Search Unity

Randomization based MMORPBA

Discussion in 'Game Design' started by Appliances, Oct 15, 2015.

  1. Appliances

    Appliances

    Joined:
    Oct 15, 2015
    Posts:
    19
    Hey guys, Appliances here. I want to create an in-depth discussion about a randomized game that brings aspects from many other styles of gaming/games to create a world that is completely unique to those that play it. The ability for Players to develop their Champions in such a unique way, that hopefully no one on their server, or maybe even the world, has a champion quite like theirs. I will be discussing games such as LoL, Fable, Minecraft, and even aspects from "Roguelike" games.

    I want you to think of three questions while reading this article: is scripting a game that I am about to discuss, possible? Is a game like this, viable? And if the latter are true, then how long would it take? In this discussion we are going to break away from set storyboarding, graphics, and focus mainly on scripting capability and creativity. I myself not being a crazy scripter by any means, but knowing enough to make the discussion practical. To reduce graphic tension, the game setting will be that of a birds eye view, and similar to League of Legends. This way we can enhance skillshots, tactical gaming mentality, the impact of microclicking, and other great aspects that come with a Diablo/LoL scenario. The way the map comes to be will mimic the randomness of a Roguelike or minecraft. Characters will develop like Fable, or elder Scrolls. And without further adue, lets have some fun.

    I want to start by discussing the map setup, and how the map will come to be. The view will be birds eye with graphics similar to League or Diablo, maybe simpler for size purposes. But HOW the map is configured and spawned will be very similsr to a "Roguelike" or minecraft game. The first person to ever log into a server (hopefully there will be many servers as the game grows) will cause the initial portion of the map to spawn. Just like how if you made a new minecraft server. However, there won't be thousands of little destroyable blocks, but rather chunks of information, such as "this area is generally foresty, with evil traits, and the objects that spawn are normally a darker/erie shade of color. The spells and trainign one would aquire from this area, would be necromancer, life steal, curses, fears, and bloodrawn weaponry. However, assets with the exact opposite traits would also spawn on a more rare basis (such as your paladin trying to cleanse the area)" this type of information would be needed for each chunk of land that was force spawned after the server was created. The first chunk of land being a hometown that everyone starts in, with some characters that would help someone new to a game this advanced. The map would be in a hexagon shape, that way any new chunks could connect to eachother easily. When the first character ever, reaches the edge of the first hexagon, be causes a new one to spawn, with similar, the same, or totally different traits than the first. The map MUST be fluid, meaning a n evil zone, could eventually be turned into a heavenly zone, because of the players influence on it. This however is an advanced fluidity, so I'll give an example of simple fluidity: trees might be destroyed through battle, or, if a player finds a flute, it may cause a cave to be created under a hill which can be unlocked by playing the flute on that hill, but only with a tune that the character learned from the townsfolk, or finding a book on a dead skeleton. Both the cave, and the tune, would not have existed if the character did open a chest, and find the flute. This might Tie into how quests would be carried out.

    Character development. All characters would start as children, like in Fable. They would be a clean slate. No stats, they aren't a "mage" or "warrior" but they all have the possibility of everything. They travel the world to seek out items and quests that might benefit their current spell combo or kit. Or the champion they seek to create. It would almost be like, making your own League champion, from scratch. They would use items that helped raise stats that would make the spells they choose to play with, stronger, or more diverse. Such as the character that found the flute, would be promoted to keep that flute forever, for it might help train a heal spell, or stun spell. The flute after a long time, might even provide a unique spell of its own. Which the character may or may not use towards their battle kit. Skillshots would obviously exist. But they would develop them on their own. A character might learn "ice" and start out by only being able to just shoot a simple ball forward. But over time, they would be able to completely customize their ice. Making a circle AOE ice storm, or a cone damage type, or a more powerful straight shot. Also, all basic attacks, if the chamlion even used them, would be skillshots too. And I have a new idea on how spells would be cast. There would be a basic attack hotbar. Meaning you would hold, say Q down, and depending on when you released it, would have different effects. Say, someone with a sword could press Q, and do a stab. But holding it might be a power sweep, but holding it for a decent amount of time, might be a special basic attack. Players would be able to use this hotbar in concession with their spell kit. Such as, pressing W, causes an ice shot that goes straight, but holding it might have other effects, or holding Q, then pressing W, might be a basic attack, with the effect of ice, all being customizable by the player. And the player would attain the ability to do these things, over time, in a completely randomized world. All monsters that spawn, would also have these same potentials. They would spawn as a cleans slate. And they would also be able to continuously level up, having their own spells, like a normal character would. Making bosses, producable over time, and not specifically created. Say a monster spawns and is week, but kills another monster, so it gets stronger, and keeps getting stronger and stronger, it might become a boss for that zone. Characters might not even be able to travel that zone because the monster might be so hostile, fast, and strong, that a full team is required to clear it, or a sneaky, rogue character, would be the only ones to travel this zone.

