MOBA roles in RPGs

[kovak]

I've decided to make this topic after reading tons of mechanic stuff in this forum. I'm really happy to say that i've learned a lot and how it helped me on this transition. This is kinda a mini-guide since i'll try to explain how MOBA team compositions can be portrayed in RPGs, it doesn't mean that i'll be referencing classes itself in the genre but the actuall function instead. There will be no mentions to sub-roles, functions that can be built via items/ upgrades or are not present in a frequent way besides being means to allow a Role to do its job in 1 or 2 skills of its skillset/ kit (ex: tank). Probably someone will claim that there are more roles than this or that some of them are not roles and all i can say is that as an oldschool player/ developer i have to say is no, one thing is what the community assumes as the truth and the other is what devs assume as the tools when designing. Every MOBA you know falls into this formula when designing their core rules for unit building.


Before we start i need to mention that teams are composed by 3 to 5 units who are controlled by different players in most of games which leads to the co-op aspect of the game. Each unit has its own unique skillset/ kit who's tied with a specific role, reading the skills tells you which role a unit follows considering 4 core points: Damage, Effects, Cost and Cooldown.


I will not talk about Cost and Cooldowns here since they are linked more with the overall concept of the unit rather being a rule to follow.


NUKER

• Usually deals the highest amount of damage with a single skill
  
  If not it's based on chainning them through buffs or conditions
  
• If not it's based on short cooldowns to annoy the enemy player, it has a psychological aspect as well, in the end the amount of damage is the same
  
  No need to mention that mixing those aspects leads to more refined gameplay
  

[*]They usually has only 1 AoE skill and that's it, most of times they don't have any.

[*]Has the lowest defensive attributes




Easiest role to come up with if your game has 3 skills since they all gonna be tied with burst damage, the 4th is complementary in most of times. In some MOBA they have a 5th skill that's also related to dealing damage. There isn't many things to say about this, damage is damage, how you gonna design it is up to you, no matter if it's a Elemental Mage who controls weather or sci-fi Soldier with neon daggers that backstabs people. Notice that missing skills punishes this role a lot.


SUPPORT / DISABLER

• Has means to allow his allies to survive no matter what kind it is
  
  Thanks to this they have the highest defensive attributes by default
  

[*]Most of its buffs are single targeted

• 
  If it deals damage the damage is a in between moderated and high
  

[*]Needs to have at least 1 AoE skill, if it has buffs the damage needs to be reduced.

• 
  AoE skills with buffs are not rare but has moderated effects as well
  

Why put them side by side? Their job is to keep allies alive, how they do it is not important. If it's by healing or by weakening an enemy without the need to deal damage is what makes them who they are. A support is focused on positive aspects wile the Disabler is focused on the negative aspects of what buffs can do and that's it. In the end of the day the Disable is also a Support, no matter if he can nerf a foe's damage, drain a foe's health, paralyze a foe and put a foe to sleep. Still, the most effect support is offensive and we have to be realist here: a combat ends with damage, if you can't deal damage then there's something wrong.


I think they are the easiest role to explain so far, maybe i'm being dull though.


CARRY

• Are upgrade dependant
  
• Can't do much alone in lower levels
  
• Deafult attacks are really valuable to this role
  
• Has the lowest damage done by skills
  
• Buffs needs to be moderated to not rend the upgrade aspect overpowered
  
• May have evasive methods to protect themselves in offensive ways
  

This role became less and less frequent in MOBA since it's easier to make Nukers who use the upgrade aspect in their designs instead. They are usually built considering passive skills and even their active skills are related to passive buffs. As mentioned above default attack skill is really important to this role, it doesn't make it less insteresting at all since everything deppends on how you are going to design the Carry, their buffs can help but not as much as a Support/ Disabler. They do almost the same job as the Nuker but on mid to late game is where they deal as much damage as the Nuker with the same few swings.


Remember: To this role a good pair of weapons are as valueable a good high damage spell for a Nuker.


