Telcontar

I like that morale system. Basing it on reserves is pretty cool, and gives some incentive towards not keeping the field flooded as much as possible at all times.

 

Whether or not that randomness has any real impact depends upon, again, the pace of your battles and how important each unit is. Without knowing more, I can only recommend playtesting it - it's a simple element to remove, at any rate.

 

Also, I'll mention that when I include randomness into things like damage calculation I tend to go with a normal distrubution - that is to say, damage is centered around a particular mean (the unit's base damage value) and rarely deviate by much.

I have to wonder though, if the randomness is used such that you wouldn't notice it, is it really adding anything? Is doing a range of 20-26 damage much different from doing a flat 23 damage?

 

It very well could, depending on the game. Imagine A small-unit count tactical game, where each unit actually means something to the battle. A player is retreating his units, the rear of which has 22 health. This unit takes a shot before it can get under cover/out of range.

 

Does it die?

 

In the flat deterministic system (23 damage per shot) it does. In the more randomized system there is the chance that it does not. Provided that the game itself rewards players who respond well to such situations, it could be a very fortunate thing for a player to salvage one more unit out of a battle.

 

Really, it all depends on the rest of the game. A bit of variability can provide short-term advantages or disadvantages, thus giving players the chance to capitalize on the former or attempt to mitigate the affects of the latter. Thus, a dash of randomness can reward a player's ability to adjust on the fly. Conversely, a completely deterministic system may be more rewarding to those who can plan far in advance.

Hello!

 

Sounds like a great project, and I may very well be interested in writing something up for ya. There is only one detail I'd encourage you to comment on first - and this is an issue you'll probably want to add to your main post there as well as anywhere else you are placing this notice.

 

The issue is one of rights to the produced material - while the overall winner seems to become a pretty standard "work for hire" situation (as in, you are buying the actual exploitation rights of the story material as part of the payment). However, the possibility of pulling material from other contest entrants confuses things a bit. Would they then be able to go off and use that material in something else?

 

Being an indie project, yeah, chances are you wouldn't care much. But whenever money is involved, it's a good idea to think a bit about rights assignment.

I find that introducing small amounts of randomness in damage or other affects is useful in turn-based or other slow-playing games to prevent certainty of any particular outcome. If you keep the range of randomness small, "bad luck" is unlikely to actually decide any particular situation. The player with the larger or better army will still win - but by how much? WIth what exact losses? Over time, the small variations snowball into larger amounts of uncertainty, keeping thing exciting.

'Newbie designer' comment is a pretty good point.

Also, I'd say that anyone who plays a lot of video games knows about the shortcomings of computer opponents and computer teammates. Having people working both for and against you is more fun and will open up more engrossing interactions.