    Quests. They would be farely random, and almost never set in stone. I'm so done with "kill ten of these, and you get this" like no, the characters should be able to find their own quests, and seek things out, because they want to, not have to. The character to get the flute, would use the flute, and eventually discover a tune that opens a cave. But he would have to seek it out himself and find it through time and on his own.

    That's about it! Let me know what you guys think!
     
  2. AndrewGrayGames

    AndrewGrayGames

    Joined:
    Nov 19, 2009
    Posts:
    3,821
    First question: What is the player doing? What's the primary mechanic?
     
    Gigiwoo likes this.
  3. Martin_H

    Martin_H

    Joined:
    Jul 11, 2015
    Posts:
    4,436
    I don't think that works well in a game with fully randomized content. Think of Dark Souls which is also very open and doesn't funnel you through a fixed progression, but if you are lost you can just check the wiki on what you could or should do. You can't have that outside source of information if everything is random. Imho the goals should be more clear cut, even if you are free in how to achieve them. E.g. in 7 Days to die your goal is to survive past day 7 and it's up to you how you do it. But due to the mechanics you'll be doing very specific things because you need to. You need food, water, shelter, weapons, tools, furnaces etc..
     
  4. Appliances

    Appliances

    Joined:
    Oct 15, 2015
    Posts:
    19
    The primary mechanics would be character development. One would be in charge of developing the "strongest" character and becoming "the best" it would take a lot of aspects from games like League and Diablo but would essentially be a free world. You'd be able to fight other players all the time when coming into contact with them. And to better your ability to fight, you would have to develop your character in more profound ways. It would be like, a giant league happening with an actual quest system. It would be like building your own LoL champion.
     
  5. Appliances

    Appliances

    Joined:
    Oct 15, 2015
    Posts:
    19
    Ya but darksouls isn't randomized really at all. It's really just a simple play through RPG with extremely MEDIOCRE and basic storyboarding. It's like playing candyland. You literally just go forward through some set paths that can't be changed. Accept if you want to win, you just look up on Google how to do so. I don't really see why the necessity to look things up on a third party program would make a game better to play. Also, many games don't have one select play through, Oblivion has countless offbranches in the story, hell, even Runescape never had one full story yet there was a time when 300k players were active at any given moment on it. You really have to be more open to exploring and finding new aspects of the game that literally didn't exist beforehand, on a day to day basis. People actually want this type of gaming as well, looking into PokémonGO as an example of a game with randomized content
     
  6. AndrewGrayGames

    AndrewGrayGames

    Joined:
    Nov 19, 2009
    Posts:
    3,821
    That all is closer to an answer. Let's narrow it down: what are the mechanics of character development in this work? What is the player doing?
     
  7. zoran404

    zoran404

    Joined:
    Jan 11, 2015
    Posts:
    520
    I don't think his idea covers any mechanics.
    It's just a typical idea of a very diverse game where you can do anything, which I believe many people thought of at some point...
     
