I’m currently working on a short hack that I want to have high replayability through unit customization. However, because the hack is too short to allow most of the cast to promote, and I don’t want to overload on skills, I’m looking for ways units can be personalized and significantly altered without changing classes or learning several skills.
So far, I’ve implemented more powerful stat boosters that allow a unit to be greatly more useful with just 1-2 of them. The game has deflated stats across the board, so I hope for each one to feel meaningful. I have also made a couple of passive stat rings, each giving a spread of stats that are meant for a specific unit, but could be used on others.
How long is your hack? My first thought about “making everyone unique” was filling their inventories with unbreakable prf weapons. This might not work for you, but I feel as I should still say this.
I have given some characters personal weapons and skills, but those are static. I’m looking for ways the player can allocate resources (not counting XP) to customize and build units.
I mean, look at what traits a unit has (gameplaywise)
Stats (including mov+con, also including growths)
Skills
Prf Locks
Class
Promoted class
Movement type (flying/ignoring terrain), though this is usually tied to class
Weapon ranks
Weapon types (again, tied to class usually)
if you get rid of class and skills here, and you’ve already done stats, then the only way might be to maybe figure out how to assign a prf to a unit freely, and add arms scrolls. Maybe you could have some item that gives a unit flying movement. Could add thracia scrolls that boost growths. Other than that, you’ve basically exhausted every single trait a unit can have. There’s not much else room to go with FE, since skills would probably be the biggest thing here that can be used to differentiate units. So many other things like weaknesses or terrain penalties/benefits are tied to class, too.
I came here looking for ideas on customizing units without removing unit identity, but yeah I think you’re right. There isn’t much left other than unique weapons.
Maybe I could make multiple Prf options for a unit, but you can only get one? As for “assigning” Prf weapons, I think I could use multiple item IDs for copies of the same weapon, each ID assigned to a different unit, then make the player choose one of those units to give the weapon to.
Character-specific stat boosts could work, kinda like the talk convos from FE4. Speaking of FE4, items that give stat boosts and/or skills when held could also work. You could restrict them to certain characters too.
Just throwing some ideas out here.
Yeah, choosing from multiple weapons seems like a decent idea.
Just wanted to touch on this, unit identity and customisation are basically inversely correlated. I think if you’re prioritising identity slightly, then it’s important to know where you want to draw the line. I think if you are willing to mess around with classes a little bit something like awakening second seal system might work, since there every unit has their own pair of classes instead of being able to freely choose any class. Just something to consider on where you draw the line.
I’d also heavily recommend trying to make some use of skills for this. You don’t need 6 skills on every unit but maybe everyone has a personal skill to always set them apart somewhat (therefore retaining that unit identity you want) no matter what customisation is done + a few skill scrolls handed out (for customisation).
If you really wanted you could probably figure out a way to set skill limit to like 3 so that units can have class skill (canto, locktouch, whatever) + personal skill + one scroll skill, to encourage spreading the scrolls out more. Alternatively just have personal skills and let unit class be more fluid, maybe. Not sure what exactly you want here so it’s up to you in the end obviously.
Just wanted to bring this up cause I think by ignoring skills you’re ignoring a lot of different possibilities, just because skills can be so much more varied and in-depth than other unit traits. Not something that needs to be done ofc but I would recommend considering it.
Yes, I’ve given some characters personal skills that can be built around. For example, one character has a skill which grants him +30 crit when initiating battle. However, he’s an armor knight, so he won’t double anything and his low move restricts his potential targets. Plus, without further increased crit he can’t reliably kill things. There are some tools that can help him though. There are two secret books which each give +5 Skill, but there are other characters who want them too. There are passive rings that boost Skill and Move respectively, giving him extra crit and target access, but again they have other good users. Or of course, you could just hand him the killer lance, though it only has 10 uses and a single chapter of availability.
FE4’s talk convos definitely had an inspiration on how I give these boosters and rings to the player! Most are either placed on a unit to start, or given to one through a talk convo. The units in question are certainly good with the item, but are not its only good (or best) user.