Battlejewels Build 053 -- Help Me Start Balancing It Out!


skeezix

Internal Development
Joined
Mar 11, 2003
Messages
8,063
Website
www.codejedi.com
A lot of internal and visible changes have gone on here; mostly its about levelling up and everything to do with that. Its quite a lot going on .. how fast to level up? (too fast is boring, too slow is annoying); scaling up opponents (so they're not too hard, not too easy); adding spells and gear, and all that junk. New spells and gear are yet to be done and the opponent only partially scales up (he gets some naive skillups, but not yet any gearups or spellups, since they're not entered yet :)

Still, you can level up, increasing your skills in many ways, and buying spells as you go (you start with no spells, so even have to buy your basics that you're used to.)

Obviously the existing spells will become underpowered as you level up, but you can help trial out the levelling up system and let me know how the opponents fare against you and so forth :)

Too many changes to post here, so I'll reply to myself with some highlights.

Get it here: http://www.codejedi.com/battlejewels/binar...ls-gp2x-053.zip

jeff



I really hate that you cannot post twice in a row yourself without getting them appended together ...
 
A new Battlejewels release!!

yeeeah.gif


Can't wait to leave the office (9 hours from now on, daaamn) and to check the new version. Thank you for updating my favorite GP2X game!
 
Theres a lot to do yet (unfortunately.. this game will be the death of me :p), but its getting there. I can post the looong update list if you like or let you explore it out. The AI is meaner, for one :)

jeff
 
I would love to help you out but if you think I am going to upgrade to this for my financee you have another thing coming.....

But seriously. I will get her to test it out and see what she thinks as she absolutely loves it. She wont get round to having a go until late tonight but I can post her feed back tomorrow if that's ok?

Only thing I do remember her saying on the first release is it crashes when you get a line of 6.

I have never known anyone that shouts at a game so much.....oh except maybe me :lol:
 
The link at the top works; quoting it gets it all malformed in the process.

Post comments anytime; if anyone wants to sign up to the mailing list let me know, though a lot of the chatter is Palm OS specific right now.

I will put out the Windows desktop build soon, so you can ruin your work-lives too :)

semyaza -- the lines>5 bug got fixed a few builds back. I hadn't anticipated that was possible at all, but it is with Earthwarden, wildcards like the treasure chest, and so forth. People keep discovering tricks I'd not thought of... gamers abusing the rules, who'd have thought? :)

Here is what I psoted to the mailing list when I let 053 out:

--
o Start a new game; old saves are nolonger valid!

Levelling:
o you start at lvl 0, with _no spells_!
o updates to the character sheet for the new values.. skill pts, spell pts,
etc. (the char sheet will get totally redone in awhile to make more room for
everything, don't worry.)
o when you level up, you get 10 skill pts and 1 spell pt
o awarding experience for clears, casts and match outcomes
o in the Training Grounds, you can buy spells or train up your skills
o 1 skill pt adds 1 rank to a skill; meaning depends on the skill
and use
o 1 spell point lets oyu buy one of _your_ spells, if you're at the
right level and have its required previous spells. If the spell belongs to
another 'colour' (class usually), then it will cost more spell points.. so
you might need to save up some if you'd like to buy some other classes spell
o hides spells oyu already know or that are too high level
o levelling up gets you free extra hitpoints as a bonus
o at level 0 (just began a new character), enemies have no spells either :)
o amt of experience to level up increases for each level, but shouldn't be
as crazy as a lot of games
o experience for casting only awarded if spell is near your level .. ie: you
can't farm by casting low level spells if you're high level
o less experience for wins in non-refill mode
o you can't buy monster-only spells, so don't ask :)

Skills:
Endurance -- adds to your hitpoints
Dodge -- increase your chance to outright dodge incoming damage
Toughness -- reduce amount of damage taken in most ways
Alertness -- Chance to get first move in a match, and makes you learn faster
Speed -- Chance to get free moves when you clear

The 5 masteries -- one per colour (so it is best to take the one that is
your own colour usually); increases how much mana you get from a clear, and
reduces how much damage you take from spells of that colour.

Buff/Debuffs:
o to help see whats going on, a variety of buff/debuff icons will show on
your and enemies portrait
o a 'lock' icon means that character is missing a move, for instance
o a white-cross means a heal-over-time effect is on
o theres a half dozen various buff/debuff icons; I'll make it on the website
one of these days, when Ste makes new artwork :)

Mechanics:
o treasure chest works differently, though not yet ideal; various amts of
gold it may return, and various rarities of items
o you are penalized in hp for bad moves; amt varies by level.
o AI is a little more aggressive
o damage shield passes remaining damage through to receiver
o showing level in save/load slots

Lots to be done yet, but I thought you'd like to see it faster..

ex: more spells; still same old spells in there, but you do have to buy them
as you level up; I'll be adding many more spells soon, assuming all the
below works okay :)

ex: the opponent scaler is just the beginning; it scales up their skills to
level, but doesn't yet scale up their gear or spells to match player growth

--
Theres a lot more changed internal and out, but thats the highlights.