  8. Appliances

    Appliances

    Joined:
    Oct 15, 2015
    Posts:
    19
    Ok there's a viable question, I wanted to promote the idea, and have everyone discuss the mechanics. Mechanics would include, customizable skillshots. But the ability to unlock more customizability in different skill sets according to the characters will to find them. The mechanic that I went over with combination spells, such as the basic attack hotbar, and the fact that clicking a button would cause a different effect. The player woukd seek out objects that would effect them in attaining a route to these spells and skillshots that they could use. They would literally start with nothing, no basic attack, or skillshots. Imagine In Diablo, instead of just blatantly sweeping through levels killing everything, you could either kill them, or interact with them, the interactions is what would grant spells and customizability, killing them would great lower to spells and exp, which also will allow for more customizability. The "randomness" in the game wouldnt be blantant randomness either, a chest would more likely grant an item that is related to the character that opened it, but the possibilities would still be very vast. And that weapon you got from the chest, might just have a piece to a weapon that is better. Building items would be a lot like league, where a fruit that you farmed from a tree that you protected against other players for a while, might have the possibility go be turned into a juice that can eventually be turned into a glue that allows you to have a certain leather on your hilt, making the quality of your sword more "sturdy" or maybe your knife have "less weight" making your basic attack faster. And yes, this is possible, because Runescape has already done it. There are some soups that you can only make by having the right level in like five different skills, and the items you need to make it are found across the whole game, maybe even needing to beat a whole questlines just to get one piece to finish the soup... In the game I'm describing, I want to avoid the idea of finding thousands of old game items that no one needs so they just delete it, I want a character to be able to carry these items for long periods of time, maybe eventually effecting their spells because of having that item for so long. Everything would be stat based so the item itself wouldn't matter. Two players might be trying to make a potion, so they need a seed, one player might grow a plant that has more stats than the other, therefore the seed they yield from it, would be better, making their item, slightly better. Maybe two players have similar swords, but one slows 19% and one slows 20% just because a big combination of ideas, such as one player being more rounded in ice, as well as having a better made sword. That he made and sought out himself. Other mechanics would be the parent system, a character walks to the edge of a zone, causing a new zone to spawn. That whole zone would be the parent. With certain stats. Meaning the objects, monsters, and abilities related to those stats, would also spawn, of course having room for random and opposite stat spawns. Also the idea of deletion, a wolf might spawn. But if it dies, its not just going to spawn again in the same spot in two minutes, it might be something way different, with different stats. It is up to the player to kill it, or interact with it. Interacting with it would open a lot of other possibilities as well.
     
  9. Appliances

    Appliances

    Joined:
    Oct 15, 2015
    Posts:
    19
    Also, another mechanic would be, not just fighting all the time. You would have non fighting activities like, professions and stuff. And character that came in contact with eachither, wouldn't just have to fight, they could obviously talk to eachother and choose to go about something together. The game would only show them as hostile, if you actually were hostile, or your stats were just very opposite of there's. All of the damage/healing you have done to other players around you, would totally be visible on certain stat screens available to the player. This way they could calculate just how strong their opponent is, and if the opponent is just putting out too much damage, they might choose to not fight them, or the game simply wouldn't let the higher stat player attack the lower stat player. Simple as that. Players that has similar stats would be promoted to either join together, or fight for territory and farm for long periods of time, maybe even having week long rivalrys until one player proved their dominance, to where the other player would give up, and forfeit the zone, or the game would refuse to let them fight anymore. Battles would be much longer, in league you can die in less than .5 seconds. That's not fun in an RPG. Movement would be much faster, more spells would be available, skillshots would go much farther. Combos would be more epic. For instance, imagine Lee Sin, a league champ, who can roundhouse kick someone using his ultimate ability, knocking them back, and knocking any other enemy in the way, back as well. Imagine if this "ultimate" didn't have a cooldown, but rather could only be casted after a concession of spells were successfully landed, almost like a dbz game combo, then after landing the spell combo, he could roundhosue kick them, but instead of it being a short distance like in league, its a faaarrr distance, and would possibly destroy scenery. But the scenery would be interactive, for instance, low stat rocks might be broken with simple spells and professions, but high stat rocks, might be virtually impossible to destroy. Yet a fight might occur near, it, a really heated battle, between to players, that has lasted for days, they are just racking up the damage, logging in and out, seeing each other, and immediately fighting, then one finally lands his best combo that he has, and knocks the other through that rock that no one seems to be able to break, and the rock now breaks. If everything was scripted based off stats. These ideas could easily happen
     
  10. Appliances

    Appliances

    Joined:
    Oct 15, 2015
    Posts:
    19
    No, I have a lot of specific ideas based off mechanics that I discussed. You cant even go into first person like elder Scrolls, how would that mean I'm trying to make a game where you can "do everything" no not even close lol. It's basically an open world league of Legends, that has the ability to spawn random chunks of map, like Minecraft, or a "Roguelike" game. That's pretty limited if youbask me, also I made my initial post broad, so we could discuss it as a community. But if you have no viable questions or responses I don't see how it is worth your time to even be on this chat
     
  11. AndrewGrayGames

    AndrewGrayGames

    Joined:
    Nov 19, 2009
    Posts:
    3,821
    Cool list of features.

