Hello.

I am posting some general questions again about Strategy RPGs/Turn Based System games.

Please reply to both questions. Thanks!

EDIT: I have changed the questions to just one new question. 8/25

What is your goal in asking this?

Everyone prefers different types of games, and different rules within those games. Even fairly tolerant players will find that certain rules make more sense in one game design than another. Without any knowledge of your game concept, or what you're aiming for, what kind of experience or "feel" you want, and so forth, our answers are totally arbitrary and as such pretty much useless.

You might as well ask if a strategy game should be turn-based or realtime. You'll get vehement answers from both sides of the fence, and neither side is wrong.


Make a game you want to make, that you would find fun. Game design by committee (or game design by "crowdsourcing") is doomed to fail.

What is your goal in asking this?

Everyone prefers different types of games, and different rules within those games. Even fairly tolerant players will find that certain rules make more sense in one game design than another. Without any knowledge of your game concept, or what you're aiming for, what kind of experience or "feel" you want, and so forth, our answers are totally arbitrary and as such pretty much useless.

You might as well ask if a strategy game should be turn-based or realtime. You'll get vehement answers from both sides of the fence, and neither side is wrong.


Make a game you want to make, that you would find fun. Game design by committee (or game design by "crowdsourcing") is doomed to fail.

I'm making a turn based strategy game in the vein of vandal hearts and final fantasy tactics. I often read reviews of games to see what players think. Vandal hearts is one of my favoritest games of all time (the first one) and I hated several aspects of FFT's gameplay (although there are several aspects I quite like about it)--but it is considered by many to be the "gold standard' of TBS games. Personally I like alternating team movements but I read a fairly convincing article on initiative based movement like FFT's--as far as VH2's movement people either seem to love it or hate it. So I was curious to see how people would respond. I agree that about making the game I want, but some points I'm flexible on.

I agree that the most popular game mechanic isn't always best and that it strongly depends on the feel of the game and goals you're trying to achieve with the game, but with that said, I don't see anything inherently wrong with polling opinions and opening a dialogue on the benefits and drawbacks of a particular game mechanic to help decide whether you would like to include it in your own game.

I am a big fan of the tactical RPG genre and personally I like the FFT method of individual characters having their own turn rather than one team, then the other. Alternating team movements seem to make it much easier to gang up on a single character or do a lot of damage before the other team has time to respond. To me it feels more realistic and less frustrating to have alternating character movements vs team movements, though I might also be influenced by playing D&D where turn ordering is based off an initiative roll modified by various factors.

I also prefer magic or area of effect skills to affect all people in range rather than magically avoiding your allies. Again, it feels more realistic to me and forces you to be more strategic about your character placement.

Good luck with your game, I'd love to talk TRPG mechanics anytime if you'd like.

I agree that the most popular game mechanic isn't always best and that it strongly depends on the feel of the game and goals you're trying to achieve with the game, but with that said, I don't see anything inherently wrong with polling opinions and opening a dialogue on the benefits and drawbacks of a particular game mechanic to help decide whether you would like to include it in your own game.

I am a big fan of the tactical RPG genre and personally I like the FFT method of individual characters having their own turn rather than one team, then the other. Alternating team movements seem to make it much easier to gang up on a single character or do a lot of damage before the other team has time to respond. To me it feels more realistic and less frustrating to have alternating character movements vs team movements, though I might also be influenced by playing D&D where turn ordering is based off an initiative roll modified by various factors.

I also prefer magic or area of effect skills to affect all people in range rather than magically avoiding your allies. Again, it feels more realistic to me and forces you to be more strategic about your character placement.

Good luck with your game, I'd love to talk TRPG mechanics anytime if you'd like.

Sorry I didn't see this reply until just now when I stumbled on it.
I personally prefer team based combat because it's easier to set up defenses and offensive actions that way--as the FFT method seems to make it more of a free-for-all.
There are different advantages to the different systems. Vandal Hearts II tried to solve this dilemma by introducing the simultaneous move but the AI is way too predictable (active spell casters move first, ie those close enough to attack or be attacked; then units with the highest AGIL, and they always go for the weakest unit in range, otherwise an exposed back, or flank if they can't reach the back).\
So anyway message me if you ever want to talk directly, you can either meet us on IRC or IM or something.

I would say turns based on individual unit speed is best.

1. It provides another variable to make things more tactical. Knowing how quick a character can take their next turn and having moves result in longer wait times for the next turn all make you think more about what your battle plan should be. Do you use a weaker attack this turn which will let you get another turn in sooner, or do you use the strong attack now which will make your character unavailable for many turns to come? These decisions add another layer to the game.

2. It keeps the action going. If you set the game so that an entire team of units moves before your team gets to move, the problem is that you are stuck with a longer period of downtime all at once. Instead of waiting on maybe 1-2 units to take their turn... you could be waiting on 5+ units... Which is a lot of waiting. By having the FFT method of turns based on speed, you get a better mix of turn distribution. Then it's more like "you go, then I go, then you go, then you go again, then I go... etc" instead of "you go, you go, you go, you go.... finally I get to go"

3. As mentioned already, the speed based turn system just feels more realistic in terms of how a battle would play out. You'd have faster units doing more attacks over time than slower ones. You wouldn't have all of one side attack and then all of the other side. It would be all mixed together.

