This is something I definitely need to give more thought!
I want to avoid grinding as much as possible, and I was expecting people to reject the proposed system because of how much grinding it might encourage.
I dislike the idea of levels being completely segregated from story elements, though. In MARDEK 3, characters like Meraeador joined at a much lower level than Mardek because that made sense, I thought; it'd be ridiculous if this "I've never battled before" character was suddenly on equal footing to someone who'd been doing it for years! I would have made him level 1 actually, but players complained about the level discrepancy even when it wasn't enormous. I dislike XP going to non-combatants for the same reason; what's it actually representing, then?
I'd like to just discard levels entirely, and I'm even thinking about getting rid of random battles, and instead populating dungeons with a limited number of encounters such that it's possible to fully clear them. There needs to be some reward for finishing a battle, but if they're obstacles, then clearing them is a reward in itself, sort of. This is something I've thought about for years, and in an earlier game idea, you acquired new abilities by clearing out all the instances of a given monster species in a particular dungeon. I liked that a lot.
But it's tricky, because I know why level progression exists: it's appealing to players, to feel like they're growing. So getting rid of leads to a big loss that needs to be made up by something.
I'll need to brainstorm this before coming up with something for certain, and it'd be valuable to get feedback from players once I get to that point. I'm thinking the slow progression might not be the way to go about it though.
I'm unsure how I'll be handling the party chat. In Taming Dreams, there were no level-based backstory bits unlocked, but instead there was a more complex chat system where individual characters - and pairs of characters - occasionally got new optional dialogue based on the party state, which you were alerted to by a (!) that appeared in the corner and a sound effect. Writing bits for the current situation enhanced the immersion, but it also took ages to write. One possibility is a blend of the two - and something similar to what you're describing - where characters who take part in battle get affinity points for all the other characters present, and when they reach a certain point, it unlocks a bit between them... though I'm concerned about that leading to dialogue inappropriate for the current situation. Maybe the benefits outweigh any hits to the immersion though?
I've just added this to my notes, so I might end up doing something like that! Thanks for the idea!
I want to avoid grinding as much as possible, and I was expecting people to reject the proposed system because of how much grinding it might encourage.
I dislike the idea of levels being completely segregated from story elements, though. In MARDEK 3, characters like Meraeador joined at a much lower level than Mardek because that made sense, I thought; it'd be ridiculous if this "I've never battled before" character was suddenly on equal footing to someone who'd been doing it for years! I would have made him level 1 actually, but players complained about the level discrepancy even when it wasn't enormous. I dislike XP going to non-combatants for the same reason; what's it actually representing, then?
I'd like to just discard levels entirely, and I'm even thinking about getting rid of random battles, and instead populating dungeons with a limited number of encounters such that it's possible to fully clear them. There needs to be some reward for finishing a battle, but if they're obstacles, then clearing them is a reward in itself, sort of. This is something I've thought about for years, and in an earlier game idea, you acquired new abilities by clearing out all the instances of a given monster species in a particular dungeon. I liked that a lot.
But it's tricky, because I know why level progression exists: it's appealing to players, to feel like they're growing. So getting rid of leads to a big loss that needs to be made up by something.
I'll need to brainstorm this before coming up with something for certain, and it'd be valuable to get feedback from players once I get to that point. I'm thinking the slow progression might not be the way to go about it though.
I'm unsure how I'll be handling the party chat. In Taming Dreams, there were no level-based backstory bits unlocked, but instead there was a more complex chat system where individual characters - and pairs of characters - occasionally got new optional dialogue based on the party state, which you were alerted to by a (!) that appeared in the corner and a sound effect. Writing bits for the current situation enhanced the immersion, but it also took ages to write. One possibility is a blend of the two - and something similar to what you're describing - where characters who take part in battle get affinity points for all the other characters present, and when they reach a certain point, it unlocks a bit between them... though I'm concerned about that leading to dialogue inappropriate for the current situation. Maybe the benefits outweigh any hits to the immersion though?
I've just added this to my notes, so I might end up doing something like that! Thanks for the idea!