In my current game I am starting to have some problems with keeping track of skillpoints.
You know, some choices give you points in strength, others wit. And if you have a certain amount of points an action might work or not. That all works fine for chapter 1.
But with different paths etc. it starts to become kinda hard to keep track of it all. So far I have made a semi spreadsheet in excel, but at best it shows me the maximum skillpoints you can have at certain points. No idea how many other point you might have in the other stats.
So, what I was wondering,
.1. How do you keep track of the points that you awarded?
.2. How many points do you think is a reasonable amount to make a action succeed (you can have a max of 10 points, so with 7 points it will work because you might have taken other skillpoints at some point).
.3.How has your day been so far? It seemed like the polite thing to do was to show some interest in you after all these problems Iâm trowing at you
Thanks for reading, and if you post something, thanks for that too.
Interesting well letâs see hereâŚplanning on putting in a skill point system in my game as well, but limited at 10
I would say 0-3, for small minimal things. 4-7 for medium difficulty and 8-10 for higher and more harder difficulty.
My days going good.
And it would be quite simply if you were using if commands.
*if skillpoints > 7
*set beatboss
*goto victory
*else
*goto fail
*label victory
You beat the final boss!
*finish
*label fail
You did not have enough skillpoints to win.
*goto_scene death
It could help to made a go sub if you plan on using the skillpoints a lot, to make sure your points never go over. Itâll make sure the MCâs skillpoints never fall below 0 or above 10, though you would need it in the scene every time your using skillpoints. Especially if itâs a stat you wonât have any need of keeping track of many there are so you can focus on building that game!
If this wasnât what you were looking for or have questions on it please donât hesitate to let me know. I blame exhaustion for any misunderstandings =p
Thereâs two things that factor in to this: a) When the player gets upgraded stats, and b) how large and complex of a range the stats can be.
a) If everythingâs frontloaded, itâs easy: Mark down what a âdifficultâ check would be and extrapolate from them. If itâs more about getting points over the course of the story, youâve got more to worry about, as you constantly have to update your âmaxesâ.
b) If the stat range is simple, 1~10 and only 2~4 stats, itâs easy to note down what âpathâ of stats leads to what, giving a small margin for straying from their path. If however, your stats fluctuate or are more heavily interconnected, it becomes a larger problem.
Now something worth noting: Random test: So long as your game doesnât have complex parts which loop in on themselves with only one path out, you can randomtest your game with a large number to get a fell for how âdifficultâ a check is. I really recommend it.
The max 10 was mend as an example because Iâm quite certain Iâm going over it. It it was more mend like, do you think 70% of the max is a good idea for the best outcome since there are six different skills.
So the greatest problem right now is keeping track. I do know how to use *if (fighting <= 1) etc.
Ah then go sub will indeed solve your problem, by automatically limiting it. Like you just said. Your first command would decide if the player won or not. The go sub would then check when the mc is gaining or losing skillpoints if itâs going over or under and automatically put a stop to it, or cap. Same would go for any other skill, though itâs mainly used for percentagesâŚ
And as reaporra just mentioned, itâs also helpful if your going more advance to check up on it in random test. A shame my own random test doesnât work, but ah well.
@Reaperoa Well, I am trying to keep the number of skills limited to six. More would be to complex for me Iâm afraid. And I donât like more than that anyway as it makes games feel inaccessible or unclear or something like that. Not completely what I mean, but not that important right now anyway.
Things are definitely not frontloaded (had to look up the meaning of that). Going for a, âIt is a bad plan that cannot be changedâ writing attitude. so my current planning consist out of three lines a chapter for global direction.
So yeah, Iâm constantly updating the maximum.
That on itâs own is doable, but part of the difficulty there is keeping a proper maximum. The further you get the less likely people are to be near the maximum as they will chose points in other skills too. So the further they get, the less they have the maximum I will have to use. And some problems getting a good balance for that.
As for paths.Chapter one is rather linear in that it ends on the same spot. Second chapter three paths but again ending at the same spot. Chapter three starts to get separate paths.
So, for your direct answers, Iâm already dreading direct answer 1 since Iâm afraid that itâs going to be an important tool. But I will spare you and use my own head.
And I guess that for now I will keep using excel and lots and lots of testing through playing.
Again, of someone has any good tips for me, let me know.
All my skills are in 5s (0, 5, 10 etc.). Different classes also have different skills in my game, so I try to have various lower skill checks (10-30) and only a few higher ones, until later in the game when players have had a chance to specialize in what they prefer.
I am only one day into my game (the entire game takes place in roughly a week) and have already accidentally made a couple of skill checks totally impossible. I am starting to keep track of it, which in my case involves a bunch of color-coded numbers with arrows between them, then some running totals at various relevant points. Then whatever I actually need to know can be added up without trying to figure out how to plan for or plug in every possible addition function.
I only use Excel for really simple stuff, like the class schedules of all of my major characters (there are eight students that I can look up as of any of my eight periods in the day, so thatâs 64 locations - simple!)
If you know the maximum and you want to to do a stat check to allow/disable a choice, why not just check if it is above, below or equal to an arbitrary fraction or percentage of the maximum?
*if strength > (10 * 0.4) test code
In other words, if strength is greater than 40% of the maximum, in this case 4, then run whatever you want your code to be. If you can only have a maximum of 10 points, that makes calculation fairly straightforward. If it goes higher than that, then either youâll need to manipulate what you to divide or multiply by to give full integers or conversely allow your stats to have decimal places.
The primary issue here is that you donât appear to have an upper limit on your stats, which would make everything easier to calculate from the outset and also would ensure that all your stats have parity with each other which is important. Say your upper limit for every stat is 12. That means you know every check (like the example above) has to be a factor of 12 to give you a whole number.
*if strength > (12 / 3) test code
Similarly, if your upper limit is 50, for example, you can use percentages of the maximum.
since Iâm afraid that itâs going to be an important tool. But I will spare you and use my own head.