INITIATOR

• They start each battle as the frontline
  
• Usually half of its skillset/ kit has AoE skills with moderated damage
  
  If it has high damage usually is overtime
  

[*]Has buffs to cover the lack of damage in the AoE skills

[*]Being able to survive damage taken is not necessary




When working on any initiator concept i constantly ended up screwing up. This is the harded concept to come up with and that's why it's in the end of the topic cuz he may have a bit of everything though he's not the jack-of-all-trades role at all if you don't have a clear idea of what you wanna do. They can be used as secondary Supports/ Disablers deppending on your team composition. 


You have to be careful when calculating the damage and effects of an Initiator's skills for obvious reasons. Dealing too much damage will rend your other concepts useless so does when thinking about buffs they provide. I've noticed the rejection that players has to single targeted skills when they see an AoE skill, even if it deals half of damage of a single targeted skills, my only solution to this would be to deal from 1/3 to 1/4 of the single target skill and add any effect to it, usually it's how it's done in MOBAS since there you has to consider the amount of time a player has to use this again in  seconds.


CONCLUSION


"If you can't explain something in a few lines then you learned nothing, if you can't understand with a few lines then you know not enough", this is my personal conclusion considering 8 years of my life. I really need to post examples but there's no real conclusion here besides that discussing about it will enrich the topic.


Also notice that those descriptions fills the Warrior, Rogue, Mage and Cleric classes easily.

 

[Milennin]

Not sure what's the point of this guide. It's obvious that MOBAs borrowed a lot from established RPG mechanics, ranging from tank, healer and damage roles, and everything in between those. But they're both completely different types of games, it's not really easy to compare the two. MOBAs are competitive team-based games with real-time combat mechanics, which has you control only a single character, while RPGs are single-player, turn-based and have you control a party of people (in most cases, at least).


So, what's here to discuss? How different classes or types are supposed to function in combat?

 

[kovak]

Pretty much, that's something that killed many of my weeks to figure out.


Idea is not to compare them but to see if there's something that's worth bringing to rpgs or how they improved stuff compared to rpgs.

 

[Pine Towers]

We need to go back.


MOBA is a real-time game, so roles like Initiator are viable. But when dealing with turn based combat, this changes. Luckily, MOBA weren't the games that started it all. Before MOBA, the mod community made several types of maps (either in Starcraft or Warcraf 3) that deals with controlling one character often in tandem with others to achieve a common objective. From the top of my mind I remember a Dragon Ball Z game within Starcraft mods that let you control one character and had to train to defeat the bad (computer-controlled) guys alongside other players. But this, in a rather distorted manner, is what a RPG does.


In a (tabletop) RPG we're dealing with this: Each player controls a character. The game design grew from 1970-something to now, so we can look at how they did this. I'll use as example the Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition, since this is the edition where most of the game design is at plain sight and not obscured by flavor text (if this is good or bad, is not the subject of the topic). Here we have 4 (combat) roles: Striker ("Initiator"), Defender ("Tank"), Controller ("Disabler", dealing more with field control and debuffs) and Leader ("Support", healing and buffing mostly). This let to players filling each role for the better of the combat: You don't need a Defender, but one can make the others do their roles more easily. The philosophy behind this can be found with a quick Google.


BUT, in a RPG Maker game (or most of the computer RPG), you're often dealing with ONE player controlling the whole party. This strays a little from the RPG (role playing) aspect of controlling one character to a tactical aspect of controlling a combat unit with few battlers. So, the word must be it - tactical. Each character should feel like a part of a well lubricated machine (a blood hungry combat machine).


The problem is: This is only half of the equation. You can build a great party with synergy and each one having a role, but this doesn't matter if the enemy group doesn't offer a challenge for the machine to be tested. And only be a couple HP sponges that only "attack" each turn without a tactical thinking, you're not using the machine at its full capacity.

