skills Skills: What You’re Doing Wrong

[+ Super Saiyan Gary Sinise 199]

It’s been a while since I’ve written a straightforward article about RPG Design; today I want to talk about something that is crucial in most RPGs. When done right, skills can be a lot of fun (for the player and the developer!), but when done wrong they can make an otherwise-good battle system become boring fast.

 

RPG Skills: What You’re Doing Wrong

 

There are lots of ways to handle skills in your RPG. In most RPGs that I’ve seen, the skills tend to follow a pretty boring formula (typically a formula borrowed fromFinal Fantasy games): you’ve got skills that deal (or heal) different amounts of damage, to some enemies or all enemies, and you’ve got skills that inflict or cure status effects. It’s very easy for a player to get bored with the skills in your game if you aren’t willing to break away from these staples and create some unique abilities for your characters.

 

I’m not going to talk about skill trees or any stuff like that—how your characters learn skills doesn’t interest me; this article is about the skills themselves and what they do in battle. I’m also not going to cover MP (TP/SP/whatever-you-call-it) costs or balancing. That might be a good subject for another article.

 

I’m going to cover a variety of fundamental skill types that show up in most games, and with each one I am going to try and illustrate a different example of some design flaws that I see all the time when it comes to skills in RPGs.

 

Dealing Damage

 

Most of the skills in your game will deal damage. Let’s face it: that’s pretty much the goal of every battle in your game: deal enough damage to defeat the enemy. The easiest way to design damage-dealing skills is also, unfortunately, the one that most people use. Each element (fire, water, etc) will typically have a number of skills that deal different amounts of damage—to one enemy or to multiple enemies. That’s pretty standard, and I have no problem with that as a core. The problem comes when the designer relies on those skills and is unwilling to expand on them.

 

Let’s take a look at an example: say that your character has a fireball skill. It does a decent amount of damage, but as the player levels up, he gets a second fire skill that is essentially the same thing but does more damage. The player really never has any incentive to use the first skill (other than potentially a lower MP cost—but that’s rarely relevant).

 

*bloop bloop* Take-a that!

 

This is common—too common. Have the new skill overwrite the original one. Nobody wants to spend time scrolling past useless skills in menus. Personally, I might not even have a new skill to upgrade the original. The way I see it, your character has a MAG (INT/MATK/whatever) stat for a reason: as the character gets stronger, so do his skills. If you balance this properly, your character only needs a single core damage-dealing more per element (maybe one for single targets and one more for hitting all enemies). This allows you to use your valuable skill slots for things that are a lot more interesting!

 

And please do not have skills that deal damage less than or equal to the amount of damage that would be dealt with a regular attack (obviously elemental-themed enemies or character gimmicks may be an exception here); I’ve played many RPG Maker games where spamming the “attack†command would deal more damage than using the skills.

 

What you’re doing wrong: clogging up your game with useless skills.

 

Status Effects

 

Most games will have the same basic effects: poison, sleep, paralysis, etc. There are lots of ways to build skills that inflict these effects, but it is important to keep in mind the point that I stated in the above section: the end goal of every battle in your game is to deal enough damage to defeat the enemy (barring the occasional gimmicky boss, of course). If your status effects don’t lead to dealing more damage to the enemy, then the player is wasting a turn to inflict that status.

 

Pictured: Poison.

 

What is a turn worth to your player? Here is a concept that’s worth thinking about for every skill (and item) that you design in your game: the value of a turn in battle. If a character is going to give up dealing damage for a turn in order to inflict an enemy or ally with a status condition (be it poison, sleep, a buff or debuff), then that status needs to have impact. Think of it as a trade: the player is trading his time (and damage) this turn in order for a bigger payoff in the future. The damage that would be dealt (or prevented, in the case of sleep or paralysis) as a long-term result of the status must be more than the damage that could be dealt that turn just by attacking.

 

In nearly every RPG Maker game that I’ve played, this trade is not worth it. Don’t be afraid to make your status conditions big. Don’t be afraid to make your buffs and debuffs create huge damage swings on the upcoming turns. If the upside of the status effect isn’t worth the loss of the turn, then the player isn’t going to be using those skills very much—if at all!

