Individual Inventories?

[Sword_of_Dusk]

I'm even trying to make it so that the player won't even need to place units on the map.

Eh... I'd honestly rather have the ability to place my units exactly where I want them as opposed to hoping the game gives me favorable starting positions.

And that's cool for you. To me, it's a way to force the player to spend resources (which is fine, that's what potions and inns and such are, too) which simultaneously screws you over if you don't engage in sufficient micromanagement.

Fair. Hilariously, I find myself doing far more micromanaging in regards to my actual moves and tactics than I do weaponry. I'd say I only ever sweat weapons every five or so chapters (not counting newly joined units). Except with healing staves. I do actually pay close attention to those at all times.

A normal turn-based RPG with individual inventories per character would honestly be pretty tedious, even if you did the Kingdom Hearts 2 thing where any consumables they use are automatically re-loaded with whatever's in stock. It's my one black mark with the Mother series despite everything else I like about them.

The only one I can think of is Dragon Quest, and once you have characters who can cast Heal, I find the inventories become a secondary thought. Thankfully.

 

[Frostorm]

Eh... I'd honestly rather have the ability to place my units exactly where I want them as opposed to hoping the game gives me favorable starting positions.

Unit placement is still up to the player. It's simply dictated by the player's (x,y) position on the map. The battle map and the exploration map are one and the same, so it makes sense that you're placed where you were standing. I think I have an old video showing what I mean:

 

[ATT_Turan]

Eh... I'd honestly rather have the ability to place my units exactly where I want them as opposed to hoping the game gives me favorable starting positions.

Ditto.

The only one I can think of is Dragon Quest, and once you have characters who can cast Heal, I find the inventories become a secondary thought.

Dragon Quest, all of the Suikoden games, Phantasy Star 3, all of the Infinity Engine games (Baldur's Gate, etc.). The latter are the worst because you not only need to worry about keeping each person stocked with any potions and ammo they need, you also have to adhere to their individual weight capacity.

 

[Frostorm]

Even the latest Baldur's Gate 3 (early access) still uses the same formula. But that's mostly because they are intentionally trying to adhere to the 5e ruleset. Yet despite that, it's still getting rave reviews, even tho it's still a WIP. I'm the kind of player that loots EVERYTHING, even the most mundane vendor trash items. Even w/ a full STR character, I find myself running out of inventory by the time I'm 1/4 or 1/3 of the way into a dungeon. That's across a full party of 4, btw. Then I have to go look at each item and toss out the least valuable and it just becomes a chore cuz I'm literally doing that after several steps (useless items are littered everywhere).

 

[Sword_of_Dusk]

Even the latest Baldur's Gate 3 (early access) still uses the same formula. But that's mostly because they are intentionally trying to adhere to the 5e ruleset. Yet despite that, it's still getting rave reviews, even tho it's still a WIP. I'm the kind of player that loots EVERYTHING, even the most mundane vendor trash items. Even w/ a full STR character, I find myself running out of inventory by the time I'm 1/4 or 1/3 of the way into a dungeon. That's across a full party of 4, btw. Then I have to go look at each item and toss out the least valuable and it just becomes a chore cuz I'm literally doing that after several steps (useless items are littered everywhere).

This is me when playing Fallout, except I don't pick up every little thing I see. I check the weight against the item value to decide if I want to take it. Something has 1 weight but only has a value of 5 caps? Not worth the space. If the value is 20 caps though? Oh yeah, I'm picking that up.

 

[Basileus]

I like the separate character inventories used in Dragon Quest. A shared inventory is more convenient, but also makes things easy since all characters will have access to every healing item in the game at no cost. Things are lot less tense when the tanky Fighter can just reach into a pocket dimension containing dozens of Phoenix Downs and Megalixers when the Healer goes down.

If players are content to go into the menu to change equipment, change classes/materia, use skills points, etc. then it should be fine to take a few extra seconds to make sure each character is carrying a couple potions. I only see this being a problem when items are an afterthought and not generally worth using except as a do-over button to fix the rare mistake. The more important items are, then the more worth it is becomes to take a moment to think about how to use them.

It makes sense in a game like Dragon Quest due to how the item system and ability system work. Characters don't have that much MP for a long time and MP-restoring items are rare in most DQ games, so using items to heal whenever possible makes a lot of sense. Some items, including equipment, are enchanted and can cast a spell for free which gives the player a reason to hang on to many items all game. The abilities available to a character are also determined by the weapon they have equipped, so characters can change their skillsets/classes by going into their inventory as changing their weapon as a free action. Deciding what items to give a character with limited inventory slots is effectively part of character building. The choice to give a staff that can cast revive to a tanky Soldier that is unlikely to die first, or a speedy Thief that will almost always act first, is a lot like combing class skills in a game like Final Fantasy 5.

There shouldn't be a problem putting limits on the player as long as those limits lead to interesting options. If your game's items are very useful, then players should expect there to be some kind of limit to using them. But it doesn't hurt to design menus to reduce the time it takes to make those choices either.

 

[M.I.A.]

Although I think individual inventories are a practical and potentially strategic measure in a game, they can also become a great hindrance. For example, in Final Fantasy 4 Heroes of Light, each character had 10 individual item slots.. but equipment and spells also took up those spots, often leaving only 1-3 slots per character. Factor in that you obtain new items in each area or after some fights, it just became a constant shuffling of equipment/items/spells, passing between characters just to carry items. Or worse, wasting items to make space for a treasure.


If individual inventories are used, equipment and spells shouldn't occupy those spaces. Also, so items should stack. Like.. 9max potions & ethers, etc.