    It doesn't answer the question, "What is the player doing?" The game is doing a lot. I can't see this being fun.

    Tell you what, let's try something different. I want you to take a day's break from this topic.

    When you come back, I want you to ask the question, "What is the player doing?" Going one step further: Pretend that the two big answers came from me. Everything you said in response to the question? I said it.

    If you can find the answer within the text - if you can find the fun of your concept in that text - put it here. If you can't, it's OK. Either way, a better discussion can be had.

    The reason I say this? I can't find the fun. It could be there, but it's lost in the hay. There's a lot of hay - and bear in mind, I live in Texas, I know a thing or two about hay. Hay Fever, not so much. But, we're not talking allergies - we're talking fun.

    Where is it? What is the player doing?
     
    Xenoun, Appliances and Martin_H like this.
  12. Appliances

    Appliances

    Joined:
    Oct 15, 2015
    Posts:
    19
    Hhmm, the players are farming for gold and experience, building weapons and items from scratch, fighting other players with customizable skillshot, leveling up, attempting to find (aka force spawn) some of the best secrets in the game, traveling the game world in which they essential create off a random basis. Becoming the strongest custom made champion. Making groups and factions to take down big monsters. Questing. Thats a lot of doing to me lol, and I already mentioned all those things, a couple of times. The reason I didn't write it so simply is because, those are pretty obvious things in an RPG. I mean, every RPG has those things. My goal here isn't to tell you what your doing. This discussion is about CREATING a different way of doing these things. I'm getting us to think deeper. Not mediocre. Stop bringing it to a shallow standpoint. Do you have any advise on, scripting methods that might help a randomized game? Maybe the ability for a pre-existing character to gain random qualities, that it didn't have before, because of the actions of a distant game object/character? Is that possible? Or are you still trying to figure out what the character is doing.
     
  13. Appliances

    Appliances

    Joined:
    Oct 15, 2015
    Posts:
    19
    Also, where is what? Every server is supposed to be a different where. That's the point haha. It's not supposed be another "and you, a super duper magical hero, born in *enter cliche fantasy town name*" also. There isn't really an ultimate "end" its not like "you won" or "you saved everyone" its like, WoW, or Runescape, constant playability.
     
  14. AndrewGrayGames

    AndrewGrayGames

    Joined:
    Nov 19, 2009
    Posts:
    3,821
    Much better. So...of all of those things: what's the most important? There's a lot of competing things going on there. What is the centerpiece around which all of this revolves? Which mechanic is the one that's driving the player forward?
     
  15. Appliances

    Appliances

    Joined:
    Oct 15, 2015
    Posts:
    19
    Character development, and battling monsters/other players. The randomization aspect, will also push players forward in a "lets see what's out there" kind of way. Say a player forces the creation of a character that is similar in stats and qualities to what the player is looking for. The player, in coalition with this character, would retrieve quests, and exp in relation to what the player would want. So the player has a skillshot. And the skillshot is just a straight shot of ice that slows people. And the player has been trying to achieve a passive for his skillshot, that stacks, and after a certain amount of stacks, the skillshot causes the enemy to root in ice to the ground. The player is reeeaallly close to getting this passive. Now say there is another player. This other player is in the same scenario. But this player has spells related to fire, and is in coalition to a game character that is also fire. The game "mechanic" would be that, it recognize that there are opposing characters nearby, their granting both players a quest, that requires the killing of, the other player, and/or the character that the other player is in coalition with. The players seek eachother out, fight, whoever wins, essentially gets the passive they want, and the other doesn't. Now the winning player can progress further into the game quicker, be because he was very better, noting that the losing player, still has many chances, in other ways, to gain the passive he wants. He might even get special buffs that help him kill the winning player later on. This battle mechanic would keep players on their toes, and would cause them to try their hardest.
     
  16. zoran404

    zoran404

    Joined:
    Jan 11, 2015
    Posts:
    520
    You've been using words "custom", which means that there are several possibilities that the player can chose, and "random" which means the server randomly chooses from several possibilities.
    But never have you mentioned any of those possibilities. There are no practical examples of those concepts you are talking about.
     
