Stronger RPG backend

[Pandoro]

Edited by wc8: Vote for this feature here: Mini-Games
Hi there,

I know similar feature requests have been posted, but I think my view is a little different and might also be interesting. I've been playing for three days now and it's a great thing, however I noticed that the current goal is really just to keep yourself alive and level up. Of course collecting these cool weapons is nice and all, but there is no real rpg goal for me.

What I would like, and I know that this might not be how everyone feels, is to also have a bit more of actual gaming. People have suggested monsters and bosses, but the requests I have read so far are always based on the idea that your tasks become monsters. What I would like to see is for example a daily quest or monster you can fight, purely game related. Your damage will be determined based on your weapon and level and possibly other stats. Then it is somewhat based on luck who gets to attack more etc., you know, the general rpg fight. If you loose you risk some health damage, but if you win you could for example get some extra gold/xp/item. This could for example also be badges, or other rare collectables you can display somewhere. This idea of course has endless further possibilities, like offering strength potions in the store which you could buy before a fight etc. (Also premium items could be possible here.) Or if you do certain dailies or todos, you could be granted a random bonus for the fight of the day.

Too me this would be more attractive than just the pure goal of staying alive until the next level up. Currently I have a reward which allows me to do some online gaming. But instead of paying the 5 Gold, I would rather read a paper and get 1 gold, save the 5 gold for gaming and then at the end of the day, try my luck and have fun doing an actual short gaming session within habitrpg. I think this will not influence the general purpose of the game, as it will not take up lots of time or interfere with the general balancing. It could even be implemented as an automatic fight you do at the end of the day. The next morning you could then check out the log, or animation of the fight (with animation I mean something simple and funny, no hardcore graphics ;) ) and see how you did last night.

I'm excited to hear your opinions.

TL;DR : More actual gaming elements which do not interfere with the general game, but give a better goal than simply staying alive and collecting fancy items from the store.

[lefnire]

I think that that's a good idea. First on the agenda will be RGP tie-ins to
your productivity (tasks become bosses, etc), but once the show's on the
road we can start building these "mini-games"

On Thu, Jan 24, 2013 at 6:53 AM, Pandoro notifications@github.com wrote:

Hi there,

I know similar feature requests have been posted, but I think my view is a
little different and might also be interesting. I've been playing for three
days now and it's a great thing, however I noticed that the current goal is
really just to keep yourself alive and level up. Of course collecting these
cool weapons is nice and all, but there is no real rpg goal for me.

What I would like, and I know that this might not be how everyone feels,
is to also have a bit more of actual gaming. People have suggested monsters
and bosses, but the requests I have read so far are always based on the
idea that your tasks become monsters. What I would like to see is for
example a daily quest or monster you can fight, purely game related. Your
damage will be determined based on your weapon and level and possibly other
stats. Then it is somewhat based on luck who gets to attack more etc., you
know, the general rpg fight. If you loose you risk some health damage, but
if you win you could for example get some extra gold/xp/item. This could
for example also be badges, or other rare collectables you can display
somewhere. This idea of course has endless further possibilities, like
offering strength potions in the store which you could buy before a fight
etc. (Also premium items could be possible here.) Or if you do certain
dailies or todos, you could be grant ed a random bonus for the fight of the
day.

Too me this would be more attractive than just the pure goal of staying
alive until the next level up. Currently I have a reward which allows me to
do some online gaming. But instead of paying the 5 Gold, I would rather
read a paper and get 1 gold, save the 5 gold for gaming and then at the end
of the day, try my luck and have fun doing an actual short gaming session
within habitrpg. I think this will not influence the general purpose of the
game, as it will not take up lots of time or interfere with the general
balancing. It could even be implemented as an automatic fight you do at the
end of the day. The next morning you could then check out the log, or
animation of the fight (with animation I mean something simple and funny,
no hardcore graphics ;) ) and see how you did last night.

I'm excited to hear your opinions.

TL;DR : More actual gaming elements which do not interfere with the
general game, but give a better goal than simply staying alive and
collecting fancy items from the store.

—
Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHubhttps://github.com//issues/199.

[Pandoro]

Since I realized that many people are more into the idea of todos and dailies becoming bosses, I came up with a different, probably easier to implement and less intrusive way to add an rpg feeling. What is the main driving power in many rpg's? Too have those fancy, rare items. (correct me if Iḿ wrong, but that is mostly my reason to play) Now one simple option would be to just increase the store size and make these expensive fancy things available, but that sounds a bit lame. The other option, of course, are the premium items, but not everyone is willing to pay for a game directly from the start.

