Evolving Skill Idea

[Maliki79]

Hey Makers!

Was curious about an idea that has been floating around in my head the last few days.

I'm wondering if anyone has taken to make skills that can be edited in game, similar to Independent Items.

What I am envisioning is to have a base skill that does say 100 damage to a target.
Then, the player can change the skill by adding an element which would give the spell more power, higher mp cost, a different animation and more.

The player could then make changes like allowing more hits, scope changing, adding states, buffs etc.
I'd make it so the game could switch out skills, but the amount of changes I'd like to make would make that near impossible to pull off easily.

So again, just curious if something like this was done.

I don't think I would use this idea in my current project, but I have another one that it would be a great fit for.

Currently working in MV if the solution becomes a bit technical, which I imagine it would.

Thanks in advance.

 

[SGHarlekin]

Well I would assume you'd at least need every possible version of every skill in your Database, which would already be huge. And then I would probably get a plugin commissioned to handle the menu stuff and the actual learning and/or replacing of the skills.

I can't imagine eventing this kind of system. Surely possible, but the pure workload seems insane.

 

[RCXGaming]

Well I would assume you'd at least need every possible version of every skill in your Database, which would already be huge. And then I would probably get a plugin commissioned to handle the menu stuff and the actual learning and/or replacing of the skills.

I can't imagine eventing this kind of system. Surely possible, but the pure workload seems insane.

They could just make conditional calls with Action Sequences.

Example: I have an item called the Abyss Apple that gives you different levels of buffs depending on what your TP is at when you eat it.

TP 100 -> 200: 1 buff stack
TP 201 -> 300: 2 stacks
TP 301 -> 399: 3 stacks
TP 400: 4 stacks

And so on. If your TP is less than 100, the animation doesn't even play and nothing happens, but you also don't use up the apple.

It's pretty simple to reapply that logic so you can have attacks hit more times (just copy-paste Action Effect), change animation (Special Attack now uses Fire Sword animation instead of a regular one if you have X state on) and so on.

Scope changing seems a bit trickier cause I haven't played with that yet, but you can do pretty much anything.

 

[Puppet Knight]

Would this differ much from TAA Spiders Skill Mastery system?


You're essentially able to update the damage calc, Cost, Skill Requirements , and Scope per level.


I know they're also working on adding in Level Up effects where you can change the name of the Skill and even have a script run (allowing things like learning a new skill on level up)

Might be worth reaching out to @taaspider if you're on the same wavelength to collaborate


Also I am seeing that this is acting a lot more as a conditional modifier. But I could easily see that being integrated into the above program as well

 

[Maliki79]

Hi @Puppet Knight!
As far as I can tell, the issue with that Skill Mastery plugin is that it is too linear.
So what if the player wants the skill to hit 2 times instead of one and then want it to hit 4 random targets? What if they wanted to do those in reverse order?
The skill mastery probably has you dev make different level versions of the skill, which is something I'd like to design away from.

And while I do think a plugin would eventually be needed, I don't want to go there just yet.
(Not JUST yet...)

@RCXGaming, the Action Sequences would probably do it, but there would need to be a LOT that would have to go into each one.
To the point that a separate plugin would be a more optimal solution.

@SGHarlekin, eventing would be totally out of the question. There's just too much that you can't do with eventing here.

 

[Puppet Knight]

The skill mastery probably has you dev make different level versions of the skill, which is something I'd like to design away from.

*Raises pitch fork*

And while I do think a plugin would eventually be needed, I don't want to go there just yet.
(Not JUST yet...)

*puts down pitch fork* thats fair

 

[ATT_Turan]

@RCXGaming, the Action Sequences would probably do it, but there would need to be a LOT that would have to go into each one.
To the point that a separate plugin would be a more optimal solution.

Well...kinda depends on how you mean.

Action Sequences are a bit limited in how they can handle conditionals, but basically anything you'd put into a plugin could be put directly into the action sequence. Unless you have a lot of skills that would act the exact same way from getting a modifier, I can't immediately think of a large benefit to writing and integrating a new plugin instead of using the existing action sequences.

That's how I'd do it.

The rest of the stuff you describe with skill cost, scope, damage, can also be done fairly straightforwardly with Yanfly stuff (or even natively in the case of the damage formula).

As far as the actual game mechanics part of the question, I've played games that did stuff like this. It's cool.

 

[Oggy]

I actually use a system kind of like this. My players party has basic skills they have from leveling. They get augmented by the player via special stones that either add a state apply or increase damage, single target to are, and so on. It a neat way to give skill "upgrades" without adding tons of skills to scroll through.

 

[Puppet Knight]

I can attest for how cool Oggy's system is coming out too.