  17. Appliances

    Appliances

    Joined:
    Oct 15, 2015
    Posts:
    19
    Yes, the concept is explained more broadly until we hone in on the specifics. However. I definitely did give examples, like with the ice mage and fire mage. However, I can answer that for you. I just haven't talked about it because the convo hasn't really gotten there yet. I'll start with the biggest items, to smallest. It will in a sense be a matrix of randomization. Taking Minecraft and "Roguelikes" into context. First the player spawns on a hexagon shaped map, very similar to the LoL arena minus the specific lanes and stuff. This first hexagon (I'll just call it a hex), will be pretty similar in each server. The first player to EVER venture to the edge of this Hex, will cause another hex to spawn. This Hex will have random traits based off preset ideas, specific examples include, how it looks, what kind of monsters will spawn there, where the walkable game space looks. It will essentially spawn a random LoL jungle, but instead of their being set monsters in set jungle camps, it will be more free. And the areas will be much bigger, and the distance between walkable space will be much bigger. Each hex might have like, 10 pieces to it that allow for random interaction, for instance, areas where buildings might spawn, or be created, areas where game objects could fit, like plants, or monsters, etc. Everything would be decided from a stat. A rock might spawn, blocking a pathway so players can't reach a part of the hex, that rock might have a hardness of 10, ok, no big deal, a player would just break the rock. But that same exact rock could spawn again in another part of the hex, but have a hardness of 10,000,000, so now the players can't just break the rock, they either have to wait until their strength is really high, there weapon is really heavy, they obtain a game object that is meant to specifically smash rock, or they learn spells that allow them to teleport over it. Now say the player teleports over the rock, and is the first player on his server to do so, there might be a house, a cave, a portal, etc (also randomly placed, note the game would know that the area behind the rock is viable to have a certain amount of things spawn in it, depending on its size, its qualities, etc.). Say there is a house behind the rock. What's in the house? No one knows yet, maybe the game hasn't even decided. Create a mechanism where the random process would start, for instance, the player tries to open the door, but its locked, and because he tried to open the door, the game now knows to start adding random traits to the inside of the house. The character walks around the house, finds a key, unlocks the door, goes inside, and finds whatever the game decided would be in there. And the stuff in the house would be similar to the traits of the player who was first inside. There's a chest, he opens the chest, and again, finds something random. But everything wouldn't be completely random. It would just appear that way to the player. The player might have a flute in his inventory, so what he finds in the chest might be a book, that has a tune, that can be played on the flute. So essentially, the player, on his own, caused a whole hexagon game chunk to spawn, a rock with random attributes go block his own path, and a house, and a chest, and something inside the chest, all on a random basis. Two servers might have the same interactive plants, say the same exact tree, game model and everything, but yield different fruit.
     
  18. Appliances

    Appliances

    Joined:
    Oct 15, 2015
    Posts:
    19
    Customizability would be, spells: the character can choose what spells he has on his kit, but he can also customize how the spells work. For instance his Q would be an ice blast, but over time he would learn more about ice and stuff so he'd be able to choose how that ice blast was cast, it might be a straight line skillshot, a cone of damage, or whatever he wants. He might even be able to add a totally custom passive to it, such as, a slow, or, a root. Or whatever. Customizable items, gear, etc.
     
  19. Xenoun

    Xenoun

    Joined:
    Sep 2, 2015
    Posts:
    201
    So it's a game about exploration with a focus on character development.

    Question: If there's multiplayer and the world generates from the login/spawn point and moves outwards what happens when 10 people have explored from the spawn and move outwards? Any new people joining would then have to walk further each time before reaching "new" random content. How would the difficulty scale in terms of what they find? Does each area regenerate or have randomly occurring events so that there's always something new, even in explored zones?

    I've had my own thoughts on a game similar to this, except without so much random interaction. Would be interesting to see your answers.
     
