Stealth? In a turn-based RPG?

[BloodletterQ]

Considering that it's primarily used by WRPG Rogues at varying qualities... what are some ways that this ability can be interpreted in a turn-based JRPG? Here are some ideas.

• Make it effectively the Final Fantasy Dragoon's Jump. That's the route I'm going for.
• Boosts evade and maybe crit. Seems kind of obvious. Likewise this and the above can be alternative thief/rogue class skills.
• Free attack avoid. This basically makes it Guard+.

Curious about your take.

 

[Frogboy]

I wouldn't make it improve Evade. That would seem to imply that they're still readily available to attack but can dodge better. I'd reserve that for skills that improve speed or maybe concealment (Blur, Displacement etc). Stealth means that you go unnoticed. That's the purpose of the Target Rate parameter. That's what I boost for stealthy character during turn based battles.

 

[Tai_MT]

Here's the way I did it. It's actually called "Stealth". Agility drops to 0% (meaning you will go last so long as you're in Stealth). Target Rate of the one using Stealth goes to 0% (so you won't be targeted while you're sneaking around). Your Luck increases by a set percentage, depending on the level of your "Stealth" skill. That last bit is important.

Most of my Thief's skills run on the Luck parameter to do damage. Not all, but most. The most prominent of which is his "Limit Break", which is "Backstab". Backstab uses his Luck, uses the enemy Agility as defense, and either multiplies the damage to a single target... or it hits multiple random targets.

In terms of the way Stealth is designed in my game, it's more around using it as a buff instead of a "don't hit me, bro" type skill. It has that advantage of not targeting you directly (but full party attacks will hit him anyway).

I could've probably designed it so that being hit breaks "Stealth", but I decided that the way "full party" attacks work wouldn't really break your stealth in terms of lore, so it wasn't a big deal.

 

[Eschaton]

Is there any way you can include the TGR parameter into the damage formula? Perhaps your stealthy battler can do more damage with lower TGR? Then build a skillset devoted to reducing the stealthy battler's TGR?

 

[Tai_MT]

I don't think you can do that without a script of some sort. At least, I've not seen anything in the Help File or the "help popup" that indicates how you'd even get that data to put into a damage formula. Everything else is like "a.atk" and "a.mp" and such. But, I don't think there's an "a.tgr" at all. Probably never would be anyway, since TGR is measured as a percentage and not a solid value. Might do wonky things to the program if you tried to do it that way.

So... probably have to script it if you'd like it to do that.

The way I did it just made sense. Since my "Luck" stat was renamed to "Reflex", I decided that if you were being stealthy, you'd have a bonus to any Reflex skill you might use. Moving stealthy makes you slow though, so that's the trade-off. The low target rate simply makes sense if you're sneaking around. Few enemies would spot you.

I went about it kind of the way you might for "pickpocket" rolls. You'd gain higher dexterity or higher chance to steal the item if you were sneaking around... so... higher Reflex. I just had to incorporate that high Reflex (Luck!) into other moves of his skillset to make Stealth worth using. Granted, you can build my thief to use the Agility stat instead (at which point, Stealth is pretty much worthless as a skill buff and only serves to buy you some turns to heal up) and there's a few skills that are useful in that regard, but Stealth is pretty much there just to buff a Luck build.

 

[nomotog]

My thought is to make it a buff that unlocks a set of skills you can use. Skills like backstab, steal, lay trap, ect. If your using skills or any kind of movement/positioning system I would have stealth make it easier to move about well also being restrictive on where you can use it (you can't use stealth in the front row for example).* I also like Tai_MT's idea of having it lower your turn order. It gives the skill a nice risk element.

(In the battle system I am musing about I want moving from row to row to be somewhat costly, but I don't know now yet.)

 

[jmike]

The title had me thinking of stealth games though and creeping up on enemies for silent kills. Maybe something as simple as how Final Fantasy XIII did it, if you walk up to an enemy unseen, you get a pre-emptive strike. Though I am thinking of map stealth and not rogue stealth skills.

 

[M.I.A.]

@Tai_MT 's handling is pretty much how I would handle it. Maybe not all the way as inclusive as the skills/sets, but definitely in battle.

It would have to be balanced, but not over powered. Making a character stealth is not exactly the same as making them invisible, so being targetable should still be in play. Perhaps drop the likelihood in which they can be targeted..

Unless of course you want complete invisibility.. then reduce likeliness of that character being targeted to 0 (via plugin's/rates).. however, if that characters takes any action, or is hit with splash damage, then they either lose invisibility entirely or invisibility steps down to stealth.

Hope this helps!
- MIA

 

[BloodletterQ]

Well being that my protagonist is the rogue, I guess a pre-emptive (enemies would have pre-set routes unless you alert them) could enable stealth.