forget
• 3D view if it's an action game where I would need a debug mode to look at them carefully
• A short description of enemy AI that can be compared to other entries
• Where to encounter the enemy
• Condition for special mechanics(taming, conditional loot, blue magic, etc.)
• Stat conversion for other game modes(racing, fishing, etc.)
• A method to auto-fill entries if I have progressed far past that enemy(Buying information, auto-fill for bosses, etc.)

Notably, I don't need specific stat numbers. It's kinda rare, at most you do one of those stat hexagon things for ratios and that's more than enough.

Things I do not want Bestiaries to have:

• Action cost to simply view the information
• Action cost to auto-fill information. It isn't fun in any game with savescumming, it only serves to add tedium for completionists.
• A marker for showing if you actually did X to the enemy. That defeats the purpose of auto-fill.
• Special mechanics or events triggered by Bestiary knowledge. Honestly? It just feels like adding too much workload for not a lot of payoff.

I have not been impressed by jobs and builds dedicated to filling and using Bestiaries. From the very design concept, they don't look fun.

 

[gstv87]

I hated the bestiary concept since Pokemon, especially when it's never stated that some Pokemon are impossible to get in a given version unless you traded for them with another person with another version.

the only good use of a bestiary would be the series version of the pokedex, from the same Pokemon: a device that gives you the information you ask for, based on what it knows.
and "what it knows" should be revealed as you acquire that information.
the knowledge that a given Pokemon can do X is of no use to you if you don't have that Pokemon, or the Pokemon you've encountered from that species have never done X in your presence.

it should work as an automated note-taking device rather than an omniscient readout, updating as you go instead of being all-knowing in advance.

 

[Iron_Brew]

I hated the bestiary concept since Pokemon, especially when it's never stated that some Pokemon are impossible to get in a given version unless you traded for them with another person with another version.

the only good use of a bestiary would be the series version of the pokedex, from the same Pokemon: a device that gives you the information you ask for, based on what it knows.
and "what it knows" should be revealed as you acquire that information.
the knowledge that a given Pokemon can do X is of no use to you if you don't have that Pokemon, or the Pokemon you've encountered from that species have never done X in your presence.

it should work as an automated note-taking device rather than an omniscient readout, updating as you go instead of being all-knowing in advance.

To be fair, that's how MrT's monster book works. It doesn't even tell you what drops monsters have until they've dropped it, and keeps track of that stuff for you once it's happened so you can quickly review.

I actively really like it as plugins go, and am adapting it suuuuper heavily in the backend for prototyping purposes.

In general too this thread is incredibly useful, and it's great to hear everyone's thoughts in such detail, so thank you all for engaging! I'd love to hear more

 

[kirbwarrior]

Things I've seen very few bestiaries do that I love;

• Let you fight the monster from the bestiary. This was something I really liked about FFX, but it did it fairly poorly (it's pretty late in the game and out of the way).
• Add creatures to the bestiary without fighting them. You might read about them in a book, someone might show you their cool "cat", you might talk to one that doesn't fight (such as how often there's a Slime in DQ that doesn't want to fight), etc.
• Let you 'purchase' drops from the 'monster'. One game had this for the Beastmaster, another for the Witch (who would 'concoct' it). This made it so rare drops could be a nice upside (getting an awesome item for free) instead of a downside (hoping rng would let you have something in the game).
• Show you how many times you've killed a monster in a game where you can kill off that monster from ever showing up again.

 

[Ahuramazda]

The bestiary setup I'm using shows info based on the number of enemies of that type killed. If it is a normal enemy you will get all the info shown for their entry by the time you kill 20, if it is a rare encounter you will get them all after 5 kills, and if it is a boss you get it after beating them once.