  20. Appliances

    Appliances

    Joined:
    Oct 15, 2015
    Posts:
    19
    Of course! These are the questions I was waiting to have asked. Yes, I've definitely thought of this myself. The game shouldn't be dependent on the characters that were simply the first ones on the server, correct. I assume that would cause misbalance, and players would have to take set paths created by other players. Doesn't seem fair. I've came up with an idea that would require "adding random attributes to pre-existing game characters" which is an idea that would scripting creativity into the game. An earlier player might come across a set of ten randomly created monsters (humans, wolves, etc) and chooses to kill nine of them and befriend one. That befriended one would become stronger and offer things to the player. Remember the befriended monster could have many stats. The stats would be similar to, or unsimilar to the player that spawned it. Players would naturally get better at knowing which monsters to kill or befriend. However, does mean all players after that come through are limited to those stats? No, because the monster that Player 1 spawned, would be susceptible to a lot of other stats that Player 2 might want to access. For instance, player 1 force spawns many characters but chooses to keep the mage around. He learns from the mage. But he learns fast amounts of offensive sorcery. The second player might have already worked on potions a lot and has developed a kit that might be heavy on CC, team aid, and aoe and/or Dot casting potions towards his kit. The mage that Player 1 spawned, might also know some knowledge about potions, or is susceptible to learning about potions because of the second player. Both players would be able to interact with the same AI but on different playing fields. This would help powerboost the AI and that AI would become a known AI to many many players who have or want to increase stats or game styles that relate anything to sorcerry. Same would go for anyone who held a sword, or swords of all types, all professions would go towards a kit that players would use to combat with. A scout might be good with a bow, and a short sword, and have the ability to do many other scout things. These many things would be paths to a player who might want to be good with a short sword, but not necessarily a bow. Higher level players might also have to go backwards in the map to find a zone they have forcespawned. For instance. There might be a chunk of the map that spawns in the second ring of hexagons that is registering the possibility for a high level idea to spawn there. However it just appears normal or is sort of stagnant until a player becomes strong enough to cause that zone to produce something of high level. The player might be as far as the fifth ring of hexagons fighting way heavier monsters. But the flute that he became so good at over time, summons a high level horse that is in the second layer of hexagons where weeker creatures are. He might still have to visit those week zones, to find high level secrets. Even if he spawns a cave. That cave might become permanent which now low level champions that are still in hexagon 2 can explore and grow from, but that champions from hexagon 5 also have the ability to go back and do the same. All being effected by it differently, and all effecting it differently. To a point where the cave might become a meeting ground for all types of champions, but might eventually be destroyed by a large group of champions that became to be in a way so opposite of the people that used the cave to where they might fight for it, and defend/destroy it.
     
  21. Appliances

    Appliances

    Joined:
    Oct 15, 2015
    Posts:
    19
    So to make it short. There would be ideas in each zone that would develop to associate for large groups of people and other ideas. A player might be a potion user for all 5 moves on his kit and do healing/damage/CC/defence from just potions. Another player might have totally offensive magic. Both players might learn both kits from the same randomly spawned monster. We would have to be able to make it so monsters that spawn randomly, also have the ability to grant players large amounts of ideas, even if the randomly spawned monster, didn't spawn with the ability to do so. The monsters wouldn't spawn with the ability to grant "ice blast" they would spawn with the ability to gain the ability to teach "ice blast" if a character needed "ice blast" as a move. Or, "teleport" to a character that needed "teleport" remember combat would be a lot like league so players would have to pick and choose which spells and passives that they wanted to have that would fit in their combo. Then after they choose a spell to have in their kit, they would cause other AI to teach them MORE about those spells in their kit.
     
  22. Appliances

    Appliances

    Joined:
    Oct 15, 2015
    Posts:
    19
    Essentially we would have to script AI (and just about all randomly spawning assets) to have the ability to "gain" information and not give it. But "gaining" information in methodical ways so the assets aren't just a hodgepodge and random creation of all characters who passed by. However, an AI might have the ability to gain any ideas relating to sharp, speed, vision, and some forms of cc. That means the AI would be able to gain information from players who developed champions that had, swords, were quick, preferably had lightweight swords, were supports with vision and mobility, cc in the form of dust bombs, or critical hit point atuns. Anything relating to sharp, speed, vision, and cc. But the monster might have waayyy more players that use sharp swords rather than cc around this AI, meaning it gains more specific information, therefor expelling more specific information. But still being viable for many players. I assume you would see a much broader range of AI at lower levels, but a much more specific developed AI at higher levels in the map. Which would make sense and would reflect skill level in understanding the overall mechanic of the game, which would in turn allow characters to develop the better kit they want. Whereas players that weren't as good, would be more randomized and less defined in their kits.
     