 

[Lord Semaj]

I think an important aspect of MOBA games is outplaying the enemy team.  This mean shutting down their skill attempts, dividing them up, picking off the weaklings, using team combos to attack them, or just outfarming them or outsighting them for a gank.


To have much of this in an RPG game I feel like you would need a real time battle system.  Each class would have 3-4 abilities and you can fire them off in real time to cancel enemy skills or assist allies with damage buff combos or stunlocks.  All it would need is mouse support and a front system battle mode with a good UI.  Come to think of it though... this already exists.  Games like Legend of Grimrock perform the form roles quite well and have real time combat for their dungeon crawls.

 

[kovak]

@Pine TowersOne player controlling them is not a bad thing with turns, Actually it gives the same depth as a tactics game deppending on the choosen mechanics.


About enemies, the idea of specialized enemies comes in hand as long as they follow the same building rules as your party you may find a more interesting challenge.


With this in mind even early game enemies may feel worth facing, 2 to 3 at least.


@Lord Semaj I'll look for this Legend of Grimrock :v

 

[Frozen_Phoenix]

You can translate them to a rpg environment.


Nuker: High damage spells with high cooldowns.


Support: Healing/shield spells, buffs and debuffs.


Carry: Scaling speed and attack stats on an atb battle system with spells that increase basic attack damage over the fight.


Initiator: Has no place in an rpg, in mobas you need someone with usually an aoe disable to initiate fights so the team can follow up, in an rpg the fights are started automatically. Replace this role with "disabler", someone with stuns and such, but it can overlap with the support role.


Edit: Another thing that can be cool is a moba item system in a rpg, even more if you put in a crafting system to make the higher tier items from low tier ones.

 

[Pine Towers]

a crafting system to make the higher tier items from low tier ones

This is quite interesting, indeed. Normally we see crafting systems in RPG as "take 3 sticks, 1 wool thread and make your wooden sword". A MOBA style of improving previous items is great since the player won't break immersion by selling to a rural shop the Magic Sword of Death since he can improve it into the Magic Sword of Death and Destruction, or just hanging around with 325 swords and 645 Potion of Minor Healing (when he can infuse them into Potion of Healing).

 

[kovak]

@Frozen_Phoenix i have to disagree with you about the Initiator since the action order is determined by the Agility vallue

 

[RogdagoR]

I'm actually trying to give some "MOBA's feelings" into my combat system, with upgradable equip(since you don't drop gear, but you will have to power up it with the stuff dropped by the enemies) and with fast-paced tactical battle system(i hope lol).
 


I'm using a "role" system like those you describe, and the class is secondary...mostly is for team comp(party) building, but yeah i'm trying to take some ideas from MOBAs like LOL or DoTA.

 

[Wavelength]

Many MOBAs are examples of good (competitive) game design in general and therefore there are certainly mechanics that can be adapted well into thoughtful RPG systems.  However, one really important thing to remember is that MOBAs are designed around a ~40 minute experience where you can constantly change up your strategy (equipment, skills, etc.) on the fly to react to the game state, whereas RPGs are based around a 10-80 hour experience where you are making very long-term decisions and a lot of things about game flow and party composition are determined for you in advance.


As an example, take your idea of "Carries".  In an RPG, it would be extremely bad design for the "carry" to be significantly weaker than your other party members at early levels and significantly stronger at high levels - this would create enormous balance issues assuming the number of playable characters is higher than your party size.  It would also be fairly bad design to make their basic attacks stronger than their skills, because repeatedly hitting "basic attack" is not interesting in RPG battles (it can be more interesting in a MOBA where one small mistake in positioning can mean your carry is wiped off the map).  So too would it be bad design to make them equip-dependent.  A more reasonable "carry" design would be one that would require the other characters' resources (mana, turns, protection, etc.) to be poured into them within a battle in exchange for superb DPS output, or for them to grow in power over the course of a battle.

