Game Projects

Basic Stuff

Text-based, procedural. Has mazes/towns/overworlds.

Combat and barrier bypassing is entirely based around the magic system, which is very thorough and targets every single system in the game.

Layout

The game is separated into elemental regions based around the shatterloop six. While areas are handcrafted, their layouts sure aren't, and in the case of dungeons/etc it's a lot more random but based on handcrafted parameters.

Resources are also handcrafted though their diaspora is pretty wild.

Spells Basis

Spells have both an element attached to them and a god/goddess that sort of represents what they do (or what they affect).

Unlocking a spell requires going to a shrine for that deity within the appropriate elemental region -- there are a few scattered around.

This unlocks the spell but doesn't activate it -- actually learning the spell requires gathering PGCS resources, which are potentially tiered -- since there's no base building, you'd have to also source the locations where you transform materials. The more powerful the spell, the more tiering / resource obscurity there is.

The Cloud Library can assist you here -- more on this in that section.

Spell Cost and Draws

Spells cost some amount of elemental Mana. Starting out you have 10 available of all six types. Simple spells cost 10 or less.

There are Auras that increase your magical capacity (more on this in the Auras section).

Mana doesn't regenerate -- you instead have to Draw it from world fixtures based around that element (like you can pull Wood Mana from a tree for example). Thankfully, Drawing fully fills your capacity there -- however in combat it's less efficient.

Each element has a crystal assigned to it, for example Ruby is paired to Fire. Crystals can hold additional Mana capacity and will also fill fully during a non-combat Draw. The downside is that they take up valuable Satchel space.

When you use up Mana, it'll automatically pull from your Crystals. Unfortunately this won't push you over your maximum, but it does at least give you more mana to work with.

The Cloud Library

The Cloud Library is a place in the Clouds realm that you can return to via Cloud Crystals found in major cities (or the one in the starting region where you begin the game).

It offers a Skein that lets you scan basically anything whatsoever in the game (the location of stuff, properties of fish, etc).

In order to do that you have to make a trade on Knowledge, 1:1 (unless you have Auras that adjust that ratio of course).

You start with a few Quills -- they're quite lightweight as far as the Satchel goes thankfully. And a Journal which is free. Any time you encounter any entity in the game whatsoever -- a shop, a resource, an enemy, an NPC, etc, you can make a note of it in your Journal. This will consume a Quill if you have one. You can also set it up to automatically do this.

This knowledge can then be traded to the Library, allowing you to make Scans. Scans are recorded so you have easy access to them later on.

You can only Record an entity exactly once.

In addition to going to the Cloud Realm directly (this allows you to buy Quills), you can also optionally Astral Project there while sleeping -- this allows you to access the Library and make/save scans but you can't physically buy Quills.

The Satchel and Cloud Nine

Your Satchel allows you to store items. It has a limited capacity. Keys are free thankfully, they just attach to the Keyring on your Belt. Equipped items are also free for the same reason.

The Satchel can be upgraded by enchantments that increase its storage capacity in some way. There's a variety of spells here, and Satchel Material plays a role the way Robes do.

You have a kind of Base called Cloud Nine that lets you categorically store items in various fixtures (like a Closet for Robes). Cloud Nine has an infinite storage capacity. You can also customize it a bit. The downside is that you physically have to go there via some means of accessing the Cloud Realm.

Spell Types

There are several spell types:

Puzzle -- affect obstacles and dungeon fixtures. There's exactly two per element -- one that removes barriers of a defending element and one that allows secondary traversal in that element's dungeon and elsewhere where that puzzle appears. You start with a fire puzzle spell and you also start in the wood realm.

Utility -- affects various things in the world in a non-puzzle way.

Combat -- deals damage in combat, adds status effects, etc.

Restorative -- restores health, adds combat buffs, etc. Nothing here overlaps with Auras.

Enchantment -- Adds things to Tools or the Satchel. Ties into the Materials system there. More on that in a bit.

Auras -- Fortifies your stats and other traits. This is a type of Enchantment that affects you and is tied into the Material of your Robe.

Teleportation -- moves you around the world in various ways.

Materials

Tools, the Satchel and your Robe are made of some material. Each material has a different set of Enchantment/Aura conditions that can apply to it -- it'll allow or disallow certain elemental spells, allow them to stack, and have limits on their use.

