Game Design: Champions Online

[Dynamo]

Re: Game Design: Champions Online

 

I like Java myself' date=' but this is an excellent idea. Flash definitely rivals Java for rapid development. Since I'd like something turn based and GM hosted, Flash web site would be a natural fit.[/quote']As long as we aren't looking to create an immersive 3D environment with rich graphics and sound, I agree that Java, Python, Flash or C# would be perfect for the project. The RAD abilities of these languages would make them a better choice than C++ to create an Online Battlemat program that supports Hero SPD-based combat turns and GM control.

[BNakagawa]

Re: Game Design: Champions Online

 

I am a relic of the first attempt to bring Champions to the PC. (back then we had 386s)

 

One thing that must be kept in mind is that the HERO system, while incredibly flexible, really only works well within a narrow range of values.

 

One person's game might feature CVs in the 5-7 range, another might feature CVs doubling that. Writeups from one game are almost certain to be unplayable in the other.

 

So, you're going to have to implement some sort of benchmarking system in order to make sure that people don't make broken characters, intentionally or not.

 

One way to accomplish this is to establish average values for important things like Dex, CVs, SPD, defenses, attacks. Then you could introduce packages that added or subtracted to make quicker, light fighters or slower bruisers. You lose some flexibility, but it'll make the game easier to pick up for the novice.

 

Also, the game in general is context sensitive. You'll need to pick some setting that everyone can wrap their heads around quickly and easily. A player won't know what to expect from a disad if they don't know what's in the campaign world. x2 effect from magic attacks might be irritating in one campaign, suicidal in the next. No way to tell unless you have designed the setting first.

 

That said, I'd love to see something playable emerge...

[White Russian]

Re: Game Design: Champions Online

 

I am a relic of the first attempt to bring Champions to the PC. (back then we had 386s)

 

One thing that must be kept in mind is that the HERO system, while incredibly flexible, really only works well within a narrow range of values.

 

One person's game might feature CVs in the 5-7 range, another might feature CVs doubling that. Writeups from one game are almost certain to be unplayable in the other.

 

So, you're going to have to implement some sort of benchmarking system in order to make sure that people don't make broken characters, intentionally or not.

 

One way to accomplish this is to establish average values for important things like Dex, CVs, SPD, defenses, attacks. Then you could introduce packages that added or subtracted to make quicker, light fighters or slower bruisers. You lose some flexibility, but it'll make the game easier to pick up for the novice.

 

Also, the game in general is context sensitive. You'll need to pick some setting that everyone can wrap their heads around quickly and easily. A player won't know what to expect from a disad if they don't know what's in the campaign world. x2 effect from magic attacks might be irritating in one campaign, suicidal in the next. No way to tell unless you have designed the setting first.

 

That said, I'd love to see something playable emerge...

 

I remember poking at a demo of that.. must have been at a Slugathon, I think, if my recall serves me right.

 

Wow, take me back.

[StGrimblefig]

Re: Game Design: Champions Online

 

Emphasis mine

As long as we aren't looking to create an immersive 3D environment with rich graphics and sound' date=' I agree that Java, Python, Flash or C# would be perfect for the project. The RAD abilities of these languages would make them a better choice than C++ to [b']create an Online Battlemat program that supports Hero SPD-based combat turns and GM control.[/b]

I wonder whatever happened to Herosphere? The last update on their site appears to be from August 2004.

[Dynamo]

Re: Game Design: Champions Online

 

Emphasis mineI wonder whatever happened to Herosphere? The last update on their site appears to be from August 2004.

As I recall, Herosphere was being done in someone's spare time. A programmer's spare time is fleeting. He'd probably love to get back to it, but after this much time, the code may be more or less impenetrable without a complete review, even to the original author. I'd be happy to see it further developed, but I would also be surprised.

[Dynamo]

So' date=' you're going to have to implement some sort of benchmarking system in order to make sure that people don't make broken characters, intentionally or not.[/quote']Most of the current crop of MMOs do this with classes and levels, something I'm trying to avoid, but I'm still aware of a need for a benchmarking standard.

 

I'm thinking of something similar to the Low-Powered -> Standard -> High-Powered -> Cosmic graduations in Hero, but more granular with many more levels. Several different composite attributes such as best attack damage (and/or a weighted average of all attacks), primary defenses, movement, combat values (with some some metric to weight shifting values between best attack OCV and DCV) and skill rolls are constrained by the Power Rank (need a better name) of the character. While a character occupies a given Power Rank, the constrained attributes cannot be improved beyond the upper range of the next Rank. When all the character's contrained attributes have advanced to at least the lower range of the next Rank, the Character's overall Power Rank increments, allowing individual constrained attributes to be advanced into the next Rank.

 

A character's Power Rank, maybe with a sub-incremental metric to capture current advancement toward the next Rank, will determine the difficulty of foes generated for instanced scenarios. For example, the Street-level hero will face punks and scrubs and low-powered supervillains, while a higher ranked hero will face trained agents with normal-powered supervillains, or high-powered demon hordes with a major archvillain.