 

[Basileus]

@Wavelength


The imbalanced "Carry" class problem sounds a lot like the problems with Wizards, Clerics, and Druids in D&D 3/3.5. They are incredibly weak at early levels, but at later levels physical damage classes tend to fall off as monsters get tougher while magic classes tend to skyrocket due to having amazingly powerful spells and fewer restrictions on casting them. It's sometimes called "Linear Warriors, Quadratic Wizards" because of the difference in how they scale (a more linear curve vs a more exponential curve).


MOBAs are weird for reversing this and having magic and abilities that cost mana be powerful early on while having manaless basic attacks scale into godhood. This can sort of being seen in games like the Tales Series where the protagonist almost always uses swords and tends to have the highest damage throughout the game - but even then there are plenty of cases where the mage classes have restrictions removed through items or skills that let them spam=cast enemies into oblivion. 


I can see an emphasis on physical attacks in an RPG only if the game is using a Real Time Combat System. When basic attacks can be chain into a physical attack string with skills that can be worked in to extend combos it can be very, very satisfying in a way that standing still and waiting for casting times just isn't. However, in any kind of Turn Based Combat or even Active Time Battle Combat - anything menu based really - this is reserved. Basic attacks using just the "Fight" command are boring as Hell while all of the special abilities you can program without having to worry about complicated player inputs is amazing. That said, it isn't unheard of to have a similar party composition in a way.


Obligatory Dragon Quest Reference: In this series you can rely on basic attacks to be pretty strong and useful early game when spells are limited due to MP restrictions. A bit into the game you have more MP and cooler abilities and you can weave abilities into fights without too much of a problem as long as you are just exploring and don't need to be in tip top shape for a boss. Around here the basic attacks aren't as good and it's really tempting to use magic to speed up fights. But later in the game the basic attacks become very powerful once again, even though you have even more MP and even cooler abilities. This is because you not only have better gear (with fewer weapons overall than a game like Final Fantasy, each one is a bigger upgrade than many games and are spaced farther apart) but you also have much better stats (in DQ your stats are extremely low in the early game but scale well with levels, enough to easily make up for few equipment options for some classes). A classic boss strategy is to have a Priest cast defensive buffs and heal the party while the Mage casts attack buffs on the physical attackers - this is much more powerful than it sounds as Dragon Quest actually makes positive and negative status effects extremely powerful. Two casts of an attack buff can easily double an attacker's damage...and since Critical Hits in Dragon Quest reduce the target's defense to 0 for the hit instead of boosting the damage, this makes a Crit deal massive amounts of damage. Like more than 3-4 spells from the Mage. It's hardly mandatory but the "Protect the Carry" comp definitely started in games like this and continues to be a viable strategy even today.

 

[kovak]

@Basileus About skills being strong on the beginning is not true, they cost a lot of mana and deal just a bit more damage than the basic attack command. Only when a skill is at level 3 or 4 (deppends on the game) that's worth using it to deal damage else you goes for its effect in early levels. I don't know which mobas you've been playing but i'm sure there's something wrong with how they scale. Now a days skills scale with basic attacks and for carries cases those skills becomes an extention of the basic attack and has game changing properties or they do not and the game provides other means for skills to be more effective usually based on the type of damage dealt.


I knew not giving examples would cause this issue (my writing is not good enough either) and yes, i know there are differences between real time and turn based combat. It was my fault for not writing down properly about how a Carry usually is. He's not really weaker than the others, consider him more resilient than a healer or mage but he has the smallest resource pool to cast his skills, he also won't deal as much damage with skills if they provide buffs/ debuffs or their damage is closer to his basic attack and has a strong extra effect with short duration, but it doesn't mean that they are weaker, they take a bit more of time on the beginning to kill someone at lower levels when alone. 


The MOBA role takes in consideration not only what the unit can do for the team but also what they can do when alone, most of times when alone else it becomes harder to balance the core aspects till playtest and without any upgrade. In MOBA most units has 4 skills that can be improved by leveling, in rpgs you have the freedom to have more skills unlocked but this is not a big deal since it's up to the rest of the game's design. The biggest difference here is that rarely an actor will be alone in a party.