Hope this is helpful!
-MIA

 

[Skymin]

First off, I'm not, in any way, saying you are wrong in your opinion. Everyone has their own. Just need you to know that as we go forward.

Anyway, I deeply disagree with FE weapon durability being a con. It's something that should be noted to a potential player, but not an outright decidedly Bad Feature. Perhaps Breath of the Wild's durability system is bad (still haven't played it, though I do think it is bad), but there's a reason for that: you never know when your weapon will break. It is highly annoying to not have any idea when a weapon is about to go poof. FE does not have this problem. You always know exactly how many hits you have left, thus you aren't blindsided if you pay even a modicum of attention. 3H even goes beyond simple item management and uses durability as a resource. It's well implemented, and I was happy to have it back.

Like you said, personal preference and all, but it's not so much a con as a feature that one has to consider if they like. Because if they do, that's a pro.

First, I just want to say sup SoD, been a while.

To be fair despite all the issues FE Fates had, removing durability in favor of stat cons towards more powerful weapons was an interesting twist I wish more SRPG did. Props for healing being like XCOM too where you can only heal so many times per map, but gets replenished after the mission is over saving time in the process.

Sure FE lets you keep an eye on the durability left easily enough, but FE: 3H took it to a new level with battalions causing micromanagement to get a bit much at times on the harder difficulties. Much as I prefer it over Fates, sometimes I wish I could go back to just choosing pros and cons between weapons that suit characters differently based on their base stats.

Anyways, I opt for the separate inventories during battle as this is usually better in an SRPG as it forces players to be more mindful of their positions, and thus, strategy.

 

[Sword_of_Dusk]

First, I just want to say sup SoD, been a while.

To be fair despite all the issues FE Fates had, removing durability in favor of stat cons towards more powerful weapons was an interesting twist I wish more SRPG did. Props for healing being like XCOM too where you can only heal so many times per map, but gets replenished after the mission is over saving time in the process.

Sure FE lets you keep an eye on the durability left easily enough, but FE: 3H took it to a new level with battalions causing micromanagement to get a bit much at times on the harder difficulties. Much as I prefer it over Fates, sometimes I wish I could go back to just choosing pros and cons between weapons that suit characters differently based on their base stats.

Anyways, I opt for the separate inventories during battle as this is usually better in an SRPG as it forces players to be more mindful of their positions, and thus, strategy.

Hey, Sky. You around here now?

I actually have no problems with Fates trying what it did. What I wasn't quite a fan of was that it still didn't stop players from just running Iron weapons a lot, as many already do. I think Silver weapons got the most flack, as you had to jump through extra hoops to ensure they didn't gimp you during EP.

As for battalions in 3H, I actually didn't do much micromanagement in regards to them. I only really employ Gambits against monsters or tough bosses, and I naturally slid into the habit of just replenishing them while doing battle preps. They serve as stat boosters to me more than anything else.

 

[Skymin]

Hey, Sky. You around here now?

I actually have no problems with Fates trying what it did. What I wasn't quite a fan of was that it still didn't stop players from just running Iron weapons a lot, as many already do. I think Silver weapons got the most flack, as you had to jump through extra hoops to ensure they didn't gimp you during EP.

As for battalions in 3H, I actually didn't do much micromanagement in regards to them. I only really employ Gambits against monsters or tough bosses, and I naturally slid into the habit of just replenishing them while doing battle preps. They serve as stat boosters to me more than anything else.

Yeah after finishing up my next Fes game I decided to start coming here more often since I want to start jumping on the MV train. Speaking of which, how's your game coming along?

Iron Weapons may have been still the most common, but there were some unique ones like the Shield Spear and even Fruit Shuriken that mixed things up more than the formula usual did for what it's worth. The latter would of interesting if the topic creator implemented something like that as you can use the weapon like a healing item as a two-for-one type which would help mitigate the issue of limited inventory per character.

The battalions and gambits were completely different in how you're supposed to use them in Maddening mode though. In that difficulty, you legit have to spam gambits just to hinder enemy movement early game just to not get swarmed to death of even basic grunts, however. I swear the poison strike archers were such a pain; kudos if TC gives all archers an automatic poison skill as it deadly in a tactic game lol.

 

[lianderson]

As long as the game design compensates for how cumbersome individual inventories can be to a player, this inventory system can indeed work, and work well.

 

[Sword_of_Dusk]

Although I think individual inventories are a practical and potentially strategic measure in a game, they can also become a great hindrance. For example, in Final Fantasy 4 Heroes of Light, each character had 10 individual item slots.. but equipment and spells also took up those spots, often leaving only 1-3 slots per character. Factor in that you obtain new items in each area or after some fights, it just became a constant shuffling of equipment/items/spells, passing between characters just to carry items. Or worse, wasting items to make space for a treasure.

This can be easily fixed by giving the player a bag that everything not on their party goes into. Inventory full on all characters, but you found a great treasure? It just goes into the bag!

And yes, I'm stealing that idea from DQ, but that's because it works.

Yeah after finishing up my next Fes game I decided to start coming here more often since I want to start jumping on the MV train. Speaking of which, how's your game coming along?

I scrapped what I had in order to redo it better. I bought MZ on release, but since there's still far more support for MV, I haven't used the new engine much. Recently, I realized that I can use MZ to make my maps (layer control makes it a better editor than MV), which gave me the impetus to rework things.

 

[Frostorm]

I think I'm gonna give up on individual inventories... Been trying to debug GALV's plugin all day but I've hit a wall. Apparently, LeTBS doesn't have an equivalent for .currentAction(). Basically, I need the ._actions[0] of the current battler, which I can't find under BattleManagerTBS...