Legendary Equips/Items on Loot Drop

[Wyn Wizard]

Hello everyone!


As of recently, I've decided to try to get back into RPG Maker by making a small dungeon crawler similar to that of Subterranean Starfield, which was created by our very talented Archeia for the Ace Lite Cook off I believe. Anyway, I've been trying to come up with ways to make my game stand out among the others. So, after watching one of my favorite animes, SAO, and suddenly had a realization. No, I'm not gonna make it SAO. The Idea I did get though was the idea of Legendary loot drops from boss fights or quest runs. Yes, I know this is a dungeon crawler, but I cannot help but make optional quests that can be completed while clearing dungeon floors. My main question is what do you guys think about Legendary loot drops in a dungeon crawler? I appreciate any and all feedback.

 

[Lord Semaj]

Games are generally balanced around not having the legendary stuff.  Acquiring the legendary stuff makes the game easy, almost jokingly easy.  Getting the OP Sword of Demons or Armor of Faith can make the next boss encounter trivial because that's what legendary gear is supposed to do: reward the player for going out of their way to acquire it by giving them sheer power.


My take on it therefore would be that legendary boss loot is perfectly fine if it is a guaranteed drop from specific bosses or quests.  As this is not an MMO, there is really no point in encouraging farming or grinding.  Low drop chances exist in online games to keep these items from being overly common and give players a feeling of distinction for acquiring them (that or to piss everyone off so they spend more money trying).  I think it could be a positive thing for a dungeon crawler to have additional wings, quests, or boss fights that are not required to reach the next floor and the player can choose to engage them for an easier time on the next floor or skip them to preserve the challenge.  Have the main bosses drop the gear necessary to clearing the next level while these side bosses drop things that make the player extra mighty.

 

[Webby]

It depends on the items because if the item/equip is broken or really op, the game would be unbalanced and that's


not going to be fun for most players because this one item can solo finish the entire game and I found it randomly


by killing a bunch of slimes...


It's better to give the legendary items/equips to the MMO because it's based around on grinding to get the


items. I'm not going to push you to abandon the idea, though try to make it an concept like "Kill X boss for 100


times and get this absurdly useless sword that has better enchants than your current sword but weaker" because


why not?

 

[Ryaryu]

Actually, games generally keep legendary items to subquests, and the reason is what @Lord Semaj said: Legendary items tends to break the game.
You can give them from special bosses. One approach to use is to punish the player: bring a strong boss in a secret area avaliable in early game (with advices of course). The player who finds it will be crushed and forced to reload the save. He will swear to himself that he'll beat that boss when he's strong enough. When he does this, he'll be strong, either over-leveled or a good strategist, and deserves the legendary drop. Remember this: Legendary itens are supposed to be special; if you can receive them by just playing the game straightforward, there's no merit, right? They'll become normal items with one-of-a-kind names.
Unless you're doing a random drop mechanic like Diablo series, in this case any monster dropping legendaries is ok.

 

[Crabs]

You can put some drawback on your legendary items to balance your game


Like a sword that gives an insane dps but put your character on frenzy state, so you cannot control him.


Or an amulet that gives a lifesteal for your character, but you won't be able to heal him.

 

[Oddball]

one way to balance ledgendary items might be secondary effects. maybe one of them doesnt give quite the ATK boost as ordinary weapons, but maybe it has an insane HP regain which others dont have (like 15%)


i think if the normal items just gave stat boost, the ledgendary weapons having secondary effects with not as good a stat boost might help them to be balanced with the others, yet still feel ledgendary

 

[Milennin]

I was planning on having legendary item drops in my game, and was thinking of making drop rates for them something like this:


Early game: 0%


Early-mid game: 20%


Late-mid game: 40%


Late game: 60%


End game: 80%


So, by the end of the game the player is pretty much guaranteed to have found at least one legendary item drop. If they somehow don't, there is a tier below legendary which is only slightly worse and gets a 100% drop chance in the end game, so even in the case of them never finding one, it's not like they're going to miss out on a lot of power. These items are not bound by level, so a legendary item found in the early-mid game is just as good as one found in the end game.


