Class idea: Adept

[Milennin]

Something I've been toying with in a test project was the idea of a unique class whose gimmick is that they get a randomised skill set at the start of every turn, based on the current combat situation. This means that their turn-to-turn skill set is quite small, but since their skills are picked from a large pool of possible different abilities, you are assured to have a different set each new turn.

Quick, simple examples:

Random encounter starts with party in good state:
-Adept gains powerful damage abilities.

Encounter with the party at low health:
-Adept gains healing and utility abilities.

Boss battle with unique mechanics:
-Adept gains abilities that may help deal with the boss's mechanic.

Pros:
+Usually has a good answer for the situation at hand.
+Feels different to play in every encounter.

Cons:
-Can't rely on having a specific skill or effect at the right moment.
-Smaller selection of skills to choose from per turn than a regular character.

To enhance the class's viability, some smart randomising is required, such as to avoid getting two skills that are too similar to each other. Like, if one AoE damage ability has been picked, the other skill(s) will not be AoE damage, unless they have vastly different secondary effects to them. If there is one straight heal skill picked, the other ability would be a regen or a defensive skill, or add in a damage skill to offer the choice between going offensive or defensive for the turn.
Of course, it also helps to have a good variety of checks to see which skills are most required at the moment, which gets more difficult when it needs to check on both the enemy and the state of the party.

Thoughts? Opinions? Would you pick this class in like an RPG that lets you build your party from a selection of different classes?

 

[NinjaKittyProductions]

I would definitely pick this class. I am always drawn towards classes that have variety/jack of all trades/versatility over classes that are single focused. The idea screams Wild Mage so much. The only thought/opinion I have is to do it. Everything you described just sounds amazing for a class. In my opinion, this would make each fight/encounter one that is always a surprise and one where you will need to plan a strategy on the fly.

 

[Wavelength]

It sounds pretty fun - especially if you were to expand it into an entire battle system (or even better yet, a customizable system like Slay the Spire's deckbuilding)!

One issue is that if the difficulty of your game mostly comes from highly Acute sources - particularly bosses that can spike your party from 100 to 0 in one or two turns - this class would become pretty inappropriate for those tough battles. The value of a "semi-random" class like this is that over time the player would be able to make gains (over and above what a "reliable" class would provide) that outweigh the turns where you get a bit screwed. In a highly Acute challenge structure, however, "over time" doesn't matter - the boss only needs to outdamage your party's resistance for a turn or two and it's all over.

Also, not sure whether this was a typo or intentional design, but you are re-randomizing the skills every turn, while biasing the skill randomization based on the party's initial state upon entering battle (encounter starts with party at low health, encounter starts with party in good state, etc.). That doesn't make a lot of sense to me. There's probably more value in changing the bias before the randomization every single turn.

 

[Milennin]

Also, not sure whether this was a typo or intentional design, but you are re-randomizing the skills every turn, while biasing the skill randomization based on the party's initial state upon entering battle (encounter starts with party at low health, encounter starts with party in good state, etc.). That doesn't make a lot of sense to me. There's probably more value in changing the bias before the randomization every single turn.

Oh, I see I did leave out a lot of details there and it came out unclear. What it meant there was that their turn 1 skill set is determined by the party's initial state upon engaging an encounter. At the end of each turn, their skill set gets wiped and they get a new set distributed based on the then current factors in play. They adapt to the situation on each turn with a newly drawn skill set.

 

[Aesica]

I dunno actually. It kind of sounds like this class can do almost everything, but in a tunnel-visiony, choice-restricted kind of way: "My party needs healing, so I can only 'see' my healing skills." It'd probably be really good for beginners because the mechanics would hold their hand, but an advanced player might want to, say, use the class's powerful magic attack and have someone else chuck a potion or use a healing spell. If that class's mechanics are in "party is low, you need healing" mode, they won't have that kind of interesting choice to make.

 

[JosephSeraph]

TBH I absolutely adore this. It really depends on how you pull it off, but it screams Akitoshi Kawazu / SaGa, and I LIVE for it. Looking forward to see what you pull off!

