Need epiphany or insight for custom system.

[VinnyBoy]

Hello, I'm VinnyBoy, you might have heard of me in whatever. I'm currently writing a game, like so many tried before. It's not d20, its class based, its medieval fantasy, lots of stuff to think about.
And I want to make a bunch of monk classes, and I want them to have a "combo" and "finishing moves" dynamic. Basically, the character, under the right circumstances, try several micro attacks called combo that will deal minor damage. Each combos can also increase the effectiveness of a finisher attack, that, obviously, stops the combo chain. The player can choose to do a finisher instead of a combo, if he wants to make it "safe", or he can gamble his damage away by trying to do lots of combos.

I am not clear on how I want combos to be "awarded". I want to ability to be interesting, I want the dice system to be fun and especially fast since this will be their main shtick and thus, will happen often. I have a few ideas.

First, you should know that hitting a target in this game works kinda like D&D, you do an attack roll against a defense stat. Damage is increased by strength but reduced by constitution AND armor, meaning that your damage dice from your weapon or abilities is very important. Also, 1 point of damage is a much bigger deal here than in D&D 3.5, on purpose, so even something that adds 1d6 damage will generally be a huge deal.

- Alright, my first idea is to allow follow up combos on any starter attacks that simply hit. This have the advantage of being fast and easy to understand and play, as well as somewhat "realistic". Unfortunately, it doesn't make the ability all that appealing since stuff that will be easy to hit will be easy to kill even without doing combos. The combo ability will end up as a mook killer more than anything.
- My second idea was to allow follow up combos on a specific result on the attack dice itself, disregarding any modifiers. This have the advantage of being easy to scale, easy to play. Its a wee bit more complicated since you now have to compare two results from the attack roll to two different value, but its still easy enough. But I dunno, I find it a bit bland.
- Finally, my third idea is to simply ask the player to make another dice roll to see if the attack can be followed by a combo. This is likely the best way to do it except that is basically doubles the number of dice rolled. This might seem silly, but I'm not really too keen in one class rolling several time more dice than other classes. It unbalances "play time".

So, I'm looking for insight, inspiration, comments, praises, criticisms, questions or ideas regarding my problem here.
Also, thanks if you read all of this.
Also (2), english is not my forte.

[Grod_The_Giant]

- Alright, my first idea is to allow follow up combos on any starter attacks that simply hit. This have the advantage of being fast and easy to understand and play, as well as somewhat "realistic". Unfortunately, it doesn't make the ability all that appealing since stuff that will be easy to hit will be easy to kill even without doing combos. The combo ability will end up as a mook killer more than anything.
I don't follow. If easy-to-hit means quick-to-kill, combos will be useless for killing mooks-- the whole idea is that it takes a couple turns to set up, yes?

My suggestion for this mechanic would be to have an accurate, low-damage setup ability. If you hit with it, you can either use your finisher next round, or use the set-up again. Each time your setup lands, increase the effect of the finisher. (You might even have the finisher auto-hit, if you're worried about accuracy)


- My second idea was to allow follow up combos on a specific result on the attack dice itself, disregarding any modifiers. This have the advantage of being easy to scale, easy to play. Its a wee bit more complicated since you now have to compare two results from the attack roll to two different value, but its still easy enough. But I dunno, I find it a bit bland.
Sort of a "if you hit by 5 or more, you get [bonus effect]?" It's not flashy, but it's simple.


- Finally, my third idea is to simply ask the player to make another dice roll to see if the attack can be followed by a combo. This is likely the best way to do it except that is basically doubles the number of dice rolled. This might seem silly, but I'm not really too keen in one class rolling several time more dice than other classes. It unbalances "play time".
Roll until you miss? You've already hit upon why this isn't a good idea. (Plus, if the player optimizes accuracy, this'll go on for a long time)

[VinnyBoy]

Sorry, I forgot to mention that combos and finishers are supposed to be extremely fast attacks that are all done in a single action. The whole deal will be the player deciding if he wants to stop the combo to ensure his finisher or risk it for a greater outcome. This is why they are micro attacks, they are not meant to be "real attacks".

For my second idea, yeah, it was like roll for 5 or more, although it was more like roll higher than 10.

For the third option, it was to roll a specific "see if you can follow up" dice roll. Like, you do an attack roll, and you have, I dunno, 47% chance to follow up an attack, so you roll a d%. Also, since I hate optimization for reasons that is good for another thread, I'm trying to make it hard, maybe impossible to optimize a character.

Also, I suck at quoting.

[Grod_The_Giant]

Sorry, I forgot to mention that combos and finishers are supposed to be extremely fast attacks that are all done in a single action. The whole deal will be the player deciding if he wants to stop the combo to ensure his finisher or risk it for a greater outcome. This is why they are micro attacks, they are not meant to be "real attacks".
Ah, gotcha. That's going to be hard to achieve without lots of rolling. You could do "roll until you miss or decide to end the string; at that point you do X bonus damage per attack roll," but, well, that's lots of rolling. Or you could abstract it to a Power Attack type process, where you take a penalty (because you're less likely to connect with all those attacks) to deal bonus damage (because if you do hit, it hurts).