4. Depending on how your game is set up, having teams take turns could be really frustrating. For example, it could be possible to totally destroy a unit just by ganging up on it with all of the team's units during the team turn. There is no room left for retaliation or anything... which means your game could devolve to just having all units constantly focus on a single enemy unit... essentially each team would take turns wiping out a single enemy unit. Unless you make a single unit able to withstand an entire team's worth of attacks... which I think is a bit unreasonable. If units are surviving more than 5-6 direct attacks, then your game could take hours to finish a single battle.

I would say turns based on individual unit speed is best.

1. It provides another variable to make things more tactical. Knowing how quick a character can take their next turn and having moves result in longer wait times for the next turn all make you think more about what your battle plan should be. Do you use a weaker attack this turn which will let you get another turn in sooner, or do you use the strong attack now which will make your character unavailable for many turns to come? These decisions add another layer to the game.

2. It keeps the action going. If you set the game so that an entire team of units moves before your team gets to move, the problem is that you are stuck with a longer period of downtime all at once. Instead of waiting on maybe 1-2 units to take their turn... you could be waiting on 5+ units... Which is a lot of waiting. By having the FFT method of turns based on speed, you get a better mix of turn distribution. Then it's more like "you go, then I go, then you go, then you go again, then I go... etc" instead of "you go, you go, you go, you go.... finally I get to go"

3. As mentioned already, the speed based turn system just feels more realistic in terms of how a battle would play out. You'd have faster units doing more attacks over time than slower ones. You wouldn't have all of one side attack and then all of the other side. It would be all mixed together.

4. Depending on how your game is set up, having teams take turns could be really frustrating. For example, it could be possible to totally destroy a unit just by ganging up on it with all of the team's units during the team turn. There is no room left for retaliation or anything... which means your game could devolve to just having all units constantly focus on a single enemy unit... essentially each team would take turns wiping out a single enemy unit. Unless you make a single unit able to withstand an entire team's worth of attacks... which I think is a bit unreasonable. If units are surviving more than 5-6 direct attacks, then your game could take hours to finish a single battle.

I changed the question to nail down what would work better for people.
Yes, the battles won't be small generally and I'm generally not going after the casual gamer.

I think round robin is a bad idea for an srpg. The moment two opponents get near one another, it will turn into a back and forth until one of them dies. In a game like chess it works great because you literally take out a target in a single move. If chess pieces had hit points, it would be a crappy boring game. You'd get two pawns diagonal of one another and they'd just have to hit back and forth or risk taking a beating while moving other pieces.

Unless of course by round robin you mean that it literally goes through each character on the team in order... which.. I suppose could work out okay. But it would be a bit more predictable knowing exactly when a unit gets to move or attack.

If "players turn" just means "do anything with any single unit that you want" then I think that would be a bad design. It would encourage playing the game like you're a solo character with extra lives. You'd just control one unit until it died and then move on to the next unit. Trying to control 5+ units while the opposing team is controlling just the one would lead to being at a disadvantage because you'd have to use up a turn just moving a unit while the other team used that turn to have his unit hit yours for damage.

It would force these "back and forth" slap fights that would basically remove most of the strategy from the combat. I mean, sure you could use the turn to run away from the fight, but that doesn't really help much... The enemy could just pursue. Even if the enemy gets too close to the rest of your units, they just flee for several turns and they are safe again. In a perfect game, sure both players (or the AI and player) would move all units equally... and not focus solely on a single unit at a time. But in my mind that is what people would end up doing.

The FFT way of doing things ensures that all characters get used and each character is important in some way. I remember in FFT where the laws would sometimes make some of my characters totally useless and they'd just pass every turn because they couldn't do anything. I feel like that's what round robin style would do. You'd have the weaker units just sitting on the sidelines as you use your strongest units to do the battling.

1. One team moves/then another team moves (like Wesnoth)
2. Based on "swiftness" like Final Fantasy Tactics

[/quote]

1 if units can fight back when its not their turn, if not 2

1. One team moves/then another team moves (like Wesnoth)
2. Based on "swiftness" like Final Fantasy Tactics

1 if units can fight back when its not their turn, if not 2
[/quote]

There would be auto-counters.

I think round robin is a bad idea for an srpg. The moment two opponents get near one another, it will turn into a back and forth until one of them dies. In a game like chess it works great because you literally take out a target in a single move. If chess pieces had hit points, it would be a crappy boring game. You'd get two pawns diagonal of one another and they'd just have to hit back and forth or risk taking a beating while moving other pieces.

Unless of course by round robin you mean that it literally goes through each character on the team in order... which.. I suppose could work out okay. But it would be a bit more predictable knowing exactly when a unit gets to move or attack.

Round-robin would be where you get to move one unit, (presumably) any unit, then the opponent moves one. That same unit cannot move again until the whole turn is over. Then the next turn all units would be able to move again.