Unmasking order for hidden info:
(Normal/Rare/Boss Kills)
4/1/1: HP, MP, EXP, Item4
8/2/1: ATK, DEF, GOLD, Item1
12/3/1: MAT, MDF, Elestone, Item2
16/4/1: AGI, LUK, Item3, Item 5/6
20/5/1: Item 7/8, Item 9/10, Item 11/12, Item 13/14

The info for Item4 is still technically hidden for the first part of the game, as you need a specific item that will allow you to "extract" those drops from enemies, but I wanted you to be able to see that info even for rare kills early on, so I decided to make it one of the 1st tier unlocks.

The info shown will also eventually give a enemy Capture counter "X of 10" where I have added in a monster breeding/fighting arena like FF10 had into the game.

And I have a pretty large lore/description box for each enemy that is roughly 980 characters for each, so I can fill each page with sometimes useful, sometimes funny misc info for every entry.

 

[EidolonDreams]

I love bestiaries as long as there isn't any RNG related to capturing the info. I'm perfectly fine with "Kill this monster and the info is automatically filled."

I like the old Libra system where it only happens if you scan an enemy, but in the long run I think this is just unnecessary. I'd much rather just be able to read info about what I've slain.

What I really want to see is:

• Resistances and weaknesses
• Dropped/stolen items
• Location(s) they are at
• Recruitable/tameable?
• Awesome flavor text!

Anything beyond that, like stats and times killed, is mostly just bonus. Unless it is tied to another game mechanic, then it gets bumped up to "necessary info."

 

[kirbwarrior]

I like the old Libra system where it only happens if you scan an enemy

What I really like is when Libra lets you see the bestiary info right now. Sure, older games only showed HP and maybe weaknesses (it wasn't easy to implement a lot), but nowadays we can set up the full bestiary and then just show the page as part of the skill. This is especially useful for bosses where the info is rarely useful post-battle (such as knowing if they have something to steal or even, as you said, if they can be recruited/tamed!).

I also like the idea I've heard elsewhere where Libra is a very useful ability with an MP or other resource cost but not a turn cost.

Oh, the other bestiary thing I've seen in some game; An item that opens the bestiary up to the page of what enemies are in this area and lets you summon an encounter that has the enemy of your choice, including spots you haven't seen yet. I personally would make that a skill (like Whistle from DQ), but either works. This is mostly to make it so encounters can be random and even rare, but you aren't punished for not running into it.

 

[Tai_MT]

Is it bad that I've never cared about a Bestiary in a game? Short of the game having an achievement for "fill the Bestiary", I don't typically bother with them. I don't really open them. The stats and skills are too "obtuse" for them to impact my gameplay experience.

The closest I think I've come to needing to use one and enjoying is in one of the Pokemon games that was like, "Hey, this is what's in this route" so I knew I still had to grind out encounters to get what was left. But, it was too obtuse to use very effectively. Namely, you'd get a shadow... SOMETIMES... but you wouldn't know it's in the route unless you'd actually seen it somewhere else before.

I mean, in that system in Pokemon, I was only using the "percentage" at the top. I wasn't using to see what was left. I was going, "okay, caught two, I've got 50% of the mons on this route, two left to go" and that's it.

But, I tend to play games a bit differently. How much HP does the enemy have? I don't care. If I kill it in 2 hits, that's all I need to know. How much attack power does the enemy have? Doesn't matter at all. What skills? I don't really care what it's got. All shall fall before my sword! All shall cry before my enormous defense!

Anyway, yeah. I've never really cared about the Bestiary in games. Never found a use for it.

 

[Silenity]

I'm a fan of bestiaries. I really liked the one from Battle Chasers: Nightwar.

Similar to how Ahura described it above.

Each enemy has their own bestiary entry and it progressively fills out as you defeat more of the same enemy. After x amount of enemies have been defeated, you're given a reward in the form of passive stat boosts. Usually indicative of the enemy type.

eg. Defeating 100 Rogue Bandits increases your Attack and Stamina by 1% whereas defeating 100 Mages increases your Magick and Mana by 1%. Or defeating 100 Wolves increases all damage dealt to Wolf enemy types by 10%. etc etc.

So it serves as both a collection/achievement tool, has optional rewards that are a nice bonus for those who are completionists but small enough to not be required.