Also, since I hate optimization for reasons that is good for another thread, I'm trying to make it hard, maybe impossible to optimize a character.
Good luck with that. As long as you offer (meaningful) choices, there will be optimization-- one option will always be better than another. The more moving parts you have, the more unintentional combos will appear.

[VinnyBoy]

I'm not too concerned about the optimization thing, actually. The combos do very different "special effects" but similar damage, so far. And you don't get to really choose which one you use when you start a chain, you use the one the chain gives you. I used to want to allow "mixing" micro attacks together, but that was too complicated, could really get out of hand, and was relatively redundant for little gain. I "think" I know what I'm doing with relative power. There's not a lot of stuff that gives bonuses to anything as of now.

As for rolling too much, I want to put a upper limit to how often a chain can land combos. Like after 2 or 3 combos, you do a finisher. I might also put something that makes it progressively harder to follow up stuff, but that might be too much because the chances to land, say, 2 combos is already lower than landing 1.

I also don't mind monks being able to do a few more rolling that other classes sometime. Warrior classes can get several way to have extra actions in a round, and so do rogue classes, in a completely different ways. Monks will be "bursty" things, sometime doing lame, normal attacks, sometime doing a bit more, sometime doing something badass, randomly.

[Composer99]

What about, say, using a die to determine your base chance to hit (which, if you miss, denies you the opportunity to use the combo), and a pool of dice you roll simultaneously to determine the effects of your combo?

You could, say, decide to use the Flowing Crane manoeuvre (or whatever you call a combo/ability/kata/etc.), and roll your base hit die plus a few bonus dice depending on your skill in the Flowing Crane.

Then you can take on some risk by (a) reducing your accuracy with the combo dice and (b) adding more bonus dice.

Then, as long as you hit with your base attack and at least one bonus die, you score your finishing move, and the effect scales up if you hit with additional bonus dice.

[D-naras]

How about checking the attack dice? Even result? COMBO! Odd result? no combo... Simple and to the point. Then for what type of combo, you check your damage dice result. If you use d6 for damage, that is 6 possible combos you can start. If you want to increase the odds of a certain combo happening, make it so it comes up in more results of the damage die. So maybe you can do the kick to the shin combo move on a damage result of 1, the wet willie combo move and a 2 and a 3 and the nipple twister combo move on a 4, 5 or 6.

[VinnyBoy]

Whoa, I'm just looking for some stuff that do special effects, not instant kills! Nipple twister is far too brutal.

Anyway, Composer99 and D-naras, these are ideas. Not exactly what I want but I'll think about them, it helps brewing some fun concepts. Thanks.
I'm open for more stuff, of course. :smallsmile:

[Knaight]

This would be a lot easier if you could cover how the system does work, beyond having classes and not being d20. Is it roll and add? Dicepool? What?

That said, one way this could work is some sort of cluster attack. You get multiple dice, and can assign however many to the combo and however many to the finisher. You roll the combo dice to add to your attack, along with doing however much damage from each die (quite probably 1). The other dice are the actual damage of the finishing move.

Another would be a gambling mechanic: You roll however many dice, trying to hit with all of them. If you do, you've lined up a combo, the more dice that hit, the better you did. If you miss with any of them, the finisher misses.

Yet another way would be a between round thing - if you hit someone one round, you can choose to do damage or to add to your attack next round. You also have an actual high damage attack, that takes some sort of huge penalty, and if you use it, your attack bonus resets. Your attack bonus also resets if you ever use your normal attack to do actual damage. Lets say, hypothetically you are using a d10 system. One character can roll d10+5 for their normal attack (1d3), and d10+0 for their finisher. They're up against someone with Defense 12. So they roll d10+5, and hit. They roll 1d3, get a 3, and add +3 to their attack. Now, they have d10+8 and d10+3, which means they could hit with their finisher, but odds are not good. So, basic attack again, hits, they roll for attack bonus and get a 2. They now have d10+10, and d10+5. Playing it conservatively, they go again, hit, roll the 1d3, and get another 3. With the luck they've been having, they're willing to bet on that d10+8 finisher, so they go for it. That does slow it down, and prevents it from being instantly within one attack (unless they just drop the finisher immediately, which is probably worth it on inferior enemies).

[VinnyBoy]

This would be a lot easier if you could cover how the system does work, beyond having classes and not being d20. Is it roll and add? Dicepool? What?

Fair enough. I said its not d20 as in, its not official d20 stuff, but its similar enough.
Every character has a skill modifier that is half his current level. This skill modifier applies on all skill checks, including attacks. Being actually skilled simply add +4 to your roll. You are also allowed to add the skill relevant attribute to your attack roll, which is currently strength OR agility for melee weapons, whichever is the best for you. Characters have a defense attribute which is 10 + armor + agility. Wearing armor have a penalty that reduces a bunch of skills INCLUDING all attack rolls. You still want to wear armor because it provides damage reduction.

