kieranmillar wrote:
Therefore it is often better to not specifically focus on making specific monsters that reward gaining defense, and not treat gaining defense as some sort of "alternative path" to gaining attack. Instead treat it as something that saves damage in a different way with different timing. It's often more interesting to have to focus on raising both anyway.
Well, I have to correct you on this point, because testing
Tetrahedron has made me think a lot more closely about ATK and DEF "
paths"
.
A large number of holds have altars (again I'm using this as a catch-all name, no matter what they are called in a specific hold), which continually force the player to choose between gaining ATK and DEF. Even if there are no altars, there may be micro-decisions, e.g. a cache containing one or more power gems, and a cache containing one or more shield gems, and a trapdoor/bridge setup ensuring you can only take one. And even without decisions of the "
lost forever"
type, in most holds you constantly have to choose which stat to raise
now with the resources you currently have.
And the thing is, the more the player concentrates on one stat, the more it becomes beneficial to continue concentrating on that stat rather than balancing the two. Let's say at some point you have to choose between a single power gem and a single shield gem. If you've concentrated on raising ATK, you've concentrated on reducing
the number of hits you take from enemies, so the shield gem is comparatively lowered in value. If you've concentrated on raising DEF, you've concentrated on reducing
the amount of each hit, so the power gem is comparatively lowered in value. It's inescapable, unless you have a hold with only one type of gem so that the choice never arises.
In my post on altars in the other thread, I suggested one possible way to encourage a "
mixed"
route: have the altar offer a mixed option, and make it so that taking the mixed option twice gives more than taking ATK and DEF once each. Now that I've remembered this, I'm considering adding such an option to
Tetrahedron. However, even if I do that (or if someone does in another hold), this only creates an additional "
path"
, it doesn't change the fact that the choice of paths is a very real phenomenon.
So, what does this imply for setting monster stats?
Some monsters strongly encourage gaining ATK (Rock Golem, Swordsman), while others strongly encourage gaining DEF (Rattlesnake, Slayer). However, monsters in the latter category
can be tackled on an ATK path, and their damage
can be reduced by gaining more ATK (or equivalents such as Invisibility Potion, Wyrmsmiter). Golem-type monsters are simply impassable obstacles on a DEF path, unless you can gain just enough ATK to hurt them.
That means that if you use too many of one type of monster, you are taking a potentially interesting choice away from the player, or punishing them for taking the "
wrong"
path. Look at how
Tower of the Sorcerer / Tendry's Tale handles it: there is only one Rattlesnake, and it guards an optional extra. There are a few Swordsmen, but they can all be avoided by taking alternative routes, except the ones in the boss battle -- and those are placed so that they always get in one hit, reducing the difference between the paths. There is only one Adder, and completing the normal route gives you a Wyrmsmiter. There's plenty of HP available on the last level, so that the Slayer is viable on either path.
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50th Skywatcher