11 replies to this topic

[Orithan]

In the Legend of Eldin, I will be replacing Potions with smaller versions of them, called Phials. Phials can be filled with one of 6 diffrent potions, each having a small(er) effect on the player. The Player can carry up to 10 as Mage, 8 as Ranged or All-round and 5 as Mele (they will already have plenty of tanking potential , especialy after consuming a yellow Phial) at the moment.

The concern I with them is with the healing ones - the ones that heal up health or magic. I want to balance them so they don't become OP, allowing players to tank through whole sections of the game through constant use of phials.

What I have in mind is either that I make them relativley inexpensive and heal/buff for a little bit or that I make them expensive to obtain but they heal/buff for much longer. Alternativley, I could have them inexpensive and make them do a lot of healing, but incur a potion cooldown period after use ala. Terraria.

Option 1: Inexpensive, heals/buffs for a little bit.

Pros:

• Enable the player to readily keep a good stock. +
• The method that I'm used to in ZC. +
• Encourages players not to be too shy about using them. +

Cons:

• Low healing/buff potential. -
• Limited supply for the heavier users. -

Option 2: Expensive, heals/buffs a lot.

Pros:

• Gives the player incentive to go hunting for the ingredients. +
• A lot more potent over all. +
• Allows for quicker regain. +

Cons:

• Difficult to obtain, especially early on. -
• Can promote heavy tanking. -

Option 3: Inexpensive, heals/buffs a lot, incurs potion cooldown.

Pros:

• Prevents heavy tanking. ++
• Easy to obtain. +
• Prevents stacking of buffs; which in my opoinion, should be one at a time. +

Cons:

• The cooldown can cause death for potion-heavy users. -

If you have any other suggestions, just fire away. Not much has been cemented into TLoE at the moment.

[Mero]

How's this...

Moderately Expensive
Buffs a Little but has a chance of buffing a lot.
If it buffs a lot there's a cool down.
Doesn't Stack.
Should become easier to obtain halfway through the game.

[Avaro]

Option 1 sounds great. In addition, you can also have potions that heals or buffs a lot, that are very expensive. That way, you prevent the problem about limited supply for the heavier users and the problem that potions are difficult to optain early in the game, at the same time.

[Anthus]

I think the player should have a choice between using either cheaper, weaker potions for buffs with a cool down period but there should also be an alternative like regular potions. That's just my opinion though.

Of the choices you listed, 1 and three sound the best.

[aaa2]

Why not just leave potions over-powerful. They certainly did things like that in Demon's Souls, Ninja Gaiden or Devil May Cry. If you used potions those games were no trouble at all. If you did not these games were hell. You can use those potions also as a device to setup traps. As an example you could make someone feel kind of all-powerful because he uses potions then put him in a bossfight after he uses up all potions in the first phase because he feels all-powerful you backstab him with a second phase say in another room where he does not expect it.

[Orithan]

@aaa2: Not a bad idea, thanks. But, since you can get an array of 10 (cycle through them with the L/R buttons), I'm planning for them not to be OP, so there can be no heavy tanking. I personally like my third option the most, to be honest (maybe that's from playing Terraria ). And no, I'm not planning for the quest to be overly difficult, unless you go Hero Mode, (although I have a bad habit of making my quests overly difficult, just look at my canceled Diamond Quest) so that you can develop tatics to deal with the many foes that come your way.

[MoscowModder]

Here's another crazy idea for you: go with option 3, but you can use potions during the cooldown. If you do, though, there's a random chance they'll have a negative effect instead. That seems slightly more realistic to me, and it adds some more excitement to the game.

[aaa2]

Or i have another idea now why not make it that Link has to choose a potion from menu again after using each potion if he wants to use another. That way it is not an arbitrary cool-down that keeps him from using potions but his own laziness to go to the item menu.(so if he dies because he was too lazy to go to the menu he will not blame the game for dying but himself and as Miyamoto once said if a gamer blames himself and not the game he is having fun)

Edited by aaa2, 11 April 2012 - 06:17 PM.

[Orithan]

Here's another crazy idea for you: go with option 3, but you can use potions during the cooldown. If you do, though, there's a random chance they'll have a negative effect instead. That seems slightly more realistic to me, and it adds some more excitement to the game.

I will actually expand on this. I'm looking at having a system that you can use potions in a cooldown, but they have a chance of causing adverse effects and will add to the cooldown.
Here's how I think it should go as:
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Potion Sickness - A status debuff that occurs after consuming a potion, lasting for various periods of time. It will cause any potion consumed to have a chance of causing adverse effects, and also adds to the duration of the debuff. The adverse effects become more and more potent as the duration of the debuff increases through repeated use. If the duration of the debuff exceeds a maxinum limit, a far worse condition (Overdosed) ensures and replaces this one.
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Overdosed - A lethal status debuff that occurs through the repeated use of potions during the Potion Sickness debuff. It causes a meter to appear below the Subscreen that gradually fills up as it progresses. It will fill up in four ways:
1) It slowly fills up on it's own. It, at first, fills up at a snail's pace but it will speed up over time.
2) Using weapons/items. It will raise a little bit with each use of weapons and items.
3) Simply picking up items. It will raise it by a tiny bit with each pickup, including with hearts.
4) Getting hit by enemies. On addition to losing hearts, getting hit under this condition significantly raises the gauge.
As the gauge rises, your physical conditon gradually degenerates. If you let the gauge max out, you will die. If you are in the middle of the dungeon, this is almost certain to happen if you lack a certain (single-use) item. Using another potion or taking another debuff, whatever it is, will kill you on the spot. There are two ways to cure it:
1) You speak to one of the three great dragons (Eldin, Faron or Lanaryu) and they will heal you to full, and remove ALL status debuffs (including Potion Sickness and Overdosed).
2) You ask a healer to heal it. For a high price, he/she will heal you to full and remove all debuffs (if you have either Potion Sickness or Overdosed). Healing to full with no debuffs is cheap, in comparsion.
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Just throwing things out. If you have other ideas, just throw them at me.

[aaa2]

Overdosed seems nearly as bad a cursed in Dark souls. Why not also half Link's lifebar if he dies from that overdose until he is cured.

[Orithan]

I'm not a fan of this suggestion. While it does gives a penality on death, but it doesn't sound right and breaks my prefrence to the "You Only Live Once" scenario, which brings me to this pet peeve I have with the Zelda series as a whole:
One thing I hate about almost the entire Zelda series is that you get to keep all your weapons, items, ect and being asked wherether you want to save, after dying. The only real negative effects about that is facing the Game Over screen, rasing the death counter by 1, starting at a set amount of hearts and having to restart the room/boss. This makes it feel (to me) as if Link gets ressurected, with all his gear he had at the moment of death, at a certain spot as opposed to having him restart from where his last save/checkpoint was. I felt somewhat OKAY about it in Z1 (where you had to die in order to save the game), possibly because of the limitations in the early NES era and that death often exacted a greater penality than the later games (save Z2).

[Lightwulf]

Well, I think you have a good thing going there with the Potion Sickness and Overdosed statuses. I think that as long as you can implement those, that will be fine.