Overall, as long as the legendary items don't overpower the player character or has the game balanced around the player requiring to have them, it should be OK.

 

[Basileus]

I may be alone on this, but when I heard "Legendary Equips" I actually thought of "Named Gear" instead of "Infinity +1 Sword". It doesn't have to have stats that can slay the Final Boss. It just needs to be unique and have good stats for its area.


The Elder Scrolls series does this a lot. In addition to the generic Leather, Fur, Iron and Steel equipment that you find in every dungeon, there are also enchanted weapons and armor of every material category. And these enchantments are hardly special or unique. You may find a bandit with an "Iron Dagger of Burning" that does a little extra fire damage on hit. Sure, it cool when you first get it, but it's still just an Iron Dagger. It might be better than a Steel Dagger because of the enchantment and thus you hang onto it for longer, but you will replace it once you find an ordinary Elven Dagger because it is better even with the enchantment factored in. But then you find the unique, named items scattered around the world in chests or on NPCs. There might be an infinite amount of Iron Daggers in the world, and about 1/100 might be an Iron Dagger of Burning, but there is only one "Trogar's Dagger". Maybe it was carried by a unique Boss NPC at the bottom of an out-of-the-way dungeon. Maybe it was left on a sacrificial altar in an ancient ruin once used by necromancers. Maybe it was found beside the body of a long dead adventurer along with his journal - whether that dagger belonged to the body by the journal or was just kept as a keepsake of the dead friend mentioned in the journal you will never know. It may not be good equipment, but in its own way it's special. It tells a story even if that story is a small one that no one besides you will ever hear or care about. Sometimes the enchantment might be fantastic, sometimes it might be "unique but useless", and sometimes it may not even be enchanted at all - just an regular old Steel Dagger that has a unique name.


When I think of "Legendary Equipment" I think of the "Legendary Rule" in Magic the Gathering - "There can be only one". If you have Bronze, Iron, Steel weapon types in your game, then there is no reason why you can't add a "Joudan's Fang" dagger somewhere in the Bronze area that has Iron stats. It'll be pretty good for the area you find it in, and may even mean you don't have to worry about upgrading in the next area, but it's still not that powerful overall. As long as you make a fun sidequest or boss fight or dungeon section to find that items in, then I really don't think having "Legendary" items would be a problem. Just don't put the "Godslayer Sword of Ragnarok" in the first floors of the dungeon and keep the "Drake-wing Coat" that's only marginally better than Bronze Armor out of the deeper floors and you're good.

 

[Dr. Delibird]

I thought the same thing as @Basileus did except my mind went straight to Borderlands rather than Elder Scrolls. Both have named gear that may or may not be better than not-named gear but they are different and unique.


I also believe that unique gear should NOT be guaranteed all the time. I like to look at Borderlands, if you are unlucky throughout the whole game it doesn't matter as most of the legendary weapons and shields and such are only kind of needed for optional challenges. There is also the fact that there is a lot of guaranteed unique pieces of gear that are rewarded in quests and sometimes are as good if not better than the actual legionaries.  


I say, if you spend the time to make them interesting enough for players to seek out but not make them cheese weapons of doom then it will be a good addition to a dungeon crawl type of game.

 

[Wyn Wizard]

I thank all of you for your feedback. @Dr. Delibird, @Basileus, and @Ryaryu all have decent ideas. Those ideas were sorta what I was going for tbh. My idea of Legendary items/Equips were more like items of myth that, while strong, were not overly OP. Like if a Steel Sword has a base attack stat of 65, a Legendary steel sword by some odd name may have like a 70 base attack, or stronger, depending on how much more damage it does. Or maybe having an item like the sword gandelf has that has a bonus against goblinoid creatures and what not. Something that just has a little extra kick and what not, but not something super OP or necessary to beat a boss. And yes, these items will be side quest items.