 

To allow players to team up across Power Ranks, a variation on CoH's Sidekick/Exemplar exemplar can adjust a character's Power Rank by directly decreasing or increasing OCV/DCV, DEF, and DC into the Rank of the scenario owner. The sub-incremental metric mentioned above can be used to place the character in an equivalent development point within the temporary Power Rank as occupied in the current Rank.

[AdamLeisemann]

Re: Game Design: Champions Online

 

I will admit, I am seriously in favor of a Turn-based MMO. I can't seem to find any for my budget ($0.00), but I want to know this: How would you handle the infinite possibilities for characters and SFX that makes Champions so darned fun? Not all of us are capable of creating User-content, which would seem neccesary in a Champions MMO.

[Dynamo]

Re: Game Design: Champions Online

 

While a turn-based Internet-capable game similar to Neverwinter Nights would be workable, I just don't see a turn-based MMO getting any market traction. I could be wrong.

 

The Neverwinter Nights general model permits both GM-arbitrated and GM-less play based on a pre-written scenario. It can be played single-player or over any network connection to a hosted server, supports persistent environments, and can be linked to other servers to allow characters to pass between.

 

As I mentioned above:

[...] its ability to model anything the player can conceive will forever be limited by available animations and artwork [...]

So initial Power constructs would be pregenerated a la USPD, with customization options appropriate to the Power and SFX. In a perfect world, a library of animations and artwork would be accumulated, crafted by developers and the community, supported by a similar library of Power constructs. A user would elect to buy a Lightning Bolt, choose and customize the Power construct from a menu system, and then choose from a menu of animations (one-handed with heroic pose, leap in the air with a two-fisted forward thrust, baseball pitch with windup, etc).

[gojira]

Re: Game Design: Champions Online

 

You'll probably have to establish absolute ranges for characters in addition to average starting values.

 

One energy-projecting demi-brick being followed around by six people with nothing but Aid powers is going to be game breaking. If the game is free, peole will just make alts to follow themselves around.

 

City of Heroes is running into this now. They just had to make a large number of buffs non-stackable. Establish a max value that you can't buff beyond. Then balance the campaign around that. Alternately, require all Aids etc. to be non-stackable.

[Dynamo]

One energy-projecting demi-brick being followed around by six people with nothing but Aid powers is going to be game breaking.

That depends upon what we give them for aggro-management powers. If the opposition in instanced scenarios scales to team-size and Power Rank, then we have a large spawn of foes who may or may not decide they need to bash on the buffee. Foes in WoW already aggro nicely to buffers and healers. CoH has the ability in its aggro algorithm, but the values are zeroed out. Can you say Squishies?

 

If play is balanced around a maximum buff value, the game becomes unsoloable. If I make a game like that, my wife has a small fund set aside to have me killed, since she hates teams larger than a duo.

 

It's not that hard to devise an algorithm to create opposition in an instance that scales to team-size and Power Rank. With a little more skull sweat buffers, tanks, healers, debuffers, crowd control or any other functional specialization can be accounted for, even Disadvantages. Especially if a character has a Reputation. If I was a mastermind in a superheroic setting and heard that Icy McIcer, known for a critical weakness to heat and flame, was gunning for me, I'd make damn sure to get Amana Range and Mike Rowave on my payroll real quick.

City of Heroes is running into this now.

I disagree. 2 scrappers and 6 defenders have been able to steamroll on Invincible since the Reputation system was devised. Neither I nor the developers (AFAIK) think this is a problem.

Alternately' date=' require all Aids etc. to be non-stackable.[/quote']Hero already has limits to how much one buffer can Adjust any one thing. Keep that and have the buffing limit applied per buffee not per buffer. So a STR buffer who can add up 25 adds 12, and then another with a limit of 20 adds 11. Only 8 of that 11 gets added before the 2nd buffer reaches his limit. The first buffer can come back and add 5 more until his limit is reached.

[eavatar]

Re: Game Design: Champions Online

 

my 2 cents

 

The whole mmog idea is awesome, but let's be practical. Who are the main target? We or the general public? What is the combo chances and the perfect build chances? MMO people usually plays doing perfect builds and perfect combos characters. And that could be against the champions spirit.

 

My vote is for a system like NWN, someone write the story and build the world, you play the game following the story done by someone else.

[Dynamo]

Re: Game Design: Champions Online

 

My vote is for a system like NWN' date=' someone write the story and build the world, you play the game following the story done by someone else.[/quote']Since this is purely a brainstorming discussion, we are free to "develop" as many versions of a Champions CRPG as we like. In fact, thoughts about one particular genre of game can easily be useful to the other genres. For instance, the costume designer and figure-rendering could be literally identical in a MMO, a NWN-style game, and a 3D battlemat utility. Code libraries for attack resolution can also be cross-utilized should any such project go that far.

 

A game with similar features to NWN could be used by an alliance of groups to link together servers into a large persistent world. A sufficiently large number of players, GMs, and servers and the network begins to resemble a small-scale MMO.

[Dynamo]

Re: Game Design: Champions Online

 

I tried to edit the main Subject line for this thread so I can continue to use it without getting it confused with the official Champions Online, but it didn't work. So aside from this bump, I'll let this thread die and start another referring back here when I get the urge to continue the topic.

 

What? It's my thread. I can necropost it if I want.