Frayed Knights: Call Me Imbalanced
Here is the latest updates on the development of Frayed Knights, the comedic indie RPG in development at Rampant Games:

One of the frustrating-but-cool things about focusing on a later chapter of Frayed Knights right now is that it's forcing me to worry about the higher-level game. This means focusing on leveling up, higher-level powers, and spells.

And here's where I run into some issues.

Being Imbalanced and Breaking the Rules
The easiest handle spells and power balancing is to work on a sliding scale. Level 1 powers to 1 die of damage - level 2 powers do 2 dice of damage, level 3 powers do 3 dice of damage, etc. It works. It's safe. It's easy to balance. And it's boring.

More interesting is, say, a spell that causes another spellcaster to sneeze as he's casting his next spell, which has a chance of causing the spell to fail, backfire, or to randomly become some other spell as its cast.

More interesting? Definitely. More fun? Maybe. I'm not sure yet. But how do you balance something like that? How does it compare to a fireball which should do an average of 20% damage to any number of opponents of approximately the same level?

And does it really matter? In an MMORPG, of course, balance is everything. Players will complain bitterly at any perceived imbalance, as it directly effects the "fairness" of the game for them. Obviously this is true in PvP combat. But it is also an issue in the ostensibly cooperative, massively-multiplayer game worlds. It's an issue with pickup groups - a member of a less desirable class can find themselves reliving their most humiliating elementary school experiences as they watch everyone else get chosen for groups ahead of them. Players are concerned about the survivability of their characters in a harsh, unfriendly environment that was designed to be a challenge for someone more powerful than them. There element of competition may not be as direct as it is in PvP, but it is still there, under the surface, permeating every aspect of the design.

I've heard it argued that in smaller, cooperative roleplaying games - the type of environment Frayed Knights is attempting to emulate - balance is not only less important, but actually runs counter to what makes the game fun. What is important is not making sure that everybody is approximately equal in mathematical equation in points-per-second or points-per-round, but that every player has an equal opportunity to shine. You don't want a homogenized, approximately equal group of characters (or of powers) - you want a wildly varying group that somehow compliments each other.

After some consideration, I'm inclined to agree with that argument.

Granted, you don't want any one character class or power or spell to be so imbalanced that it hogs the spotlight, or becomes overused because it is clearly superior to all other choices. But within those broad guidelines, the design rule I'm trying to follow for Frayed Knights is this:

1. Balance is Boring! Imbalance (within reason) keeps things interesting and fun.

Then there's another aspect of the higher-level game that gives me a headache. Another design rule I'm trying to follow, as painful as it is:

2. Cool, fun abilities (be they from feats, powers, skills, magic items, or whatever) break the rules.

What sucks is, as a programmer, following the rules is easy. Breaking the rules means a lot of extra work. Giving a sword a +1 bonus to damage is freakin' trivial. Giving a sword a +100 bonus to damage is just as trivial. It follows the rules, and just adds a modifier to the math. No harm, no foul.

Creating a sword that can summon a genie after it is soaked with enough blood, or that can sing showtunes on demand, or can do any number of non-swordly effects... that's a pain.

But which sword is more interesting? Which is more fun? Maybe in an MMO, it's all about the Damage Per Second (for some players) - but outside of that competitive environment, it's more fun to have something that gives you new options, or something that's just cool and unique. Something that goes outside the boundaries and breaks the rules.

Fun for the player. Not so fun for me. That complicates code. Time for me to grow more imbalanced...

Progress Report
We are slowly cranking along here on the Mournhold stuff for the next Utah Indie Night, scheduled for April 30th.

Kevin's been furiously building the vampire's castle. It's still very early, and he'll probably be mad at me posting the image here, but here's what we've got so far.

Mike's been working on a theme for the village - it's just a guitar line right now, but he's expanding on it.

We've got the concept artist working on artwork for the vampire and his mistress. We'll see how those look soon.

As for me - my goal (before discovering how crazy this week would be with the day job and a family matters) was to get the first five minutes of this chapter working before Monday. I'm still working on that goal, but I'd say it's pretty high-risk right now. I mean, yeah, I could slap something together in a couple of hours with the existing code and everything... but at this point, we're pushing for stuff of final-product quality. I'd rather have it unfinished than throw-away.

Labels: Frayed Knights, Game Design, Roleplaying Games

- posted by The Rampant Coyote @ 8:07 AM (Permalink)