I have never been a big fan of designing carriers, that's why it's harder for me to understand and explain what they are. I don't even like to play as a carry. i'm a support player by heart.

 

[richter_h]

Well, if you're about to apply MOBA roles for you characters in traditional (if not conservative, tabletop and video games alike) RPG, you have to put level progression into consideration. Not only that you'll find out the character progression for most of classic RPGs is like peeling tons of potato in single seat, the diverse role and combination will be highly limited unless you provide myriad characters in your RPG, or some characters' alternate stat&skill build as well as mix-and-match with equipments. Don't forget that MOBAs are served like hamburger; fast, with assorted ingredients, easy to enjoy although may give you headache, and ultimately you can repeat the serving in relatively short time unlike classic RPGs.


Why, you may ask? As far as I know in some MOBAs, one character may fit multiple roles at once, depending on party matchup, skill build, and of provided equipments. Some may have, say, mana issue which could be remedied by equipments or some supportive, 'mana battery' characters, while others are squishy like boiled poteto or running like they have cardio problems.


Also, the skill learning system in MOBA is flexible; and in classic RPGs—including RPG Maker environment, most of skill learning system are bound to the characters semi-permanently.


About roles, in my perspective:

• Nukers are obviously those who can do burst damage in relatively short time, usually by magical means, as if they have access to nuke launcher (duh).
  
• Supports are those who can rely on their abilities to aid their allies. Heal, dispel, repel, you name it.
  
• Disablers are those who can pin/stun/lock/hex enemies, single or multiple alike. I separate disablers from supports because disablers can be independent thanks to their own skill/spell set.
  
• Durables a.k.a. Tanks are those capable to dish out damages without dying easily, may it be with pure endurance or skill/spell set.
  
• Initiators are those with abilities to open fire and start clash, and
  
• Carries are pure, raw damage dealers that benefits from cutting-edge gears and items more than the others. Also known as babies that requires extra care so they could unleash their potential once they tapped into their true power.
  

Also, my experience with Eremidia: Dungeon! that reflected MOBA aspects:

• In most of cases, the term 'carry' is mostly, and usually applied to every characters you have in your roster. Everyone, warriors, thieves and mages alike, can be carry;
  
• 'Nukers' often misinterpreted as 'carries' because of their kits
  
• 'Disablers' are almost useless, and more in system where buff/debuff rate is initally not guaranteed once landed (namely percentage based rate);
  
• 'Durables' will always depend on aggro and/or positioning, and without it, their primary task is nullified;
  
• Initiation phase is frustrating in turn-based battle system. Mostly, you'll be screwed up when preparing wombo combo;
  
• In most of cases, when you're happen to take so-called carry characters, you'll have migraine because of their lack of contribution once they enter your roster—poor performance, no significant contribution to party, and prone to be pummeled like mashed poteto...
  
• ...and you'll bound to grind your characters, a.k.a. farming not for carries but for other characters as well;
  
• You won't have enough time to check all of available equipments in the beginning of the game, and buying each of the items available requires a lot of time and resources;
  
• Balancing the game is like boiling stones; Precise calculation as well as AI behaviors and enemies matchups must be put into consideration. Once you have a headache from playable roster, you don't want another from the opposite side.
  
• You don't know when you can call it early game, mid-game and late-game.
  

@Pine Towers had pointed several fundamental differences between MOBA and conventional RPGs (like what RPG Makers have to offer). The former has the system that demands fast-paced, complex, reflexes and highly situational battles while the latter are usually simplified, slower pace, and gives time for players to think before act.


Talk about managing several characters at once, it reminds me to another MOBA aspect; micro-management. Players will be demanded to arrange several actions for multiple units at once, and in some games that embrace MOBA aspects, controlling up to four characters in single seat means more screw-ups.


Like, if you're happen to play DotA and control a hero called Meepo... you know what I meant.