I have actually had some similar ideas myself, such as a "pray" skill that provides random effects, biased towards current party conditions. Or a Guardian Spirit Accessory that has a random chance to show up every turn and perform one skill out of a list of skills, based on what it decides is best considering the battle's current condition. But it being in a class itself,is actually way more fun!

Actually actually, having it be an accessory that shuffles between active skills that you can use every turn has the potential to add that versatility to any class, although that would require you to be wary of the item's balancing. But yeah damn i love it wig flew

 

[Milennin]

I dunno actually. It kind of sounds like this class can do almost everything, but in a tunnel-visiony, choice-restricted kind of way: "My party needs healing, so I can only 'see' my healing skills." It'd probably be really good for beginners because the mechanics would hold their hand, but an advanced player might want to, say, use the class's powerful magic attack and have someone else chuck a potion or use a healing spell. If that class's mechanics are in "party is low, you need healing" mode, they won't have that kind of interesting choice to make.

I see what you mean, but I think that can be easily solved by both controlled randomisation and having a pool of interesting skills to get skills from, to ensure a good variety for each new skill set. Yeah, it could recognise the party at low HP, so you get a healing skill. But then for your second skill, you could get a skill that, like, deals bonus damage based on the percentage of user's missing HP. Or an AoE damage skill with a delayed party heal that goes off on the next turn. Set up the system so you don't get just a set of very similar type of skills, but still something that plays in on the current situation.

 

[Aesica]

^ That's fair and could definitely be pretty fun, actually. I guess I just thought of the kind of skills I mostly see in games (generic heal, generic lightning spell, etc) but yeah, if you can implement it well with the kind of skills you mentioned, it'd probably be pretty neat. Honestly I thought about doing something similar, although based on terrain rather than battle state and not randomized. I say try it out and see if it feels fun to play.

 

[kairi_key]

I agree that if you make each skills be very intricate and interesting on their own, this could work satisfyingly. And seeing how you designed the skills for RTP game of yours, I can trust that you will also make this work.

However, this is a class that you really need to think about or get a feel of it to actually know its worth. Like, if I get a choice to pick, I would shy away from this class for sure without any recommendation. If I'd read somewhere that can show how this class can have much potential, like this thread for example, I would consider trying the class out for sure. With that, I'm gonna vote "Maybe."

 

[Oddball]

I'm guessing your pulling this off by having an event in each troop were variables are affected and if a certain variable is a certain number, they will forget some skills and learn others? and it checks party members HP and if certain enemies appeared?

A more streamlined and more reliable version of this is maybe you have a list of like seven skills that would cycle using this method, another list of five and another list of three, and if the variables are certain numbers, certain skills would be learned and others forgot? That way you get different skill combinations each turn. I might steal this idea

 

[Milennin]

I'm guessing your pulling this off by having an event in each troop were variables are affected and if a certain variable is a certain number, they will forget some skills and learn others? and it checks party members HP and if certain enemies appeared?

Yeah, I make it a habit to include a common event linked to each turn in encounters that handles a bunch of things.

A more streamlined and more reliable version of this is maybe you have a list of like seven skills that would cycle using this method, another list of five and another list of three, and if the variables are certain numbers, certain skills would be learned and others forgot? That way you get different skill combinations each turn. I might steal this idea

I do like skill cycling as well. It can add so much more strategic decision making without increasing the number of options presented at any given time.

 

[kairi_key]

Revisiting this thread to say that.... I suddenly have a dawn of idea of using this Adept class. The idea is simply cosmetic/presentation. It's just that the class can also be used for a class like Card Duelist where the skill list are practically the cards the class drawn from his deck each turn.

Yep that's all, lol.

 

[Milennin]

Revisiting this thread to say that.... I suddenly have a dawn of idea of using this Adept class. The idea is simply cosmetic/presentation. It's just that the class can also be used for a class like Card Duelist where the skill list are practically the cards the class drawn from his deck each turn.

Yep that's all, lol.

If you have something like a deck-build system, it could function like that. It could give you control over the kind of skills you'd want to show up during battle, while still keeping the RNG factor.