Improve a Battle System

[Wolf Kanno]

Inspired by this old thread (http://home.eyesonff.com/showthread.php/127438-Improve-a-battle-system!), what would you do to improve the battle systems of any of the FF games of your choosing?

[Pumpkin]

Speed up the ATB in IX and make the Trance system more like X where you can save it for when you need it

[Laddy]

Final Fantasy XIII

~Give each character two or three unique job classes that you swap with each paradigm shift that gives each character a modicum of personality and uniqueness. Like let Snow swap between Berserker and Monk given the situation and require planning your paradigms accordingly for maximum synergy.

~Remove Auto-Battle

~Add unique commands i.e. Jump, Mix etc.

~Regardless of job, give each an Attack command and each character's weapon(s) have a certain ATB cost based on side and raw power. Sazh's guns should be weaker but cost 1 ATB segment whereas Fang deals powerful all-out damage with 3 segments. This allow for greater mixing-and-matching.

~Give the player the option to control all three characters.

~Remove the arbitrary grading system.

~Replace the lame pseudo-Sphere Grid with a different system. I recommend one that's similar to Final Fantasy IX, where certain equipment teaches character's certain abilities, both active and passive.

~In addition, why not give each character a different equipment set per job class? Like Sazh may be a gun-wielding Blue Mage with light armor and quick but weak attacks but he can swap to a Ranger with heavier armor, a rifle, and bigger HP/Damage but make him slower. Both job classes are gun-based and involve interactions with enemies but serve vastly different purposes.

~Add an element of battlefield movement so you can actively avoid attacks. Include range too, as that adds a whole new level when dealing with AoE effects.

[Fynn]

FFXIII: remove that dumb lock on the Crystarium - let me over grind if I want to, let me make Vanille a Commando from the beginning - just open it up. Also, gambits would be a vast improvement.

[NeoCracker]

Speed up the ATB in IX and make the Trance system more like X where you can save it for when you need it

You see, I actually like the IDea you can't control when exactly Trance goes off due to the narrative reason being the burst of emotions.

However I do think it needs to trigger more often so you can actually use it sometimes. (Of course you'd need to up the difficulty of the bosses to compensate.)

[Midgar Mist]

IV:
Make it easier to level up at the end of the game
Shorten the gaps between learning one spell to the next
And this one couldve been better with a changeable job system

This all at least relates to the battle system anyway

[Fox]

Speed up the ATB in IX and make the Trance system more like X where you can save it for when you need it

+1.

Additionally... I'm going to go for FF VIII

- Untie magic stocks from stat junctions.
- Instead junction stats to 'magic usage' levels that increase as you use certain types of magic.

- nerf gf

[Karifean]

FF VIII

- Have everyone be capable of stocking only as many charges of one spell as their EXP level.
- Have junctioned charges of magic be used up by feeling their effects in battle. As in, the spell you junction to STR/HIT loses charges as you attack, the spell you junction to HP/DEF loses charges as you get physically attacked, the spell you junction to EVA loses charges as you dodge, the spell you junction to El.Def./St.Def. loses charges as you resist elements/status ailments, etc. etc.
- Make Draw have less of a random factor and cap it at 25 instead of 9.
- Make Card Mod be an ability of a GF that appears later in the game.
- Remove the X-Bonus abilities from the game and have the natural stat differences between the characters be (way) more pronounced. Same goes for weapons, the few STR points they give are rather worthless and can easily be tripled or quadrupled without imbalancing the game at all.
- Have Limit Breaks be impossible to 'fish' for (as in you need to waste your turn and get another to have another chance to get a Limit Break) and make it so your HP needs to change in some way before you can get another. Either that or just replace the Limit Break system entirely...

[Forsaken Lover]

There's no way to fix FFVIII. You just have to start over from scratch. The game is more fundamentally broken than FFII.

I still love that they introduced level scaling IN THE ONE GAME LEVELS DON'T MATTER.


Also in FFXII, make it more Sphere Grid like. Not knowing where the Licenses you wanted were was stupid. You just had to fish abut or look up a guide.

[Colonel Angus]

I'd make them all like X. I would love for the FFVII remake to have a battle system like X, where you can switch-out characters mid battle.

[Ayen]

I still love that they introduced level scaling IN THE ONE GAME LEVELS DON'T MATTER.

Heh, that is kind of funny, I'll admit, but that's the only branch you get!

I would make them all like Chrono Trigger.

[Fynn]

There's no way to fix FFVIII. You just have to start over from scratch. The game is more fundamentally broken than FFII.


Wow. What a constructive addition to the discussion. It's not like Karifean went in-depth with how it could be fixed just a post above yours.

[Forsaken Lover]

Suggestions like "just throw out the Limit Break system entirely' is a pretty good representation of how to improve FFVIII, I will agree.

And the problem is that they were treating the symptoms and not the disease. The disease being the Junction system, of course. As long as it exists, magic is worthless in FFVIII.