Basically, you score a hit if you, well, meet the opponent's defense with your attack roll, scoring basic weapon damage. You score critical weapon damage if you beat the defense stat by 4 or more. In some rare case, beating the defense stat by 8 or 12 might add further damage. You add strength to any non mechanical weapon attacks (currently, anything not a crossbow). The equivalent of a longsword does 1d10 damage. A two handed sword does 1d12 and have +2 to hit (because its a bigger weapon). Most weapons are simply variation of these two weapons.

Damage reduction is your constitution + your armor DR, which is around 1 for light armor, 2 for medium, 3 for heavy, but it can reach up to 5 for the biggest armors around. Wearing a shield gives you a blocking % roll, where you add your agility and skill modifier stat. Blocking simply gives a huge damage reduction, generally negating an attack fully. You can't block massively big huge large attacks effectively, like a colossus hitting you with a house, because the damage will just kill you anyway.

There are 4 class "families", each having their own gameplay "theme". Warriors play with special attacks that are longer to perform (full round), or that gradually tires the warrior until he takes some time to recover. His attacks either deal great damage or "staggers" the opponent, putting it in a dangerous situation. He also have a bunch of aggressive shield skills.
The tricksters classes have skills that exploit either the other's shtick against them, or uses situation and positioning for general shenanigans. They do not do great damage, they are prone to attack out of nowhere for no reason in particular, and do mean tricks.
The martial art classes, that I want to define better here, will play with "bursty" random attacks with a somewhat gambling feeling, as well as another feature that I know where it will go but I just haven't started it yet. They are not limited to fists, they can pretty much use any weapons they want.
Finally, there are spellcasters. They will come later. They do spells.

An example of what I have so far is this: the Blaze combo
When you do a successful attack that can trigger a combo, you can do extra attacks that add 1d6 damage to your main attack if they hit. The second combo hit will change your finisher's damage to fire damage, and the third combo, limited to martial artists and not monks, will add a "burning" effect to the finisher, possibly setting the target on fire if the finisher hit, ensuring he have the worst day ever.
Whenever you would do a combo, you can just do a finisher instead. This is what I want to do. Like, would the player want to pursue his combo to get the special effect from the 2nd hit, not knowing he will be able to do a finisher afterward? Or would he just do the finisher anyway because its a bit better than adding just 1d6 to your damage?

Theres a bunch other stuff I wrote so far, but I think that covers what is necessary. Ask if you have other questions, I love to hear myself talk (type). Or comment, think, whatever. :)

PS: I like it here already.:smallwink:

[Knaight]

Fair enough. I said its not d20 as in, its not official d20 stuff, but its similar enough.
Every character has a skill modifier that is half his current level. This skill modifier applies on all skill checks, including attacks. Being actually skilled simply add +4 to your roll. You are also allowed to add the skill relevant attribute to your attack roll, which is currently strength OR agility for melee weapons, whichever is the best for you. Characters have a defense attribute which is 10 + armor + agility. Wearing armor have a penalty that reduces a bunch of skills INCLUDING all attack rolls. You still want to wear armor because it provides damage reduction.

Basically, you score a hit if you, well, meet the opponent's defense with your attack roll, scoring basic weapon damage. You score critical weapon damage if you beat the defense stat by 4 or more. In some rare case, beating the defense stat by 8 or 12 might add further damage. You add strength to any non mechanical weapon attacks (currently, anything not a crossbow). The equivalent of a longsword does 1d10 damage. A two handed sword does 1d12 and have +2 to hit (because its a bigger weapon). Most weapons are simply variation of these two weapons.

So, basically d20, with damage and DR standard, lowered damage, new classes, etc.

How familiar are you with things outside of d20? The very first thing I'd generally recommend doing is getting some familiarity form more diverse systems. Sometimes you can practically steal mechanics, sometimes they're just inspirational, but it's almost always useful.

On damage: How about chained rolls? Every time you roll for damage, you can choose to add another die. If you roll higher on this second die, it adds to the total (and you can add a third die). If you don't roll higher, the combo ends, but you still get the earlier damage - maybe there's a penalty, maybe not. On top of that, you can choose to end the combo early whenever you want, and get some sort of 2-die combo, 3-die combo, and 4-die combo benefit.

This has a few benefits. When you get multiple attacks (with 1 attack roll), it won't add a huge amount of damage, because you probably only got as many as you did because the early damage rolls were kind of terrible. The combo naturally gets stronger as it goes. While it adds more rolls, they are all pretty straightforward, roll and don't even add type things.

[VinnyBoy]

On damage: How about chained rolls? Every time you roll for damage, you can choose to add another die. If you roll higher on this second die, it adds to the total (and you can add a third die). If you don't roll higher, the combo ends, but you still get the earlier damage - maybe there's a penalty, maybe not. On top of that, you can choose to end the combo early whenever you want, and get some sort of 2-die combo, 3-die combo, and 4-die combo benefit.

This is interesting, very interesting in fact.
Also, I played shadowrun, I own L5R books (the roll and keep one), and I used to have a d6 game around, but that one was stupid. None of these really do what I want to do, this is why I'm so stumped.