Castle Paradox

[Newbie_Power]

Improving the draw system is an obvious given. 20 magic spells per draw, please. There is no reason for drawing magic to take so long, since it doesn't increase the difficulty of the game or add any sort of strategy other than watching enemies pound on you. While this lessens the impact of modding cards and items, not everybody likes the card game, and some people are completionists and don't want to mod rare items just to save time, and modding items is still good to get early awesome spells.

For the junctioning system, make it so that higher level spells require a certain level to be equipped. This will mean an actual purpose to level up. This will also make high level spells obtained early useful for casting if you can't equip them yet.

Next, make the magic spells FF6 Broken. Enemies in FF8 have so much HP anyway that it's really hard to have broken spells even if you try.

Also adding an option to use multiple instances of a single spell to increase the times it is cast would also be a great buff to magic spells. It would also make lower/mid level spells continue to be useful once you are able to junction better spells to your stats. Since the above proposed level requirement for higher level spells is in place, casting high level spells at low levels becomes a new strategy for those purposely avoiding leveling up.

Have limit breaks heal you after they're used.

Only one summon per battle. And the ability to skip animations. To compensate, allow their power to be increased based on elemental junctions you have equipped. IE: Shiva becomes more powerful with better ice spells.

And then after all that, shake it up and make whatever balance changes necessary.
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TheGiz> Am I the only one who likes to imagine that Elijah Wood's character in Back to the Future 2, the kid at the Wild Gunman machine in the Cafe 80's, is some future descendant of the AVGN?

[Moogle1]

Restrict Limit Breaks to one per life. If a character dies and is revived, he can Limit Break again. Prevents both Aura abuse and invincible-critical abuse. While we're at it, nix invincibility. It was a bad idea.

Make stat gains from junctioning scale with level. Currently, leveling makes you weaker unless you wait until the end of the game to do it. Screw that. It encourages a style of play that is absolutely not fun. I'd personally also remove the level up stat gain abilities to further discourage not-leveling, but that's me.

Make GFs work FFX-style: replace the entire party with the GF until the GF dies or you dismiss it. Summons should always have worked that way; otherwise, they're no different from other magic.

Make magic much more powerful. There's simply no reason to use it right now: it decreases your stats, you have to go into a menu to find it, and it's usually less effective than a physical attack, even if you have Double/Triple, due to enemy resistances. Obvious exceptions include Cure, Life, and Aura, which are already useful.

Increase the effectiveness of Draw, but make it decreasingly effective each time it's used in a battle. (Ex: Your first Draw gets 20 spells, then 15, then 10, then 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, 0.) This prevents stupid grinding like sitting around Drawing from Bahamut until you're stocked. Eliminate Draw->Cast, which no one used anyway.

Put in an actual love story, instead of Squall spending the first half of the game being annoyed at Rinoa and the player spending the second half of the game being annoyed at Squall. Alternatively, remove the love story altogether. Actually, this would be preferable.
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Slime Salad :: Independent Game Design

[Newbie_Power]

[Moogle1]

[Newbie_Power]

I think it makes sense that the GFs themselves have MP, considering they're the source of all of your power in FF8 in the first place, so casting spells uses up their MP.
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TheGiz> Am I the only one who likes to imagine that Elijah Wood's character in Back to the Future 2, the kid at the Wild Gunman machine in the Cafe 80's, is some future descendant of the AVGN?

[Moogle1]

But then you have the problem of deciding which GF's MP is consumed by your magic.
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Slime Salad :: Independent Game Design

[Newbie_Power]

Actually, I recall endgame bosses having like 255 Spirit, making already useless magic do nothing.

Also though, overpowered magic by FF6 standards may not be overpowered by FF8's standards, where the basic strategy is to cast meltdown and then wail on the enemy by spamming Zell's limit break for 9999 damage per hit and the boss still doesn't die.

I think the best way to balance a spell like Ultima is to make it consume more than one spell charge (like your earlier suggestion), because not only is it a rare spell that you'll have to recollect later if you use it up, but it's also your best stat booster, so you'll take a stat hit from simply using it.

Meteor is up for question too, since it and Meltdown are the only good offensive spells in FF8.
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TheGiz> Am I the only one who likes to imagine that Elijah Wood's character in Back to the Future 2, the kid at the Wild Gunman machine in the Cafe 80's, is some future descendant of the AVGN?

[NeoSpade]

As I recall (very correctly) at the end you have the chance to go back on the Ragnorak (yay!) however...there is abslutely no-where to go, they should of put more to do after that (sub-quests), or remove the option to go back.

Giving GFs their Magic/Item /Card Mod abilities much later on in the game would help counter balance being able to get all the tornado magic you'll ever want and more within the first 3 hours of gameplay. Alternately, have it so that you don't gain Quezacolt until say; Disk 3.