Rather than obtaining the materials directly, you instead can buy or find tools/robes with some material attached to them. These are extremely randomized, though better materials are going to be rarer / more expensive.

Combat

Literally everything in the game is based around the Spells in your Grimoire and Combat is no exception.

Enemies aren't particularly complicated, and their stats are somewhat randomized.

In Combat, (unless you have spells that alter it of course), the order of operations is you take a turn and then the enemy takes a turn. If there's more than one enemy, both will take a turn during the enemy turn.

In Combat you can Flee anything other than a Boss fight -- your health remains the same while the enemy regenerates. However this allows you to leave the engagement if you feel like you're going to die.

During an enemy's turn, there will be a window where you can Dodge -- each attack has a certain dodge associated with it so learning which ones are paired will allow you to bypass damage. The downside though is that there's a brief window where this happens, the dodge links are in different starting positions, and literally move around so they're harder to click/tap. So dodging takes some skill.

Failing to dodge (or picking the wrong dodge type) will deal you damage according to the attack.

On your turn you can use combat spells. Some (like damage) have an Effectiveness meter where you have to line an arrow up with a region in a bar to deal the most damage. The Effectiveness bar is based on the Difficulty of the enemy but can be upgraded with Auras.

Since enemies and combat spells are both elemental, you have to attack with an attacking element to deal damage. Using the same element as the enemy will instead heal them and using anything else will halve the damage. Nonetheless it can still be useful to do this for a variety of reasons (out of attacking element Mana, Aura perks, a lack of a combat spell that's most effective).

I'm thinking maybe the Robe is defensive while the Wizard Hat is offensive. This adds wizard hats in (which I like) and also subdivides things a bit better.

Bosses

Bosses are handcrafted. There's exactly six of them -- one per dungeon. They have a bunch of stipulations that affect the layout of the battle -- I'll look to the Cave Frog for inspiration here, because basically the environment and where you / the enemy / various fixtures are is pretty important.

Dungeons

Dungeons are GTT mazes. The layouts are procedural but are based on some handcrafted layout parameters.

Keys are dungeon-specific.

There might be memorization or other types of randomized puzzles. Depends on what I can come up with really.

In addition to the basic layout, passageways will also branch off that have loot / additional enemies / etc.

Each Dungeon has Element Puzzles scattered around that you need to use the puzzle spell to utilize. These can contain Keys, be parts of some greater whole or just block off passageways.

Keys can take on other forms as well -- for example, I'm envisioning some Boats in the Water dungeon. They're effectively just Keys but they look a bit different for flavor.

POIs

POIs such as Crypts or Mines are similar to Dungeons but don't contain Keys or a Boss and are also more open-ended.

Resources

As mentioned, Resources are things that tie into the unlocking of Spells (once available via the appropriate deity shrine).

They require the use of various Tools, which have Durability. Broken Tools can be mended at shops for money.

There's a Skill mechanic here similar to that of Combat. Not sure what they are exactly but there will be several different types. The Skill mechanic can be improved via Enchantments on the Tool (which are dictated by its material).

Resources regenerate over time. It can take a while, but can be upgraded via Spells.

Resources can be sold for money. They can also be refined into better variants, which can be sold for more money. They're obviously also how you unlock Spells.

Dying

Dying is somewhat catastrophic and is not recommended:

You respawn way back on Cloud Nine.

You lose all Resources in your Satchel -- they'll respawn wherever you collected them fortunately but this can still be highly annoying.

All your Mana resets to 0.

You're hungry.

One of your spells will be Disabled until you collect half of the resources it required to unlock it. Or maybe a Draw puzzle like with Hearts/Summons.

All of this but the respawn can be mitigated with various Auras.

Hearts

Defeating a Boss gives you their Heart. It doesn't take up much Satchel space.

If you have an intact Heart, then when you die the Heart will instead break and restore your health to full.

Broken hearts can be repaired by sticking them on the Skeleton of their Boss and feeding them a large amount of mana corresponding to their Element. The caveat is that the mana can't come from you -- you instead have to seek out Draws of it. Each one will fill up the meter a little and you cant use that Draw again in that way (or in the other way for that matter). It will at least tell you how much more you have to go.

Summons

There are two summoning spells per Realm, one that allows you to Capture enemies and one that Summons them. You can very rarely find Crystallized Summons as well. You can also buy them, though they're very expensive and again rare.

