A piece of concept art from my game, Tensai

Posted by melee-master on Oct. 23, 2011, 3:03 a.m.

That is Guiredaro, the flaming bear and in the Tensai universe, one of the 14 signs of the Zodiac. Zodiac signs come into play with the Zodiac move and give stat boosts/cuts. He's also one of the many creatures available for players to use in battle.

I haven't got around to asking the designer to write up a summary of Tensai (he's been busy), so here's a little bit from our design document that explains the two RPS systems used in our game.

"Tensai relies on two Rock Paper Scissors systems layered over one another. One of the systems governs the actual typing of the creatures themselves, while the other classifies the attacks they use in battle. These are the Elemental system and the Action system, respectively.

The Elemental System

The basic system, the Elemental System, follows this diagram (rock is the brown orb at the top):

Rock > Fire > Metal > Ice > Wood > Air > Water

Each element is effective against the three that follow it and weak against the three that precede it on the wheel. For example: fire melts metal and ice and burns wood, but is resisted by fire, quenched by water, and blown out by air.

Most creatures will be classified under one of the elements, although some will be non-elemental and have no defensive weaknesses (or bonuses, for that matter) based off their type.

Although there may be exceptions to the elemental rules in specific cases (to be explained later, under both Attacks and Passives) generally, an effective element will deal double damage, and a weak element will deal half damage.

The Action System

In order to prevent players from simply using creatures that are elementally typed to be advantageous against their opponent (or to create creature swap cycles where players continue to swap in different creatures until they are no longer susceptible to their opponent), Tensai also features a second RPS system that will allow susceptible elementals to potentially counter their opponent. This is the Action System, and will follow the following diagram (that I don't have right now):

Ranged > Magical > Aerial > Defensive > Melee

In this diagram, each item on the wheel is effective against the two that follow it and weak to the two that precede it, similar to the elemental system. However, those that are connected by the thicker red line are SPECIALLY effective. Every attack in a standard battle is classified under one of the five categories above. In the case that an Ice elemental was facing a Fire elemental, the Ice elemental would have to rely on prediction of the Fire-type's move in order to survive.

For example, in the above diagram, Aerial attacks are Specially Effective against Melee attacks. This means that, if a Melee attack were used by the Fire-type, while an Aerial attack were used by the Ice-type, the Fire-type would have its attack completely negated, while the Ice type did bonus damage (although this bonus would be mitigated by the elemental defenses of the Fire-type). However, if the Fire type properly predicted the Ice-type would use an Aerial attack, and instead countered by using a Ranged or Magical attack, the Fire type would deal bonus damage for both the Action chosen and for the Elemental bonus, dealing an extraordinary amount of damage and probably defeating the Ice type."

Comments

Mega 12 years, 5 months ago

Wow. Great piece of art.

Sounds like you're planning this really well; It'll be interesting to see this when/if it's completed.

Rob 12 years, 5 months ago

Doesn't tensai mean genius or something in Japanese?

melee-master 12 years, 5 months ago

Yep. It alludes to the goal of the game: outsmart your opponent to win.

Rob 12 years, 5 months ago

Now what exactly are you doing awake past 4 in the morning, melee?

Rez 12 years, 5 months ago

Lovin it. Hope this goes far.

pounce4evur 12 years, 5 months ago

Might just be geeking out about the Zodiac thing because of Okami but good god man I love this idea. It's like you combined pokemon (element weaknesses) with Okami (Zodiac powers) with some awesomeness from I don't know where and you mixed it and I love it to death. :D

pleasepleasepleaseplease update about this later. I wanna see this thing finished. :,)

Toast 12 years, 5 months ago

I really like the creature design. Please keep that level of simplicity - creatures you can describe in two or three words.

JuurianChi 12 years, 5 months ago

Molten Lava Bear.

Yep, it works.

melee-master 12 years, 5 months ago

Updated to mention the fact he's one of the many creatures available for use in battle. For some reason I forgot to point that out.

sirxemic 12 years, 5 months ago

It only has 2 teeth?