  23. Xenoun

    Xenoun

    Joined:
    Sep 2, 2015
    Posts:
    201
    So essentially the AI learns skills from players who go to it at the same time it teaches them other skills that it already knows. That's pretty interesting, never seen that mechanic before.
    I'm guessing the AI would be capped in a certain way though otherwise it would eventually just be able to teach everything.

    Definitely some unique concepts there, would be great to see it in a game.
     
  24. Appliances

    Appliances

    Joined:
    Oct 15, 2015
    Posts:
    19
    Well, its more or less, the AI would be able to receive the information that the player carries. The AI won't necessarily learn all of the spells that every character has that interacts with it. Just some, or ones that it already knows. The AI would essentially teach players the next thing that they are looking for. You wouldn't want AIs to keep teaching them stuff they already know. Or random things. You'd want the AI to teach the player things they don't know yet, but that make sense to them. The AI has to be able to receive information, and expell information back, that is better than, and in likeliness to the player. An example would be, an AI exists that is sort of a gandalf like AI, the player received some task from the AI, while on said task, the player finds a flute. The AI has no pre-existing script about flutes, just a stat that is similar such as high "creativity". But because of this, and because the player found a flute, the AI can now teach the player a song. But at the same time. Other surrounding AI, say an old man, far far away in a town, might have no pre-existing script for flutes either, but behold, the player talks to him, and out of chance, the old man teaches the player a different song. This is how quest lines would develop; in a very natural way. The AI would be capped. Some AI might be lucky enough to spawn with the ability to learn almost anything, where most would spawn with the ability to learn only like five or six different stats, but remember, a single stat can relate to many things, so even the basic AI would still produce a lot of possibilities, where as much more important or rare spawning AIs would simply provide more.
     
  25. Appliances

    Appliances

    Joined:
    Oct 15, 2015
    Posts:
    19
    But the main reason, that I have this thread is to get help with scripting some of these ideas. Or someone to do it with me/for me. Essentially I want to build a team or something that is willing to experiment with something like this. It "sounds like a cool idea" but we need to make it happen. There are many ideas I am yet to go over still. I guess you can call this the "getting back to scripting originality" movement lol
     
  26. Appliances

    Appliances

    Joined:
    Oct 15, 2015
    Posts:
    19
    Also, I want enhance a few other ideas I've had. The first one is the Rule of 111. And what that means is, each stat, has 111 possibilities to it. This rule enhances the idea that as one grows in level and explores certain stats, their options GROW. It would essentially be a tier tree, that is upside down. Instead of having ten options at a lower level, that dwindle down to two or three options at the end. We want MORE as we go. The first idea would start, so say, "ice" and then ten options would branch off ice and would be unlocked according to the players actions or wants, then from each of those ten options, ten more would branch off, making a total of 111. This seems like a big task but for the most part, it can easily be done. And to make the number less daunting, I include my next idea, and that's related abilities. Each stat in the game would have to be able to function on its own as well as at least one other stat. Such as: a player might choose to main ice abilities. But what if the character wants to create an aoe ice storm? The character would have two options to find this type of spell. He could 1: develop an AI that has a reasonable level in the "ice/cold" stat as well as a reasonable level in the "wind" stat, or 2: find an AI with a reasonable level in the "ice" stat but no "wind" stat, and then find another completely different AI that has a reasonable level in the "wind" stat but no "ice" stat. The character would have to raise both "ice" and "wind" in order to make a blizzard type move. But we would limit the combinations to only one stat or two stats. Rule 111 would include this kind of stuff, unique passives, skillshot customization, and anything that might cause more options as the player progresses and not less.
     
  27. AndreasU

    AndreasU

    Joined:
    Apr 23, 2015
    Posts:
    98
    Path of Exile features a related way to build the character. The active abilities there are determined by which runes you slot into your gear with some runes giving passives to the abilities.

    The random map generation wouldnt really be noticed by the players since it wouldnt change after having been created.

    To me your concept sounds like a grind game like Diablo, WoW or PoE that aims to replace the story line with a fancy random quest generation (which you havent described mechanically).
     
