Game Design: TBS One-on-One Combat

[Rosstin]

Hey guys. I'm a student game designer at CMU with a couple projects under my belt, and I'm currently working with a client who wants me to design a turn-based 1vs1 tile-based battling game with monsters. Ultimately this will be a videogame, but while the programmers are bringing up the interface I'm experimenting with mechanics and trying to create some compelling gameplay on a board.

At first my thought was that you couldn't make a turn-based grid combat game where 1 vs 1 combat was fun. After experimenting a bit with a scheme of simultaneous movement and combat (a rock-paper-scissors-like situation where predicting the enemy's movement is important), I've concluded that it's possible to make a fun game out of this. However, I'm still having trouble coming up with fun mechanics. One of the things the client wants is a focus on environment rules. The monsters shoot around ice and fire and the environment changes based on this.

Anyway, I come to you to ask you about your experience with tile-based TBS combat systems. Are there any really fun games I can look at that focus on one-unit versus one-unit combat on a board? The fact that I can't think up a lot of examples indicates to me that there are conceptual problems with this type of gameplay that I have to understand and solve before it becomes fun.

[NichG]

There was a lot of this way way back, but not really turnbased now that I think of it. The old games Dark Legions and Archon had a sort of large-scale army strategy setup that resolved individual attacks between units as a 1-vs-1 fight, but it was realtime.

Other examples I can think of that aren't quite there are roguelikes, which are basically tile-based, turn-based 1-vs-Many scenarios. Sometimes they are effectively 1-vs-1 when you're facing one enemy that can really slaughter you if you make a wrong move, so all your focus is on that guy. Mostly at that point the tactics reduce to figuring out which one of a number of risky options has the highest chance of success - do you try a random teleport, or a wand of Death that will either kill them or leave them untouched, or do you see if you can survive a melee exchange with it, or do you try to kite it around a pillar, or what?

I could see some sort of Tron-like game having the aspects you're looking for. Both people must always move, when they move they always change the environment, and the environment progressively becomes more dangerous to both players as the duel advances, thus guiding it towards a conclusion. I'd do something like, the characters are each aligning leylines beneath them, so as they move they get this wider and wider cachement basin that channels battlefield effects towards them, and the damage/etc that is dealt by the effects is proportional to the number of upstream tiles of the right/wrong type.

Concretely, imagine that there's a 2D space of tiles in which maybe 10-20% of tiles have a special nature. Each tile has a direction associated with it as well. When you move, you cause the tile you have just left to point towards the tile you have just entered. When an effect drops, it activates whatever tiles it touches. Those tiles then propagate it to the tiles in the direction they're facing, etc; an effect cannot pass through one tile twice, so it doesn't loop forever. The special tiles could be amplifiers, resistances, buffs, etc, and so when they're included in a cascade they grant benefits and penalties. The tactics is then creating the best leyline network for you and the worst for your enemy.

Example consequences
- Never cross an enemy's path. This makes it so his entire built up network gets funnelled into yours, and he is protected.
- Once something funnels into you, you can't remove it yourself no matter how you move. This is because even if you loop with yourself, you've just created two branches that still funnel into you. This may still be tactically advantageous because it means you now have two separate inlets rather than one inlet twice as large.

[Rosstin]

Wow, it's interesting that you mention that becomes I'm toying with something kind of similar.



The Project Manager wants me to make something where environmental effects are important, so I've been playing with that aspect of it. I have these tiles, like stone tiles which are magma on the reverse, and water tiles which are ice on the reverse. And maybe these fire and ice-based monsters can modify the tiles with their moves, etc.

But I'm still having more basic problems, like with character movement, and the logic of the tiles. I'm trying to prevent the game from having that annoying Chess one king versus one king feel to it, and I want the players to have to think, but not have to process TOO much information on every turn.

We've done some tests with a fire-versus-ice battle, and the ice guy just wanted to stay on his ice/water tiles, and the fire guy just wanted to stay on his rock/magma tiles. So I'm going to redesign that so every tile is dangerous in some form.

There should probably be some kind of random element in this sort of 1vs1, so that there's less hardcore brain-intensive determinism.

I talked with the old gamer dude who runs our local store, and he was talking about Battletech, which is apparently some kind of 1v1 mech game.

[NichG]

Since its a video game, a lot of the 'thinking' can be offloaded onto the software. For instance, if the interface is very clear about the larger-scale consequences of the terrain then it prevents the players from having to count squares and things like that.

One thing that could be cool is to do a lot of stuff with line of sight. You could have a game where you have to 'stay in the shadows' because the light is harmful or exposes you to a lot of danger.

[Yitzi]

Consider allowing both ranged and melee attacks, with some units being stronger at one and some being stronger at the other. That will give an incentive to move off your preferred tiles.

[Rosstin]

Thanks for your suggestions, I worked hard today and come up with some cool ideas, a lot of them similar to what you two mentioned. Some details below in spoilers.

I'm still interested in hearing about 1 unit vs 1 unit boardgames anyone has played. My brain is kind of fried from all that designing, it would be neat to do some research by playing some good examples.

My favorite prototype of the day:

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Units don't attack, their attack is determined by the tile they land on. When a unit leaves a tile, the tile flips over and reveals a different tile. There were tiles for horizontal ranged, diagonal ranged, and an area attack centered on the unit. I'll post a picture of that later that will clarify it. This scheme ended up being fast and fun to play. Some stuff I learned: there needs to be enough randomness in the game to prevent it from being too chess-like and deterministic. Also, I used a 6x3 board rather than a square one, this was cool because it accentuated the one on one nature and made straight beam attacks more useful.

[Realms of Chaos]

As far as a good environmental game, one in particular occurred to me if it would be of any use:

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While not specifically a 1-on-1 game, that's the only way I have played it and the setting of a perpetually shifting labyrinth not only fits with a traditional fantasy motif but forces the players to decide not only how they move themselves but how they move the labyrinth to reach their foes.

Also, if you have to make environment relevant, I'd ask if the board itself has to be the only tool being used.

[Rosstin]

I ordered a copy of Amazing Labyrinth to mess around with, and another friend suggested Robo Rally. I'll play them and let you know if I come up with any ideas!

[Eldest]

Another obscure game you might be interested in is RAMbots, using the Loony Pyramids pieces. It's the same idea as Roborally. In addition, you might want to look at the Megaman Battle Network series of GBA games, while it's real-time one of the more interesting ways to fight is by changing the terrain and creating temporary allies.