I had no idea the game would turn into so much effort by adding the RPG elements. omg!

jeff

Oh and semyaza -- she'll likely be more angry; I made the AI a little meaner to keep challenge up, but it'll probably make her swear more :p

(though I do need to know if its too hard or too easy.. difficult to judge!)

jeff
 
skeezix said:
A lot of internal and visible changes have gone on here; mostly its about levelling up and everything to do with that. Its quite a lot going on .. how fast to level up? (too fast is boring, too slow is annoying); scaling up opponents (so they're not too hard, not too easy); adding spells and gear, and all that junk. New spells and gear are yet to be done and the opponent only partially scales up (he gets some naive skillups, but not yet any gearups or spellups, since they're not entered yet :)

Still, you can level up, increasing your skills in many ways, and buying spells as you go (you start with no spells, so even have to buy your basics that you're used to.)

Obviously the existing spells will become underpowered as you level up, but you can help trial out the levelling up system and let me know how the opponents fare against you and so forth :)

Too many changes to post here, so I'll reply to myself with some highlights.

Get it here: http://www.codejedi.com/battlejewels/binar...ls-gp2x-053.zip

jeff



I really hate that you cannot post twice in a row yourself without getting them appended together ...



HI, thanks for the release, as for balance you can use some D&D books for reference on leveling up, gears, abilities and so on; remember, those books are for reference, we must apply this rules as we see fit.

But it'll be easier for you if we have a dungeon master within this forums :p
 
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shinra said:
skeezix said:
A lot of internal and visible changes have gone on here; mostly its about levelling up and everything to do with that. Its quite a lot going on .. how fast to level up? (too fast is boring, too slow is annoying); scaling up opponents (so they're not too hard, not too easy); adding spells and gear, and all that junk. New spells and gear are yet to be done and the opponent only partially scales up (he gets some naive skillups, but not yet any gearups or spellups, since they're not entered yet :)

Still, you can level up, increasing your skills in many ways, and buying spells as you go (you start with no spells, so even have to buy your basics that you're used to.)

Obviously the existing spells will become underpowered as you level up, but you can help trial out the levelling up system and let me know how the opponents fare against you and so forth :)

Too many changes to post here, so I'll reply to myself with some highlights.

Get it here: http://www.codejedi.com/battlejewels/binar...ls-gp2x-053.zip

jeff



I really hate that you cannot post twice in a row yourself without getting them appended together ...



HI, thanks for the release, as for balance you can use some D&D books for reference on leveling up, gears, abilities and so on; remember, those books are for reference, we must apply this rules as we see fit.

But it'll be easier for you if we have a dungeon master within this forums :p


Personally I prefered Rolemaster http://www.ironcrown.com/IntroRM.htm much more flexable, but now were going off topic :p
 
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Bluntman said:
A new Battlejewels release!!

yeeeah.gif


Can't wait to leave the office (9 hours from now on, daaamn) and to check the new version. Thank you for updating my favorite GP2X game!
You are really mad about this game, right? :lol:

Uh, New version without old savegames? Oww...and I had over 800Gold and the hope to buy new cool equipment in the new versions of the game, my last version was 0.50 and I haven't found anything new items.
Oh, with over 60 lives in version 0.50 my gladiator really had trouble to kill a 30hp friar, these guy has to good healing skills i think, not very balanced.
I'll try the new version and check everything out. :)

EDIT: huh? My 2. fight and my opponent is an friar with 82hp, all spells and Level 2? Urgh, no, thanks thats a little bit overpowered I think. ^^
 
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Havnt got a lot of info but initial play apparantly seems ok. There was a crash when Dragon cast a Fire breath spell but never played against that character again. I'll wait until I get a bit more info.

Also no quit option during game.
 
I get frequent random crashes on this release, but they only seem to happen when a spell that causes damage is cast, or an attack is lined up. But still, nice release ;)
GP2x Mk2, FW 2.1.1, Clock 200Mhz, No ram timings unless you apply them as default, launched using gp2xmenu,.
 
As yodaofborg said; also getting crashes (well, freezes - music stops, image stays on screen, but controls stop responding, have to turn gp2x off) during play.
Great game by the way.
 
Weekend flew by didn't even have time to touch a PC :(

(For the record, I'd swear by Rolemaster as well; ICE ftw!)

Yeah, save games had to go so I could widen up a few parts of the character information, and no time to write an import routine. One of these days I'll start spewing out manmaged structure or XML or something, but not just yet :p

Sounds like some crashes.. but all when damage is dealt eh? I'll try working that section over.

There'll be some more changes there I think anyway .. I think the Toughness skill should apply to non-spell damage (clear damage, special damage).

I may tweak the level assignment of opponents.. at lvl 0 opponent is lvl 0; at lvl 1-2 I think he can be 1-4, and then at lvl 2+ he is player lvl + 0-4 or something .. so at low levels if hes a couple levels higher, it could just be too many hp on his side since the AIs favour Endurance skill over the others usually.

With all the new mechanisms in this build it'll take a few builds to get the balance halfway right I think. So much going on now .... too much? :p

Keep at it my friends :) I'll get another build out soon.

jeff
 
BTW, you can hit Start menu to bring up an options/quit/inventory menu .. you can forfeit or quit right in the game, anytiume you like.

jeff
 
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