 

A way to avoid a negative turn-tradeoff is to have status-inflicting skills also deal damage. In the Pokémon games, there are a lot of attacks that deal damage with a percentage of inflicting the enemy with an ailment. The primary function of the attack is to deal damage, but if you get lucky the enemy will be burned, or poisoned, or its speed will be lowered. This is a great way to make use of status effects; the player will never feel that he has “wasted†a turn, and when the statusis inflicted, it feels like a bonus. Similarly, if you do make skills that only inflict a status, give them a 100% chance of working. Your player will only get frustrated if he has to spend multiple turns to try and burn an enemy—by the time it actually connects, the other characters will have finished the battle.

 

It is worth noting that it’s very annoying for players who get hit with this stuff by enemies—it is probably worthwhile to have a set of status conditions that the enemies inflict on the players that are weaker than the ones that the players inflict on the enemies. I’m not going to be covering skills from an enemy perspective in this article—but it is worth putting a lot of thought into the difference between what the player does and what happens to the player.

 

In a lot of games, most small enemies will only take a few turns to defeat, so status effects really have no use except against bosses. And then, the developer will go ahead and make most bosses immune to lots of those same conditions. What’s the deal with that? And sometimes bosses can only be defeated with a certain status effect. If the player plays the whole game without ever needing to poison an enemy, and then one particular boss needs to be poisoned—the designer should step back and rethink the function of the poison status itself.

What you’re doing wrong: making the player waste his time messing around with lackluster status effects.

 

Do Something Special

 

Now on to the fun stuff: aside from the traditional skills that you’ll find in every game, unique skills can add a new level of depth and fun to your battle system. There’s lots of design space and nearly limitless opportunities to build special skills. It can be a lot of fun to create unique and memorable skills, and finding ways to use them to breathe life into a stale battle system can bring a lot to your game.

 

Some skills can be very zany! Consider skills that change the rules of the battle: one of your characters may be able to cause it to rain, which could have a unique effect on the battlefield. If you have a creative idea for a skill that can mix up a battle, try it out. Be careful not to include too many skills like this, but a few of them (maybe one for each character) can create a memorable game experience.

 

Trick Room changes the rules of the battle so that Pokémon with the lower speed stat moves first.

 

Think of your characters—give each one a unique gimmick, and tie his or her special skills that into that gimmick. Maybe a sorcerer can summon up monsters that fight on your side; or maybe another character can transform into an enemy monster. The classic example of this is the thief’s “steal†skill which rewards the player with items or gold.

 

You can also create skills that have unique effects without necessarily going over the top with them. This is easier than ever in RPG Maker VX Ace, where you can give every skill its own custom damage formula (check out this awesome tutorial by my pal Fomar0153 for even more ideas). Simple tweaks to existing skills can add a lot of depth to the game: a move that always goes first no matter what; a move that punches though the enemy’s defense; a skill that is twice as strong when the user is inflicted with a status condition. Maybe there’s a skill that will deal additional damage if you have a certain item in your inventory. You can even twist things around and have a special skill that deals damage to an enemy based on the user’s defense stat instead of his/her attack. And players will always enjoy the chance to have their characters work together and use combo skills. Be creative and have fun with it!

 

What you’re doing wrong: not taking advantage of unique skills.

 

Conclusion

 

I could write a lot more about skills, and there’s lots of room to expand on these ideas and others! Remember that the skills that your characters use will become an integral part of your battle system—the skills in your game will play a tremendous role in shaping the feel of the entire game. Do your best to make them creative and memorable. And most importantly, make sure that they are fun!

 

If you have ideas, comments or questions, be sure to post!

 

For more tutorials and articles, check out my website at finalbossblues.com

[RetroLegacyGaming 0]

I'm new to RPG Maker, and the community here, but I wanted to thank you for taking the time to write this tutorial. It's given me a lot to think about as I make my first game, and since I have such limited (read as "non-existant") scripting experience, learning tricks to get more mileage out of the built-in skill system is very useful for me.

Edited August 7, 2012 by RetroLegacyGaming

[SmileHeart 2]

Honestly I'm surprised there are not many answer for this topic... I'm a really old maker also pretty skilled, but at the time i nerver did skills for my game thinking over and over that is useless when the system already provide a complete set... My point is that thanks to this thread i could change my mind and also want to try make my own skill set (Wich i have never ever done)... Thank you very much for sharing this. Good luck.

[estriole 326]

nice tutorial.

but i a little bit disagree with multiple same spell a.k.a fire, fira, firaga.