Removing the stupid rules from the card game like All, Same and Wall, they where just ridiculous, and by the end of the game, when you actually need cards for spells and items no-one (apart from joker and a few others if you cmpleted the CC Club quest) has them.

Summoning animations need cutting (shivers at Edens 5 minute animation...), and the remodeling of weapons should be alot harder.

For one actually used the draw -> cast, especially because it was the only easy way to get Diablos from dot.

Thats my rant done :p

[Rya.Reisender]

Hm reminds me of my game Fatal Maze. The pickup system was often compared to the FF8's draw system.


Also there are some things to do in FFVIII's European version at the end. You can find a giant cactor and there's a secret dungeon with a weapon-type boss at the end.
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Snippy:
"curt or sharp, esp. in a condescending way" (Oxford American Dictionary)
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[Moogle1]

Those are both in the US release, but all those quests are available on disc 3. If you've done them already, there's not a lot you can do after time compression.
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Slime Salad :: Independent Game Design

[Newbie_Power]

[Moogle1]

It's possible to get all the -aga series (including Curaga), Tornado, and a bunch of overpowered stuff before Dollet.

I don't see this as a big problem. I think scaling junction rewards with character level solves most of the balance issues resulting from the junction system. If players want to spend hours making sure they're overpowered, that's not really different from any other RPG. You'll blaze through the rest of the game, probably, but it's its own discouragement. It's really boring (unless you REALLY like Triple Triad).
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Slime Salad :: Independent Game Design

[Fenrir-Lunaris]

Increace characters' total spell slots to encompass the entire selection of magic. if you WANT to carry every spell in the game, then have at it.

Casting spells does not decrease your total supply. Honestly, this would have been all you needed in FF8 to get people to consider using magic AT ALL. (Never mind that there's a mod for FF8 PC that does this)

Allow the player to spread some of the single-target spells like cure, fire, etc.

Remove the damage limit (or raise it to 99999) for all Summons. Including Chocobo and Gilgamesh.

Expand characters' command slots. I shouldn't have to choose between taking Item AND Magic into battle.

Have every character's attacks use the R1 Trigger to deal increased damage at the right time. Conversely, have the same trigger be used for enemies' physical attacks to reduce the damage slightly.

Allow Angelo to 'unlearn' some of the dumber pet tricks like Angelo Cannon, while keeping Wishing Star and Invincible Moon.

[Moogle1]

I was hoping you'd weigh in, but I find myself disagreeing with most of what you said.

Increace characters' total spell slots to encompass the entire selection of magic. if you WANT to carry every spell in the game, then have at it.

This is fine; magic-swapping is kind of a pain. But you could still hold every useful spell, so not a huge deal.

Casting spells does not decrease your total supply. Honestly, this would have been all you needed in FF8 to get people to consider using magic AT ALL. (Never mind that there's a mod for FF8 PC that does this)

I disagree for the reasons previously discussed in the thread. Magic needs to be more powerful, but have a real cost associated with it.

Allow the player to spread some of the single-target spells like cure, fire, etc.

Yes, at the very least, an ability that allowed you to spread would have been nice.

Remove the damage limit (or raise it to 99999) for all Summons. Including Chocobo and Gilgamesh.

Remove the 9999 limit for everything, period. There's no reason to cap damage; it's another reason magic sucks.

Expand characters' command slots. I shouldn't have to choose between taking Item AND Magic into battle.

I disagree. Takes away an important strategic component and leads to characters with the same skillsets doing the same things.

Have every character's attacks use the R1 Trigger to deal increased damage at the right time. Conversely, have the same trigger be used for enemies' physical attacks to reduce the damage slightly.

I was going to suggest this, but it ventures into Mario RPG territory. I still would enjoy it, but it would be less FF-ish this way.

Allow Angelo to 'unlearn' some of the dumber pet tricks like Angelo Cannon, while keeping Wishing Star and Invincible Moon.

Awful idea. Wishing Star and Invincible Moon are both horribly, horribly overpowered. They're already the two strongest limit breaks (suck it, Renzokuken), unless you're really good with Zell. Making magic stronger would make Angel Wing a viable alternative, although it could still use a buff on top of that.
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Slime Salad :: Independent Game Design

[Newbie_Power]

Making magic surpass 9999 damage wouldn't be a complete fix, in my opinion. I think magic being multi-hit (other than Meteor which is already multi-hit) would ensure they're strong moves, moreso than simply upping the damage output.

And Angel Wing is already viable due to Meteor and Meltdown, if you manage to exploit magic inventory to have her only cast forbidden spells. Meteor under Angel Wing is much like limit breaks, but it's just that Angelo stuff is simply better. Freaking invincibility and the best physical damage move is still better.
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TheGiz> Am I the only one who likes to imagine that Elijah Wood's character in Back to the Future 2, the kid at the Wild Gunman machine in the Cafe 80's, is some future descendant of the AVGN?