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[SirNiko]

Reduce the number of battles, but make the remaining battles more varied and interesting, possibly with lots of scripted reactions to different tactics to keep the player on their toes. When they use fire, the monster complains about burnt fur, or it laughs if you cast a spell of an element that heals it. Plus, lower encounter rates are nice for when the player wants to investigate an area.

I think the problem with RPG battles is that repetition makes them bland. After the first few fights, the battles don't require much thought until you reach a boss or meet a new monster.

-SirNiko

[s0]

How about eliminating random encounters altogether and reducing combat to a fixed number of "story-relevant" battles as well as a few optional ones, possibly related to sidequests. It would eliminate grinding and make each battle matter.

[X3N]

CAsinclair

i haven't gotten to any battles in your game yet, but the one thing i'd recommend, as a general rule, is not to use random battles, instead plan out each battle carefully, with a progressive difficulty as you go through a dungeon, and having no two battles against the same exact configuration of enemies, the way lunar and chrono trigger did. excitement requires not repeating the same battle you've already fought for the tenth time.

[gimymblert]

You can have battle with same exact configuration of enemies BUT ensure it is not the same situation each time:

Enemy that are hard to beat with physical weapon but weak against fire magic. The first time you have not yet the fire magic, the second time? REVENGE  .

Resources decay battle. You have to get accross a field fill with the same party of enemy with random occurrence. They are weak and are dispatch in a few hit. But there is no inn, no way to replenish your potion, no place to set a tent, no healer in your party, no healing loot, and they are fast, they always get the first hit. Of course at first player would be overconfident, but has they progress in the field, even if they level up, they HP dangerously get close to zero. The only way to avoid that is to remove the best equipment to gain agility (assuming you have a correlation between stat) so your party can ALWAYS fly away before risking a hit. This kind of "turn the table" experience is always memorable! especially when correctly time.

etc...

Generally that mean thinking combat as an optimization puzzle with different designed best strategy for the player to find, according to what he get to that point of the game.

[Inanimate]

i haven't gotten to any battles in your game yet, but the one thing i'd recommend, as a general rule, is not to use random battles, instead plan out each battle carefully, with a progressive difficulty as you go through a dungeon, and having no two battles against the same exact configuration of enemies, the way lunar and chrono trigger did. excitement requires not repeating the same battle you've already fought for the tenth time.

This is really important, because you can totally do this easily with RPG Maker!

[s0]

CAsinclair

i haven't gotten to any battles in your game yet, but the one thing i'd recommend, as a general rule, is not to use random battles, instead plan out each battle carefully, with a progressive difficulty as you go through a dungeon, and having no two battles against the same exact configuration of enemies, the way lunar and chrono trigger did. excitement requires not repeating the same battle you've already fought for the tenth time.

I confess I didn't read the whole thread. But my suggestion was a bit different anyway. What I meant was having relatively few battles, but making them all story-relevant in some way, as well as not even including the possibility for grinding by making battles non-repeatable (Or were they in Chrono Trigger? Can't remember). This would probably push the game in a much more adventure-like direction though...

[SidM]

Shining Force 2 is a good example of limited battles which mostly tie into the story, with non random encounters.

But it is more of a tactics game than your regular RPG

[supershigi]

Wow!  I'm so amazed... I didn't expect to return to this thread and see so many wonderful replies, so thank-you to everyone who is helping me brainstorm, I really appreciate it ^_^  I wrote down as many ideas as I could from reading through the thread, and I'm going to see what I can do with them.   

Yes, I am using rpg maker (XP), and I'm trying to do as many interesting and strategic things as I can within my current system as the game itself is already almost complete.  I just want to spice up the battles so they are more fun.  Oh, and thankfully I don't have any random battles (I hate those, I always find them so distracting when I'm trying to explore!).  Instead, the enemies are walking around the screen, and you'll go to battle if they touch you.  There are a couple forced battles per area, the rest are optional since I have a lot of friends who want the option to grind for "rare drops" like pets or things you can put in your base, hehe

I liked Parthon's example of the robot boss with 3 heads (each head having a different elemental weakness, and the body being immune while the heads are up);  I also like Moth's wind-up clock enemy example (similar to Black Tyrano in Chrono Trigger).  I wonder if this is possible to do in rmxp... I'll investigate   I think tonight I'm going to try and brainstorm more bosses that have crazy mechanics like this that would hopefully work within my battle system... and of course if anyone has any more examples like those, I'd love to hear them!