SQUARE SOFT (SQUARE ENIX now) never fails with those concept. so why do we fail? it's not the concept itself but the formula of the skill.

sometimes to finish weak enemies you want skills that only cost little mp. instead of using 90 mp firaga it will better use 10 mp fire or 30 mp fira.

but in boss fight / hard enemy. sometimes it's better to use 90 mp firaga even though 9x fire have lots better damage output. because you want to

deal damage as hard as you can in shortest amount of time. but it is only my opinion. everyone have different opinion.

 

but on the other hand i also personally agree with 'do something special'.

after reading your tutorial... it inspire me to make the skill do that special thing.

I try make skill for my healer like this. it heal the enemy by 100 hp x 10 then it will deal damage 1500 hp.

so the skill work best if the enemy hp is at max (because the heal is not going to HEAL translate to full 1500 hp damage).

i will call that skill HEAL BOMB. yay .

thx for the nice tutorial you made.

[+ Novem 344]

Moved to General RM Tutorials as it deals more with Game Design then RPG Maker VX Ace.

[Chaos17 31]

The player really never has any incentive to use the first skill (other than potentially a lower MP cost—but that’s rarely relevant).

 

That's your way of thinking but some may prefer to have the choice to use skills that don't empty their mana bar because they used the last version of the new skill. Even if you say that a problem of balancing MP, you're a bit wrong because if every skill follows the same pattern. We will have to give like 9999 MP...

 

For me skills need to be useful and a lot of time, lot skills aren't useful at all.

Example : why can't I poison the boss ?

[RAM 9]

I've been having a lot of fun with skills, so I'm interested in any smart skill ideas. So far, what I've done with my project is to have antagonists with little health and a health dependent main attack. Meaning that the main attack can potentially be the most powerful attack with enough buffs, but in a drown out battle it can become almost useless. The special skills which have to be relied on tougher battles are all elemental attacks. How much damage each element does depends on the creature's weaknesses, but more importantly with the antagonist's relationships with his companions. So far, I'm just using a simple elemental variable for each companion/element, which I'm sure will get a bit too overpowered later on in the game if I don't figure out a method to put a cap on it while at the same time still giving the player incentive to build each relationship.

 

As you could imagine, it hasn't been easy to balance, but I like the core idea so far. After reading your article I went back and fine tuned a lot of my initial work with your suggestions. Thanks for the great article!

Edited May 8, 2013 by RAM

[Discord94 0]

I for example created a skill for my Paladin class which heals all group Members from anything, but kills the user.

Saved me a couple of times cause my healer used to die quite frequently.

[Ordinary Hotdog 0]

Quick question, in the Skills tab of the Database, apparently there are two types of special Skills; Magic and Special. Specials can be accessed from the battle menu, I know that, but how do you use Magic? I have an item that when you use it, it teaches you a Magic spell, such as Flame, but as far as I know, it actually does absolutely nothing, as it is not in the Special category, and there seems to be no option or way to use Magic skills. In the Game Menu (escape,) under Skills, the only type of skill I have is Special, but I need Magic. Where or how do I access these Magic skills? Someone please respond. Thanks!

[pencilcase27 66]

It's a little bit more complicated that that. You are able to have as many different types of skills as you wish to. You can define them in the database ("Terms"). Then you can give every skill one type. And finally, to enable the use of those skills for the actors, they need to have the "Skill: Add Skill-Type" Feature.

[YaksterX 0]

So I am rather new with skills and new to RPGMaker itself (just few months including a break).

 

I have created a skill that makes the user immune to damage for the next incoming attack. Instead it counters the incoming attack and also gains life according to that damage.

 

It is kinda cool. Gave it to an enemy and the fight is so fun.

 

I do agree about the fact that old skills should level up along side older skills and have different effects such as damaging and enemy and gain speed so next attack can be faster, or lets say use a skill that does low damage but increases the player crit chance for next round along with lowering the enemy defense so you can combo it later with an attack that has a nice damage output to work along the low defense and higher crit for example.

 

It make the game a bit more lively and fun than just enter enter enter.

 

The first skill I have listed can be used for barrier or shield skills, then next time you are being hit there is an effect out of it such as you receive only half damage but it explodes in bright light and the enemy is blind for a turn... some shit like that

 

And they are fairly easy to make when you get the idea.