To capture an enemy you use the Capture spell and then defeat it. You must also have a charged Crystal of their element (like a fire elemental enemy would require a Ruby with full Mana in it). On the Capture command, that Crystal is assigned and can't be used during the battle -- you do get it back if you flee or die though.

You can't Capture Bosses.

Summons that have been placed in Crystals make those Crystals otherwise inaccessible for mana-refilling purposes. They're basically crafted from the crystal. You can release them if you want though.

Summons won't fight enemies of the same element. They'll actually turn against you.

They're most effective against enemies or bosses of elements that their element attacks, otherwise their attacks deal half damage.

Summons are somewhat random -- the Summon spell cost is based on the enemy's Spectre Presence -- the stronger they are, the more they'll cost to summon. Spectre Presence is a percentage of the enemy's strength and varies per capture.

When summoned, you can command them to use their attacks and they'll also take damage rather than you. If they die, they'll desummon and their crystal will deplete -- you'll have to recharge it outside of battle via a similar system as recharging Hearts, though thankfully they don't take as much. On recharge, those sources of draw will return to normal (same deal with recharging Hearts).

You can however heal them on your turn -- either via Restorative magic or by Damage that matches their element. This does take up the turn however. You can do this out of battle as well, since their damage sticks around outside of combat.

Summons will "level up" as they win fights, gaining more Spectre Presence and summon cost. However there's another upside -- every 20% they gain will enable them to learn an enemy attack including its element, allowing late-game summons to function like swiss army knives. Granted this only works if the enemy difficulty is equal to their own.

Summon crystals can be stored in Material-based Jewelboxes, which allows you to Enchant them -- there are summon-specific enchantments and they can also have Auras applied to them.

Time, Sleeping and the basis of Hunger.

Moving around expends time like it does in Neptopia. Some town transport types will do this as well.

Time affects when Shops are open (typically during the day, although some weird ones will only be available at night). Inns, the Library and Transport are open 24 hours. Some resources/fish/enemies are also nocturnal.

When you've been up for 16 hours, you'll gain 1 point of tiredness for each additional hour you stay up. With higher levels of tiredness you'll gain debuffs.

You always sleep 8 hours and recover all tiredness points. Every time you sleep you wake up Hungry (more on that on that section). You also can't sleep until you've been up for at least 12 hours.

These mechanics allow you to shift your schedule around to whatever you're trying to accomplish.

Starting out, your day begins at 6am and so you start to feel tired at 10pm.

These mechanics can be affected with Auras.

Tiredness debuffs will eventually kill you if they get bad enough -- health drains.

You can sleep in your bed at Cloud Nine for free, in Inns for a fee (you get free breakfast though) or while Camping (you can Camp anywhere provided you're not in a battle or boss fight).

Hunger

Every time you sleep, you wake up Hungry. Eating a meal will keep you afloat until the next time you sleep.

You can go a day without eating without any consequences. On the second day though you'll be Starving and will take damage and eventually die. Keeping a stock of food while journeying around is therefore important.

Food can be bought at Inns -- either free breakfast or portable food you can bring with you.

In addition to curing Hunger, food can grant perks depending on what ingredients are used -- various recipes will combine together these ingredients and compound the perks, depending on what that particular Inn offers for breakfast (it varies quite a lot).

While Camping, you can Cook Stews for a similar effect -- this will take 1 of each ingredient. The downside is it only recovers one day of hunger, so your food can dwindle faster if you're making complex meals a lot. But it might be worth it for the Perks.

Stews require both Fire Mana and Water Mana, 10 of each.

Food Generation

Food is handcrafted and based around the resources in that area (which are *also* handcrafted). Their perks are definitely randomized by seed however.

Food Types

There are some additional stipulations with Food types:

Raw Food -- cheaper than Smoked/preserved foods, but requires 10 Fire Mana or them being part of a Stew to be edible.

Powdered Food -- takes up less volume than other foods, but requires 10 water Mana or Stew mechanics.

Food can also be found as nonrenewable loot.

Food *can't* be pulled from the world -- there's some good Lore that explains this (and why the Guild that operates the Inn network has such a monopoly, but I haven't explored it yet). The gameplay reason meanwhile is just that this isn't a survival/building/crafting game.