Castle Paradox

[Blazes Battles Inc.]

I just added a small .rpg file called Rune Mage to the gamelist. There's not much there but the title screen and a tutorial of how the battle engine I'm making for it works, and there's no playable content. The tutorial gives you a good idea of what the game will be like, though. Granted, it's not all of the battle sequence... after spells have been cast, the game will switch to a screen where you see the people casting spells at each other... but it's a good idea of the part you control.

The game basically works with both you and your opponent laying out elements for use in spells, taken from your elemental bank, where three of the elements in your inventory pop up randomly. There are three slots in the spell to put the elements in, which are: Element, Form, and Extra. The same element can also be used more than once in a spell, allowing for up to 64 different combinations using the elements of Air, Earth, Water, and Fire. Then there's stuff like casting levels, mp costs, elemental bonuses, etc.

So, obviously, I'm looking for opinions on how the engine looks. Again, there's no playable content, so don't expect any. It'll take me a while to get the real thing out, because even though I have a 'rough draft' script of the general battles, I still have to work out tons of little bugs and build seperate A.I.s for different opponents. However, if no one wants to see it, that'll save me a lot of trouble... I'm not going to play the game except to check for bugs, it won't be fun because I'll know where everything is, what all the spells are and how to beat all the enemies. Soooo... how does this look so far?
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[Aethereal]

I like the idea of this. It looks like it would be fun to play and it would require strategy. However, is there going to be a separate screen that tells you what the spell's effect is (after casting it, of course), possibly a name, and a spell animation?

Also, unless I missed it, you didn't really explain how the 'form' and 'extra' slots work, you just told what they are. You may want to put something about that in.
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[Blazes Battles Inc.]

For the first question, yes. The first time you see a spell it will be explained, and you will ALWAYS see the name of any spell that was cast. Also, if you need to see the explanation again, there's an item you can use out of battle. Even though it won't be explained in battle after you see it cast the first time, the effect will still be fairly obvious, unless it's just something like a scan-type spell and it was used against you. There will also be a full-screen animation the first time you see a spell (or maybe just a still picture, depending on how much filespace I figure it will all take up), and an npc animation afterwards, as well as every time after the first time. Your character and the enemy will also be animated on the same screen, and will move when casting a spell. Like I said before, though, this will only appear after casting a spell or using an item.

The form and extra slots don't really have any bonuses like the element one, as of yet (I may make different Forms have bonuses or hinderances based on what equipment you're wearing), and serve more as the defining factors of a spell. As an example, the Scan spell will PROBABLY be a Fire Element spell with a Wind Form, and a Water Extra. With spells that do no damage, like Scan, bonuses or hinderances will affect the likeliness of achieving the desired effect.
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[Blazes Battles Inc.]

Wow, this is a landslide! Since 100% of the OHR community (cough) thinks it's a good idea and is at least somewhat original, I'll do it!!

The problem with plotscripting things is not that it's hard, but that's it's so incredibly TEDIOUS. Here's an example of what the script to find the last digit of the current hp is like:

[Cube]

Use modules division to find out particular digits in a number. Basically (I think) to find out the last number in a digit is:

number, mod, 10

Yeah, that's it. A lot easier, eh?

[Blazes Battles Inc.]

Um... yeah... well... that's not fair, because I'm an idiot and you're a plotscripting master. You simplified a page long plotscript into a single, simple command. I think I may just cry...
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Preserve OHR history! Do it for the children!