There are other problems in the game as well that they didn't address, like infinite invincibility items, the level scaling being outright opposed to Junctioning, etc..

[Fynn]

Well, that's just like, your opinion, man :monster:

I wasn't a big fan of the Junction system until I saw my wife master and exploit it to it's full potential effortlessly without a guide. That was super cool.

[Ayen]

Well, that's just like, your opinion, man :monster:

I wasn't a big fan of the Junction system until I saw my wife master and exploit it to it's full potential effortlessly without a guide. That was super cool.

That's pretty smurfing badass.

[CactuarKing]

Well, that's just like, your opinion, man :monster:

I wasn't a big fan of the Junction system until I saw my wife master and exploit it to it's full potential effortlessly without a guide. That was super cool.

That's pretty smurfing badass.

:eek:

I loved the GF system, but can also agree that it rendered all the useful magic in the game obsolete in your quest for perfect stats.

The Sphere Grid from X, or the licence board from XII seemed pretty good examples of giving you control over your characters and their development without holding you back (curse you XIII)

[Karifean]

I wasn't treating the disease, the Junction system, because I rather like it. I'm a sucker for systems that allow you to play around any way you want to and do some real stupid trout and have it work out. When you're unconcerned with minmaxing there's just so much fun to be had with it.


There are other problems in the game as well that they didn't address, like infinite invincibility items, the level scaling being outright opposed to Junctioning, etc..

Forgot about invincibility items. I didn't mention a lot of things, actually, but I didn't want to write a super long post. I did address level scaling though with my very first suggestion.


- Have everyone be capable of stocking only as many charges of one spell as their EXP level.

Btw you can see what any given license does what even if you haven't unlocked a license next to it in FF XII IZJS.

[Fox]

Suggestions like "just throw out the Limit Break system entirely' is a pretty good representation of how to improve FFVIII, I will agree.

And the problem is that they were treating the symptoms and not the disease. The disease being the Junction system, of course. As long as it exists, magic is worthless in FFVIII.

My changes treat the disease :)



- Untie magic stocks from stat junctions.
- Instead junction stats to 'magic usage' levels that increase as you use certain types of magic.


I like the Junction system in principle, however I agree with you completely that it being tied to magic completely stops you from using magic. Which is lame. Combined with 'Draw' it's also unbelievably exploitable. You can basically be God before the Dollet Mission. That's why my main change is to add the concept of a magic usage level (so the more you use a type of magic, the more the level increases) and tie that to the Junction system. This actively encourages you to utilise magic, whilst still maintaining the flexibility of the Junctioning.

Thinking about it I might just make it an 'Ability Use' level, not Magic specific, which would encourage you to mix up magic, attacks and GF. If I left it as magic only I might simply shift the problem from never using magic to only using magic, which is not the intent.


There are other problems in the game as well that they didn't address, like infinite invincibility items, the level scaling being outright opposed to Junctioning, etc..

This is true, although the thread is Improve a battle system, not Fix the game design in its entirety. One thing at a time :hattip:

[blackmage_nuke]

FFVIII Allow stocking of 150 spells, only allow junctioning of 100, so you have a leeway of 50 spells to cast.

I mean i'd still hate the junctioning system but you can at least cast spells without deteriorating your stats.

[Fynn]

Idk, you just use some spells for casting, others for junction ing, problem solved.

[Skyblade]

There was an old thread where I looked at revamping the Junction system to make it more fun and viable.

Where was it...

Junction Redux (http://home.eyesonff.com/showthread.php/139223-Junction-Redux?highlight=junction+redux)

[Fox]

There was an old thread where I looked at revamping the Junction system to make it more fun and viable.

Where was it...

Junction Redux (http://home.eyesonff.com/showthread.php/139223-Junction-Redux?highlight=junction+redux)

I was reading that and my first thought was "Wow, everyone had the same avatars in 2011".

:monster:

Some nice ideas in there to improve the system while maintaining the trade off of magic/stats, although my view is that that tradeoff is conceptually flawed and needs to change at a lower level. Even ignoring Junctioning, magic is at a disadvantage to attacks and GFs anyway because you have a limited stock (albeit one you can replenish through draws). So then when you include the added disadvantage of tying that stock to stats...

So yeah, there are two approaches. You can either greatly increase the overall power of magic to compensate (the way you go about it in your thread) or you adjust the junction system so that magic gets equal benefit out of it as attacks and GF, which is my approach.

They're both valid ways of tackling the problem.

[Zanmato]

FFX: Individual development system for each character.

The only, but the biggest drawback of the Sphere Grid is the similarity of all characters after mastering their grids and thus playing them becomes monotonous.
However, the combination of the Sphere Grid with the character classes would be a perfect solution! :D

I'd also add more status spells/attacks available to use like Berserk, Confusion or Stone Gaze.