The canons of strategy games

When I first showed our combat system to somebody I didn’t know, a user from some indie forum, he said to me very arrogantly:

“This combat system sucks, because you went against all the canons. In your game a player shouldn’t only use up energy to perform actions, but health as well. How is it possible to kill a unit for making a move?! You’re not allowed to break the canons! You’re crap!”

But I just love breaking canons. The battle turns out to be dynamic and sharp and you feel as if you’re in a slasher game when you’re dealing with the level boss. In that type of game you have to decide: should I hit harder or will this guy get me? In our game, in turn, you have to decide next: should I spend some of my health to hit my opponent with maximum force and kill him, or isn’t it worth it? Should I choose defensive tactics or throw my units forward and suppress the enemy? The abilities of your units push you towards impulsive decisions. For instance, the archer is able to kill almost any of your opponents’ characters with just one shot – but the price for this will be almost 90% of his health. One shot. From a distance of half the battle field. Isn’t it tempting? At the same time, we were very eager to constantly demonstrate the price of each mistake, when wrong steps made at the beginning end up leading to defeat. So, in story mode it will lead to a situation when your archer won’t feel at his best – and if your party has no strixes (the stones which are the global resource in the game and which provide the defense against disease which the Reapers are sending), the archer will die in story mode. And – I will always say it, even the main protagonist will die if you let him fall in battle without resources or time to heal.

As for me, I suppose that we broke the canons three times. The first time was when we forced some classes to pay with their health for the most attractive abilities (I mean those situations when you spend 3 units of health to produce 6 units of damage and gain 1 unit of attack). Each character in our game has a set of three main parameters: health, energy and attack. All actions are derivative of attack, as is the price you pay for these abilities. If your attack rate is equal to 3 while the ability which you want to apply costs 2 points of attack, it means that you will expend 6 points of health or energy. Some abilities are free to use, some require you to spend health or energy. A part of the archetypes is built exactly on this principle. Now the second time we broke the canons was when we, in an attempt to move away from an extra “poker-like” approach, added the rule of “empty energy”. When a character’s energy falls to zero, any incoming strike against energy causes double damage. “What the heck?” – you may ask. Well, it is what it is. You can deprive the opponent’s character of all his energy and then finish him off with a couple of strikes. Or you can apply to the opponent the card that exchanges health and energy parameters – and the unit with zero energy will die immediately.

Since then more than 200 people from all over the world have played the prototype with me and my friends. Their advice is often like real diamonds – we tried to choose people who play TBS or state that it’s one of their favorite genres. These real-life players are the ones who helped us to get rid of rules which were obviously weak or too complex, as well to change and add some things in the mechanics. So, if we we knock on your door one day and ask for help – please find a couple minutes for us, check out the game and tell us what we can do better.

Next is the third canon that we broke. All the abilities of the classes are based on the fact that you can change the levels of health, energy or attack of your or your opponent’s units. In most cases you are the one who chooses whether a unit will strike at an enemy’s health or energy. So, the “Swordsman” can cause slight damage, receiving a little bonus for his attack each time he does it. If you overlook such a unit you’re doomed, because his attacks will become stronger than that of the other units. Then there is the “Templar”. He isn’t very strong but he can reduce enemies’ attack index. If you waste your time hanging around near him, your unit will turn into harmless sheep with zero attack.

Current edition

A little later we transformed everything into the following criteria: “Dynamics“, “Mood“, “Originality‘ and “Challenge“. If you offer a rule without explanation what criterion it could improve – we’d throw it out.

The storyline of this game moves pretty fast and unpredictably and the dynamic combat system should maintain the tempo and mood which are set by the plot. Each of your moves should be important and have a value. We’re trying to balance character classes so as not to let the combat session last too long: just 25-30 turns for a team of 6 units. And we set the timer for each turn in such a way that you’ll remember what adrenaline is.

I don’t think that the edition available on http://game.aurumdust.com (the public prototype) is the final one . At the time I’m writing these lines, we’ve been able to change the balancing and part of the combat system’s rules four times. So, the first editions were ideal for fans of poker: the defending side was able to choose the defending skill already after the enemy had chosen how exactly he would attack. The current edition is dynamic and very simple to understand – that’s what I’ve been telling you about all this time.

I want to end with a barebones list of important rules that we’re using now.