*runs off to get some tea to help think more clearly*

[Inanimate]

I remember RMXP having enemy programming, so I think it's definitely possible.

[Ben Kuhn]

I'm a believer in as few random encounters - and in fact as few fights in general - as you think you can get away with. Not only does it make each one more interesting, but you can make them more lethal as well, thus raising tension. And it's much more fun to die from one tough battle than by endless attrition with a series of wimpy enemies. (Not to mention that for most games there's a point after which you simply don't have to worry about dying in random battles because you have so many healing items or healing magic and MP-restoring items.)

Have you ever played Legacy of Flan (http://www.scottgames.com/)? It has an absolutely stellar take on traditional JRPG battles. You're completely healed after every battle, so there's no attrition whatsoever. And the most important part of combat isn't simply wailing on the attack button, but messing with status effects and figuring out synergies between different moves. I doubt that most of the stuff there will work for you with RPG Maker, but you can certainly borrow a few ideas.

Oh, another thing: try to keep special abilities useful for as long as possible. That is, if one of your characters has a special technique that's just a normal attack but with double damage, obviously that character will never ever use a normal attack. This is both boring and annoying (because usually it takes a while to go and select that attack every turn). It adds a lot more spice if you have more options to consider, so if one move is stronger than another in one way, it should have some drawback against it to balance out. And keep in mind that at the end game, even a Magic Point (or whatever) cost probably won't count as a legitimate drawback because people usually end up with a crapton of Magic Points / restoring items at the end.

[Moth]

The pendulum boss is really easy to make in any version of RPG Maker. In XP, make the instant death attack a skill it uses (just make its damage 9999 or something) and make sure it's the only attack the boss has.

Under the enemy's list of actions, right click the insta-death skill and go to "Properties". Under preconditions, check Turn and make it "2 + 2 x"; this will make it happen once every other turn starting on the second turn. Also check "Switch is on" and select a switch used to determine whether he should use the attack or not. (Make sure the switch is turned on at the first turn of combat or before the fight)

Then you can do the winding up however you want. If all you want is for it to be functional a simple battle event like in this image should suffice. If you wanted to be fancier, you could do it all with skills that trigger common events but that's really tedious.

[X3N]

CAsinclair

i haven't gotten to any battles in your game yet, but the one thing i'd recommend, as a general rule, is not to use random battles, instead plan out each battle carefully, with a progressive difficulty as you go through a dungeon, and having no two battles against the same exact configuration of enemies, the way lunar and chrono trigger did. excitement requires not repeating the same battle you've already fought for the tenth time.

I confess I didn't read the whole thread. But my suggestion was a bit different anyway. What I meant was having relatively few battles, but making them all story-relevant in some way, as well as not even including the possibility for grinding by making battles non-repeatable (Or were they in Chrono Trigger? Can't remember). This would probably push the game in a much more adventure-like direction though...

Oh, I see. Sort of like FF Tactics (story based battles, which were kind of long and interestingly set up) with less battles and add exploring?

I wrote down as many ideas as I could from reading through the thread, and I'm going to see what I can do with them.   
*runs off to get some tea to help think more clearly*

Are you editing your RPG or designing a new one?

[Moth]

Did you read the original post?

I'm developing an rpg called Melolune [...] what I'm currently doing is tweaking the database to make things feel more balanced.

[X3N]

Did you read the original post?

I'm developing an rpg called Melolune [...] what I'm currently doing is tweaking the database to make things feel more balanced.

I always read every post before I respond to a thread.
But.. that habit is usually only exercised once, and subsequent replies may have forgotten information. Thank you for the answer though 

[J. R. Hill]

I liked the rhythm-based attacks in Mother 3. It made me feel like I was more involved in the action (unlike most turn-based battles where you just feel like you're rolling dice).

This a million times, although good luck doing it in RPG Maker.  Good advice in the rest thread though, for sure!

Anyway now I have to play Mother 3 again since it's been like 3 and a half years since I played it.

 
ヒナワさん・・・

[starsrift]

I always liked Square's mixing things up with some of the boss battles - like Ozzie in Cronotrigger, where you slash at ropes to open a pit to make him fall, rather than just attack him - or like Final Fantasy X where you get additional commands during the battle for some characters, such as talking to the enemy or moving the airship forward and back. A little bit of scripting like that makes the battle stand out and be memorable.

Now I'm thinking about what I just wrote and how I could possibly incorporate that into a procedural game...

[J. R. Hill]

Now I'm thinking about what I just wrote and how I could possibly incorporate that into a procedural game...

Just have certain events that only occur once and include different commands.