Biweekly update #4

Art

Boob monsters

Dev spotlight

Still working on V3.

Combat cards

Teraurge V3 will have a rejiggered combat system, and one of its main features are the different cards player can obtain. The overall system has not changed from V2. You use your attributes as fuel for your cards and you whack each other on different turns as usual.

Getting new cards by equipping weapons/items or with training is the main way to become more proficient in combat in TU. Getting resistances by equipping armor/items is another. 

The general idea is to avoid number inflation, so to keep the numbers as low as possible in terms of damage dealt and the hitpoints of combatants. For this reason it is actually impossible for the player to gain more hitpoints beyond the starting amount gained from the endurance attribute. This "number minimalism" also extends to the combat cards. The card damage values start from 1 and go from there. This will make balancing less of a headache, and I find that adjusting hitpoints is easier than adjusting the damage cards deal.

Because of how the resistances work (they just deduct the specified amount from the damage type), very low numbers still have a large effect on the overall damage output. It also means that exotic damage types are more valuable than more common ones, so one point of fire damage can be more useful than two points of slashing damage, because the slashing damage is more often resisted by enemies.

I also want to avoid leaving in an "ideal strategy", where a single deck configuration can beat all enemies in the game. The resistances and damage types are there exactly for that reason. Really tough encounters should require the player to specifically tweak their deck to win that fight.

PS: Combat card graphics are a strange beast. It's very different from the normal character/scene painting I'm used to, since it needs to communicate an action in a more symbolic way. I think I need some more practice with the style before I'm happy with them, but for now V3 can suffer the simple card art.

Hmm yes, blue fist, red fist, and blue leg.