  28. Appliances

    Appliances

    Joined:
    Oct 15, 2015
    Posts:
    19
    What's great, is that the map/enemies WOULD change after being created... That's literally my biggest point to all of this. I actually asked multiple times within this thread if we can produce a game AI that has the ability to change after being created. Note specifically, the AI would change in accordance to not only the characters, but the landscape and other AI that were also around it. AI wouldn't spawn as mages, they would spawn as something that might be able to be formed into a mage (and many other relateable things). Player influence would cause certain AI to develop in certain ways, specific and broad. Not only have you completely missed the main "game mechanic at discussion" but you've also failed to tell me how the it might come to be. Which has been my main question throughout. Diablo is random? Maybe if we prayed.
     
  29. Appliances

    Appliances

    Joined:
    Oct 15, 2015
    Posts:
    19
    The idea we are trying to script here Andreas would be: a map would spawn such a form as the LoL map, in which all monsters, trees, building, and items, would be similar to an extent according to the randomly chosen "stats" that the map itself was spawned with. The extent to this idea would be, some assets such as AI would spawn with abilities as close to the stats of the map block itself, and as far away from those stats as well. For instance, it would make sense that in a dark dead gross zone, there resides a paladin. Zones would be very large and the ability to do so would be viable due to a "LoL like graphic scene" that tends to take very little physical memory. A player that might lifesteal, or use necromancy, might travel an evil, dead, zone in the sense of making it more evil, dead, or might at least be using it to his advantage. A character that might want healing, protecting, or holy spells would either go to a heavenly/light, holy zone, OR they might end up in the dead, evil zone, but coinciding with the paladin and not the evil zone itself. The character would develop the paladin AI at great extents and therefor cause more spells relating to the paladin to be returned onto them, allowing then to further unlock spells relating to their kit. The goal here is to make a relateable stat system that is so broad, it allows for this scenario: an AI paladin spawns in a dead, dark, evil zone, with little intents or structure to his own self, a very wide range of stats that may be chosen from at any time. The paladins stat pool, for this occasion has been randomly generated to produce high numbers. A holy Player, ponders upon this paladin and coincides with it for a while, killing monsters beside it, becoming friendly with it, the paladin now starts to follow the holy Player for a said duration. Later when the seperate, a dark, evil, lifesteal Player comes in contact with the paladin, he can kill the paladin, or choose to coincide with it as well. Of course coinsiding with something that has stats quite opposite of your own, would prove difficult. But over time, protecting the paladin, an evil character might coincide with it. But for different intentions. The Lifesteal Player wouldn't want holy spells. But because the Player is so heavily influencing the Paladin AI, the players stats start reflect in the paladin. Slowly turning the paladin into a Fallen Holy Character that now represents characteristics of A Paladin, And an Evil character, creating a very epic uniqueness in not only spells, but appearance, strength, and intentions. So now an AI has been developed heavily, so in turn, the holy Player has been granted opportunity towards increased kit relating to his spell combos. He might receive a very unique "Mind Control" spell that focuses on CC and can now be used towards other AI to build them up in the path you want. AI, even AFTER spawning, MUST have the ability to change in relation to the stats of the zone it spawned it, the stats it spawned with, and the stats that Players and other AI effect it with. My idea is that the game isn't complete randomness with things spawning that have no relation with anything. But still have enough random generation to keep things unique. Each Zone would be expected to provide opportunities for players at all levels. But as the players gain increased stats, and get better at developing combos they will be viable to travel farther, and cause more unique map chunks to spawn. It is possible for a whole server to not be able to pass a certain level of game blocks. For instance, the caused the map to spawn so large, that at the edge of the map, are monsters so fierce, and clans of monsters who have similar stats that coincide with eachother at the tens and twenties and had already developed a unique area on their map. Trees, buildings, items all developed similar to them due to their massive control of that border. The border between the game area that Players are aware, and the unidentified area beyond. Once a Player, any Player, breaks through, say a rogue that was so good he snuck past them all, a holy enchantress that befriended them all, or a strong clan of warriors that won the border in battle. Once one breaks through, a whole new game block spawns, with stats similar to the block itself, and the character who entered. And some other factors according to preference. By "factors" I mean literal game script in the sense of stats. Stats like "cold" "sharp" "dark" and etc. There would be broad sets of stats that each Player, AI, game object, and zone would ALL contain and be able to share