straker
commented
2 years ago Also! Since our ability cards don't have a cost associated with them (whereas Deckbuilder cards have cost to play them that turn), we could make the cost of the card decrease the "something." Then it's not so much the number of cards you have but the total number of cost in your deck. This gives us the nice balancing effect of making more powerful abilities cost more.
So one aspect of a Deckbuilder is that you can only play the cards in your current hand. This means that the more cards you have in your deck, the harder it will be to get the cards you need or want.
Since this game doesn't have a concept of a current hand, we still need a system in place that discourages the number of card abilities the player takes. We don't want the player to always choose an ability like in 20 Minutes till Dawn, but instead have them make choices about which abilities to take and when.
To wit, I was watching a documentary on the making of Rouge Legacy 2, and they mentioned that they wanted a system in place that discouraged players from always equipping the best gear. After trail and error, they came to the concept of resolve and relics. Relics are super powerful bonuses you can find during a run, but also come with a cost to your characters resolve. If your resolve ever goes below 100%, you start to lose max HP by an equivalent percentage, even going to 1% max HP.
Everyone starts with a base resolve (can be influenced by upgrades), and additionally is influenced by your equipment. Heavier and more powerful equipment decreases resolve, while lighter equipment increases it. This creates a nice synergy in that wearing less powerful armor means you can take more powerful relics, and vise versa.
This got me thinking that we could do something similar. We could make it so that you start with a certain amount of "something" (name pending). Each ability card you choose decrease it by some amount. At the end of a run, you get Soul (in-game currency) multiplied by the "something" percent. This means that the more cards you have, the less in-game currency you get (which is used to buy permanent upgrades and the end game goal of purchasing you contract), while less cards means you get more Soul.
This is similar to how the XP system works in Fuga: Melodies of Steel where your end battle experience is multiplied by your score that battle (Rank S - F). Rank S gives 1.5x experience, and it decreases from there. This gives an incentive to to do better in combat.
We can also apply the same penalty as Rouge Legacy 2 and once you get below 100% you lose max HP.