Item Dropping

[lavaelf1024]

Being at work, I know you can set items to be dropped by enemies but can you set a group os possible items that could be dropped? ‎  Say I wanted an enemy to have a chance if dropping 1 of 3 items, is that possible? ‎  Also, if you have an enemy the regens 5 times, and I have it dropping an item, could if possibly drop the item 5 times?

I'm working on my possible weapons/armor for level 1 and would like to have certian enemies drop certian items but don't want them to have a chance of dropping 5 elemental short swords.

Also a question for DMP, I was looking at your tables and the stat's seem really high on even the lower range weapons. ‎  Is this due to the strenght of the enemies or is it so you didn't have to create enemies with different levels and the weapons/armor you have a given time evens it out so you don't have to do this. ‎  Like I said in a previous post on DMG/ATK I'm just getting to this on my first level and want to get it close the first time through.

I think it'd be easier to make say 5 skeletons, lvl 1/5/10/20/30 than modify the equiptment to combat a lvl 30 at the start of a game. ‎  Does this sound right?

[dmpdesign]

To answer your first question, ‎  you cannot set one type of enemy to drop different items via the enemy editor. ‎  However you can set the enemy to drop something special once placed on the map. ‎  The item you select them to drop once they are on the map supercedes the item they are going to drop randomly from the enemy editor. ‎  Thats about the best you can do in that situation.

For damage tables, I am assuming youre referring to the ones posted on DD? ‎  Those are outdated and need to be modified a great deal, however there definitely is a reason to give your items specific ranges of stats throughout the game. ‎  Strength and Magic power greatly affect your offensive abilities, and also strength affects your defense, so you want to set your beginning weapons stats relatively high and modify the monsters stats around that, so your leveling strength increase doesnt make you too strong too quickly.

The basis of making your stats on the weapons higher is to lower the impact of strength.

For example:

A level 1 player may have 5 strength. ‎  If we create a dagger that has the following stats: slash 1, stab 1 and smash 1, you may design a slime to take 5 strikes to kill.

If the player levels twice and their strength is now say 8, that same dagger will kill the monster in probably 1-2 strikes. ‎  With this design, strength is an overpowered factor in the setup.

Alternatively, if you go with quite a bit higher stats on your beginning equipment, then the game becomes more balanced with equipment improvements and leveling.

With a dagger at beginning stats of: slash=12, stab=14 and smash =6 you can now create a monster that at level 1 will take 5 strikes to kill. ‎  2 levels later and 3 strength points higher, the enemy will likely still take 4-5 strikes to kill, thus making them more balanced to your leveling, so that enemies dont become weak too quickly.

Level up 10 times with a strength nearing 25, and the enemy will likely still eat up at least 2 hits before it dies using that dagger.

Now with that being said, you still need to create multiples of each monster as you progress through the game, so that later maps have stronger enemies that may look the same but hit harder and take a lot more strikes to kill.

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Additionally, to that mentioned above, strength also affects your defense. ‎  So you have to be careful to give your armor the same treatment as your weapons. ‎  You want armor upgrades to be a bigger factor in your defense than just plain leveling up, so if you set the armor stats high and the enemy attack high, then leveling strength increases dont affect your ability to take a hit nearly as much as when you keep the armor stats low and the enemy attack low.

When I get Dark Destiny fully play tested and tweaked as best it can be, I will post the new stat tables for the equipment, and also some tips on your enemy stats to help people tweak their games accordingly.

[lavaelf1024]

Thanks DMP, that answered the question perfectly. ‎  So basically you need to have the weapon/armor/enemiy stats high so as you lvl up you don't wind up overpowering enemies/yourself.

[dmpdesign]

Thats how i see it. ‎ 

There are ways to modify the leveling table as well so that strength increases dont become an obstacle, but that is done outside of SOM and may not be something youre interested in doing.

[lavaelf1024]

That would probally be a last resort for me but not outside of doing it if it helps tweak the game. ‎  Everytime I figure out, or think I have something figured out, something new and more confusing pops up! ‎  Guess that's just SOM from all the posts I've read on here. ‎  SOM really takes patience and alot of trial and error! ‎  Thank the gods that we have poeple like you guys that have already pulled your hair out for help!!!

I need to remember to check out the custom fence in one of the other topics for use in my town and the graveyard.

[dmpdesign]

I should be nearly done with my game, when its released Im going to recatalog all the 300 some odd custom objects and items i made for download packs since the current installer doesnt have them all. ‎ 

They are not all worth while by any means, but they may have a few that you can use.

[lavaelf1024]

Thanks Todd. ‎  BTW, how long have you been working with SOM and how much previous experience with creating games did you have? ‎  This is my first crack at this.

[Holy_Diver]

If no one has said so, there is an easy answer to having the same monster drop different items. You just need to make different versions of the same monster with different drops and mix them together liberally.

One scenario I would like an answer to (no immediate one comes to me) is how to make a monster that would only drop an item once. You can set the monster to only appear very randomly and always drop and go away after doing so. But I'd rather the monster appear regularly but only rarely drop and only once and not appear to completly go way. And without the possibility of two showing up when the real one appears.

[dmpdesign]

Thanks Todd. ‎  BTW, how long have you been working with SOM and how much previous experience with creating games did you have? ‎  This is my first crack at this.

Well, since september of last year I guess, I think thats when I started DD ‎  ‎  (yes its taken me over a year to get it done, how pathetic!)

previous experience with creating games is next to none really...I messed with RPG maker before for about a week and when I was a little kid I programmed a version of gauntlet with Q Basic lol.

Don't be fooled by my answers here, I am not that good at all this stuff :P

I really have to give thanks to all those who came before me as to anything I actually am good at doing with SOM. ‎  (Points at John, Tom and Martin)...they pretty much patiently answered all my questions as I got a bit better at the system.

[AsusX2]

lavaelf, it may or may not not interest you but it would definatly behoove you to consider altering the level up param's. if you want i might be willing to help depending on time and how far you go with it. so far as i can see you and i are the only ones interested enough in perfecting this aspect of the game (I think), but it would help others if we got a viable level vs item vs enemy chart that we could post. if we balance weapons/armor stats and build the chart around that set w/a table it might be usable by all for either a haack and slash or hunting game. what do you think? Are you up for a challange? It would greatly help your game flow, I know it has helped mine.