 

[Maliki79]

@ATT_Turan I may have to try to use Action Sequences just to see what I can get out of em.
(I planned on using them after my game was further along, but I might need to get it going sooner.)

@Oggy So how do you get your system working?
You use a plugin or what?

The way I see this would be the actors would have a set of Blank Spells that do a base damage that is either physical or magical. They could then tweak those skills using whatever limiting factor I would make available. (Think "Add a fire stone to make a fire spell", or "Add an MP stone to reduce the skill mp use by 25%") Each skill would only be able to use 3 stones or so at the start, maxing at maybe ten.

And each actor would have 3-4 of these Blank skills to work with with more added as the game progresses.

Or it could just be a special effect that one actor has that gets changed via a roulette wheel of something.

For now, I'd love an effective way to make skills that could change almost all of it's parameters mid-game.

 

[Oggy]

I use the VE Materia plugin to manage it. Each skill upgrade then has the new skill on with it and I use a hide if known tag to hide the original skill so it only shows the new version.

 

[Tai_MT]

I have the "evolution", but not really the way you describe it. It works more like the first reply. Old skill is replaced by the new skill with the new effects. But, the upgrade is "permanent" and doesn't work backwards.

 

[ATT_Turan]

To me, the tricky part of this is the interface for it.

Oggy's notion of using VE's Materia might be helpful; I find the notion of creating an interface window much more daunting than coding all the possibilities into action sequences

 

[Maliki79]

To me, the tricky part of this is the interface for it.

Oggy's notion of using VE's Materia might be helpful; I find the notion of creating an interface window much more daunting than coding all the possibilities into action sequences

For sure!

I hate coding UIs and other visual stuff... UHG...
I can see if the materia plugin will work. I kinda wanted it to be semi-permenant tho. Like you'd have to pay something to reset the skills to start over. Or that the system would be a first in, first out system.

@Tai_MT Yeah. I'd like it if you could take one skill and add an element to it, but then choose to add a state like burn, blind or poison or cut mp use or change target scope.

 

[Puppet Knight]

@Tai_MT Yeah. I'd like it if you could take one skill and add an element to it, but then choose to add a state like burn, blind or poison or cut mp use or change target scope.

I can see this working even without the Materia plugin or additional Windows needed.

My projects system has the party access skills from equipment and master the skills (no longer need the armor equipped) via skill use.

Healthy Combo of Battle Core and Fomars Equipment Skills (@ATT_Turan and @Oggy ) helped a bunch with the implementation.

Could similarly enough dedicate an equip slot (or 2) to Armor pieces that temporarily granted access to skills based on what Skill is already learned via a

a hide if known tag to hide the original skill

System.

1 slot for spell evolving
1 slot for modifications of spells (change damage, target scope, cost, add additional effects)

 

[Maliki79]

If it was just one actor changing only one skill, it would be easy to do with YF Skill Learning plugin. (And your method would likely work too, @Puppet Knight. The issue would be allowing a set of these skills and choosing one to apply those changes to.

And if each party member had say 2 of the same skill, how would you change one without affecting the others?

 

[Puppet Knight]

And if each party member had say 2 of the same skill, how would you change one without affecting the others?

Why would a party member have the same skill twice? Or better, How would they? Slightly lost me there

 

[Maliki79]

Why would a party member have the same skill twice? Or better, How would they? Slightly lost me there

That's kinda my point for this. Say no elemental skills are naturally available, but the player could evolve the base skill to become one. But most likely, the player would want more than one type of skill or element at a time.
So they would need to craft different spells.

And the word craft gave me another idea.

Maybe using independent items could substitute for spells. Then at least, I'd be able to push the copies.

Hmmm...

But feel free to ask if I'm not being clear.
You can't help me if I don't explain myself well.

 

[ATT_Turan]

That's kinda my point for this. Say no elemental skills are naturally available, but the player could evolve the base skill to become one. But most likely, the player would want more than one type of skill or element at a time.
So they would need to craft different spells.

If that's what you're going for, then I'm sure you know you'd have to go with different skill IDs. (whether they're predefined in your database or you come up with an independent item-style system for them)

It would be a silly amount of work otherwise, to do something like restructure the learned skill array of IDs with an array of objects that stored the base ID and all modifications to it and still make enough hooks into the relevant functions to preserve its functionality with any other plugins involved.

Not anything bad on you, but I didn't get any of that from your original post - it read just like you're modifying a single skill with a variety of options. I didn't get that you were thinking about a skill crafting system where you might be able to learn several different versions of one base spell.

I have also seen that implemented in games, and it's cool, but you're getting into stuff that's increasingly complex to implement in RPG Maker.

 

[Maliki79]

Yeah. I figured it would be tough to put together. Again, it's more of a thought experiment at this point. Might see what I can pull together down the line.
Thx for the input everyone.