My ideas on crafting in 2017

[+ Asharonapaul 276]

So while back I had the idea to make crafting work for everything in game. Now that I am making an action rpg I have a new idea.

 

 basically it's just this gui. the left top box is the weapon, and the right top box is the gem. the bottom rectangle is the recipe name, and the outcome is on the right.

I have no desire for a skill tree, so crafting will just rely on the base object and gem in terms of chance of success. So a steel sword with rubies would be less likely to work than a bronze sword with rubies, and so on.

The benefit would allow the player to create new weapons which may never drop in game. The downside is that it costs all of your collected experience to craft anything, and the higher your level the more costly it becomes.

This type of balance could help allow the player to better decide on play styles and techniques as more depth is added to the game. For instance a broadsword maybe does just a little bit of damage to a dragon, but add some rubies and now you can burn it up.

[Kayzee 4,032]

Honestly crafting has sort of become a kind of 'ehhhh....' thing for me. I kinda like it in some games, but most just kinda mess it up. I never liked the idea of 'recipes', and liked it better when there is some dynamism to it. I kinda like Minecraft's crafting at times because of it's focus on arranging things in particular shapes, and you can substitute things. One of my favorite mods for Minecraft actually is Tinkers' Construct because it allows you to forge weapons made up of interchangeable parts. Also reminds me of the PSX RPG Vagrant Story which also had the idea of making weapons out of interchangeable parts, including gems. I think that's a much more interesting (and somewhat realistic) way of doing things. Vagrant Story even let you disassemble and swap parts at workshops. I think the Tinkers' Construct idea of melting down metal and pouring it into casts works pretty well. Obviously though that makes more sense in a Minecraft-like survival game though. Vagrant Story did let you fuse blades and stuff together though.

I like the idea of something like that applying outside of weapons too, working on shields and bits of armor from whatever materials you have around, but I don't know how you would get that sense of design, like you are designing the object not just creating it form a recipe. Food and potions have plenty of games where they have a more dynamic spin on it though. Just having ingredients mix and react in to add to the whole isn't that hard.

Edited July 17, 2017 by KilloZapit

[+ Asharonapaul 276]

I'm mostly aiming for simplicity. I could extend it to include crafting shields and armors. I'm still a ways off from having a working system for this with just weapons. I'm thinking of making a databse for recipes, which mostly is used for end results graphics wise, whereas formulae wise it;s modular in a sense.

I agree with you that swapping parts would be cool, but I'm not going for that level of detail. I have limited resources to work with, as I am soloing this project, with some mentor help when need be.

There are several variations on weapon types in the game.

But ya, I don't even have special buffers in game yet. But I have ideas for implementing it and such. I guess I should work on the icons some tonight.

[rpgdreamer 3]

I think that method you have there is nice and simple. I like the idea of crafting in games, but I always feel disheartened because I don't understand what goes with what. Have them laid out like that seems to be great for ease of use. Especially since it's just a base object and gem? If there is an outcome for ANY combination, that's great, because then I don't have to try and mix and match and find out nothing will come of it. I can just decide then and there if I like what shows up... and I feel like it also urges you to try out more combinations just to see what will come up if the success rate of creating something is 100%. Could become addicting!

 

Of course, with a success on every combo, it could start to become a lot of work if you added more and more materials... but I think the added work would be worth it for the player's enjoyment.

 

Regardless, I like what I see!

[Kayzee 4,032]

If you want success on every combo, it's best to make an automated system for most of it. One system I was experimenting with is a 'keyword fusion' thing where each items had a list of keywords, and fusing them together just attempted to give the best match for their combined keywords, maybe weighted in particular areas and restricted by types. Isn't the type of thing I really thought was that good as a primary crafting mechanic because of how unpredictable it could sometimes end up, but my experiments showed some promise and every combination gave a consistent result (or list of results sorted by number of matches) at least. Might make a good secondary system for junking items you don't have a use for.

 

Though I guess it's debatable if 'fusion systems' count as crafting or not. I kinda like them though. I think the idea of fusing items together to make a better item rather then making new items out of raw materials is more useful for when you have a bunch of old items laying around. But heck, no reason you can't do both!

[+ Asharonapaul 276]

5 hours ago, Kayzee said:

If you want success on every combo, it's best to make an automated system for most of it. One system I was experimenting with is a 'keyword fusion' thing where each items had a list of keywords, and fusing them together just attempted to give the best match for their combined keywords, maybe weighted in particular areas and restricted by types. Isn't the type of thing I really thought was that good as a primary crafting mechanic because of how unpredictable it could sometimes end up, but my experiments showed some promise and every combination gave a consistent result (or list of results sorted by number of matches) at least. Might make a good secondary system for junking items you don't have a use for.

 

Though I guess it's debatable if 'fusion systems' count as crafting or not. I kinda like them though. I think the idea of fusing items together to make a better item rather then making new items out of raw materials is more useful for when you have a bunch of old items laying around. But heck, no reason you can't do both!

the way my inventory and database system works it should not be difficult to make it "automated" and my icons I'm using have gem socket variations as well as material variants.