[Design Deliberation] How Armello Uses Randomness Effectively
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 25 ส.ค. 2024
- Randomness. It is a very tricky thing to get right. If it is off just a little bit the design of your game can be greatly reduced, but get it right and it can work wonders. Today's video will break down Armello's game design to discover some neat tricks to deal with randomness.
#Armello #Randomness
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Fun Fact: Armello uses a physics engine to determine what side of a die you get, So it's more realistic and won't land on a sword and suddenly go to a miss
Dargus, That sounds cool!
Now might be a great time to revisit this video. They added a limit to how many times dice can explode, slightly (or maybe not so slightly?) reducing the randomness.
I actually really like the changes in the 2.0 update. It still preserves a lot of the fun of the exploding dice but also eliminates those really rare rolls that come out of nowhere and crush your opponent. The update also give the player more control over the randomness by allowing them to increase the amount of explosions they can have and forcing the player to make interesting decisions around the randomness. They still haven’t announced any Stranger fixes though.
Chariot Rider True, though at least you can turn him off in a custom game.
@@Chariot_Rider One thing I want to add as well concerning the Stranger is that there IS counterplay to the stranger: trying to give him to someone else.
Remember, you can always stop beside another player to try and give them the Stranger. Yes, he's cruel and terrible. Yes, he always throws me into Swamps. Yes, I hate him. But I love nothing more than the curse emotes that follow when I not-so-gently nudge him into the arms of another player.
Also, the Stranger's ability is actually very useful for someone that has just died. He's effectively a free movement point when you're leaving the Clan Grounds, which is something you CAN plan around.
Now might be a good time to revisit this.. as a physical version of the game is going to hit Kickstarter
Good video. Minor nitpick: the singular word for dice is die. "I roll a bunch of dice. I roll a single die. I burn a card to add a die to my roll."
You would probably be interested in the board game Eclipse. I've played it quite a lot and am really in love with the ways the game enables you to influence the randomness of fights while still keeping them exciting and enabling the players to create interesting counters to each other's ship designs. Good video btw
+Arnaldur Bjarnason I have heard of Eclipse but I haven’t gotten around to playing it yet. Perhaps I will move it a few pegs up on my list of games I need to play. Thanks for watching!
They recently got rid of "infinite explodes." Now your dice can only explode a certain number of times. By default they can only explode to the equivalent of your spirit (nerfing high fight and low spirit characters in a way) to non corrupted heroes. For corrupted, it's based on your rot.
I actually like this system a lot more than the old system since it gives value to a weaker stat and helps give the player more control over the randomness still left in the game.
Yup. Plus it nerfs the very powerhouse heroes that have high health, high fight (Fang, Magna, and Horace just to name a few), but low magic so they cannot explode their dice as much and cause an over-excessive amount of damage to everyone. It also makes magic a valuable stat to them too so spellcaster fighters is an incentive now. Rot victories are also a bigger incentive too since they allow for a very high explode pool without the need for a high spirit stat.
I really like this change as well, and it makes thematic sense too - those with low spirit and high fight can perform well, but never spectactularly beyond expectations. Those who make a pact with the Wild however can gain extreme power in battle...if the Wild chooses to listen to them today. And of course, if you give in to the baleful power of the Rot, both consistent strength and the potential for even greater can be yours! Nothing can possibly go wrong with that path...
The Stranger, in my mind, actually helps to counteract a bit of randomness, and this might seem counter-intuitive, but I'll stand by it; I'll also add that there is, actually, a way to handle the randomness (Albeit, somewhat randomly).
The Stranger cannot come from nowhere; he is only acquired when landing on a dungeon, which otherwise has the likelihood of giving mostly boons, and sometimes banes (which in late-game can definitely be a boon for players seeking to farm prestige). In this way, the Stranger allows for someone to rethink, to a degree, their choices when they are considering going into a dungeon. Do they really want to risk it, even if it is so minimal? This risk-analysis can be a big game-changer.
Secondly, there are two ways to remove the Stranger, albeit, both cases require a degree of that random element. The first is to simply end your turn next to another player--giving a chance that they, not you, will bear the onerous onus of this bald cat's presence. The second relates more directly to game-progression, and can, in fact, really shake up the game. Upon entering the Palace successfully, the Stranger is banished from the board, freeing the player without needing to go to someone else's hand. This often means passing a Palace peril, but the point remains--it's a confirmed removal, if you can swing it. This also opens up the palace for others to enter, and the determination to rid oneself of the Stranger has caused many an early entry. Perhaps nobody likes getting the Stranger--but that flaw, that hit, can be a critical part of making gameplay fun--as now, other players may just circle around someone with this follower, rather than getting too close.
Great video overall, though.
I've found the Stranger to be helpful as much as a hindrance as it can allow me to move where I already wished to go without spending movement (action) points. That said, this feature is very random, which was the point of the video.
Agreed. It's also worth mentioning that a little creativity can make the Stranger very useful. If you're farming dungeons, just be on a dungeon at the end of your turn. Then the Stranger gives you a free move off the dungeon and you'll be able to enter the dungeon twice a turn each turn instead of only 3 times every 2 turns.
Yes it's 50% chance that the Stranger will move you in the 'wrong' directions; but sometimes you can just change your plans.
And there's also 50% chance to move in the right direction; if that move happens to be onto a mountain that was in the way; you've gained 2 free action points.
@john The video claimed the Stranger is random without control; which Slavic and I are arguing misses some subtleties of this companion.
Yes I've had the misfortune of the Stranger taking the 1 in 6 chance of moving me to a stone circle while corrupted... that was my mistake for ending my turn adjacent to the circle while I had the Stranger.
There used to be this channel called Nintendo Enthusiast and Jay, one of the hosts, claimed that Armello was better than Shovel Knight and got shit on for the next couple of years for it. I think the video’s been deleted now. That’s the only exposure I’ve ever had to this game until this video. The game doesn’t seem as bad as people made it out to be but I don’t understand how anyone would even think to compare it to Shovel Knight. The only commonality they share is both being indie games.
I like the stranger actually.
Why?
the aids cat
I freaking hate The Stranger. I've had two games where I was corrupted, and about to win. I just needed to make it in the palace but SOMEBODY walked me into a stone circle before I could do anything and instantly ended my turn. Luckily after three days I got my Rot win for the amulet so I can ignore Rot for the rest of my life.
🤔 Haku likes this!
Your script has a lot of redundancy and you should have made a couple more takes with the voice over. The presentation is also not exactly entertaining or varied, resulting in a dull experience.