So my second proposal for a stronger rpg feeling is the obtaining of "Rare items". For this I have three different propositions:

1. The addition of mini quests. Once you complete any daily, habit or todo, there is a small chance that some
   "crafting" item drops. Once a certain item drops, the according mini quest automatically appears in a list below the habits( or where ever it should be placed.) You can then check the comment of this quest where you will find a list of items you need to gather. Once all items are gathered, you obtain a rare item.
   A possible scenario would be:
   I finish my daily "read a paper", I check this and I get a pop-up telling me I found a ruby. The side-quest appears in my list and I check it. It says "Dwarven craftsmanship: Collect 1 ruby, 1 magical powder and 1 golden ring. Reward: a Dwarven ring of wisdom." During the next few days I find the other two missing items and after that I obtain my ring.
2. Every day next to the normal items, a rare item appears in the store. This is rather straight forward and well, kind of lame ;)
3. Items drop randomly from the dailies, todos and habits. Also straight forward and well.. ;)

I think this idea might be better than my first considering:

1. This just motivates you more to do your stuff. In fact this principle could be extended to another level. A small icon in the task bar could indicate a dropped item can be obtained from a daily, todo or habit. These could be more likely in tasks that have been sitting around for a long time, which motivates me even more to finally call my mom, when I know I might get this third piece I need to finish my side-quest.
2. No real new patterns appear in the game, since it all boils down to items which are obtained from doing your stuff.
3. No real extra time is spent in the game.
4. Lots of eye-candy can be integrated. If each item gets a nice icon, this is kind of cool. At least I like to look at new items in games :)

For the "Rare items" there are actually also many possibilities:

1. Just better and maybe cool looking items as there are swords and helmets now ( and pets, mounts etc. later on)
2. Medals/collectibles.
3. You might get something like skins for the website. Imagine I am tired of this white yellow theme and I would rather have some stylish black theme. You could unlock different styles by these quests and pick what you like best. For example you could unlock a forest theme, a mine theme, a castle theme etc. (I know this will probably be very hard to realize with artists at hand, but what the hell, everyone could contribute skins, which are then approved or rejected if it is lacking on this point!)
4. Rare items could also be more general rewards such as an extra 5 gold or an extra 3 exp. At first I thought this might screw up the balancing, but I think in general the main balancing (namely how expensive my rewards are) is done by any user personally anyway.

Sorry for the long posts, I'm just a little excited ;)

[horusofoz]

@Pandoro Would you consider rare items covered by Trello Card 100?

Items that change themes or aesthetics beyond the avatar are not currently under consideration so can you clarify that this covers all "items" not covered by Trello Card 100?

@SlappyBag Can you create a Trello card for Crafting? Suggested summary: Items that cannot be equipped but can be utilised for crafting usable are randomly received at the completion of tasks.

[horusofoz]

Personally I think crafting would be too far into game over productivity territory. For a game it's a great suggestion which is why it's integrated into all the RPGs I play these days but I can't see it adding to my productivity. It would take focus away from GTD in favour of targeting materials to create items.

Additionally if an extended item store were implemented with an equipped inventory+backpack window, then I feel all the motivational juice would have been squeezed from "items" and crafting would be an unnecessary addition.

[Pandoro]

Sorry that it took me a while to respond. I was away for a few days. To clarify:

The general idea of the items I had closely resembles trello card 100. I was just thinking about items, with special stats, while not thinking about where the items will be placed. But the items I was thinking about could be special body armors or weapons, but also items as in trello card 100.

As for the other themes etc. This was just a mere idea how other items could be realized. The fact that trello card 100 is there, is because the avatar cannot hold more than two items: body and weapon. (Head might be possible) So I thought skins could be another addition, but I think the idea of trello card 100 is actually cooler.

As for "crafting", I don't really see how this distracts you. You wouldn't need to do anything, apart from simply hoping that you would get another item for your mini quest. When I say crafting, I didn't mee a long list of possible combinations. What I mean are mini quests that request items to be found by completing things on your lists. This wouldn't add any interaction, the only thing would be that you could once in a while check how far your mini-quest is and how many items you might still need. After that you get an item and you can decide if you want it or not. I'm not saying that this cannot be distracting, maybe for you it might be, but to me this would simply be another motivation to finish some stuff and it sure as hell wouldn't cause me to stare at my screen for hours on end ;)

Could you maybe clarify how exactly you think this would interfere with your productivity? Is this based on the idea that you could see from which task you get an item if completed? This I could understand, but if the "quest-items" are dropped randomly, I don't really undertand why it would be distracting.

[Nelmalih0]

Even though i love games, i feel like this is gamifying HabitRPG to much, which isnt actually a game, its an app thet helps you better your life by using addicting gameplay mechanics, it feels like cheating when you add features that will not actually help you in life

[Pandoro]

@Nelmalih0 , The point I'm trying to make is that the addicting gameplay mechanics you are speaking about are still missing in habitrpg. The only real gameplay mechanics we have right now are that I can see are:

• levelling up and not dying while doing so.
• Obtaining predefined gear that is no real challenge but simply a matter of time.

I cannot recall any game that has gotten me hooked on this basis. Any game I played for a longer time had some mechanics like getting better at something than someone else, or getting some cool looking gear with awesome stats.

By now I also think that my first idea in this thread is probably suboptimal, but for the second idea with the mini quests I don't see how that is cheating considering you are still encouraged to do real life tasks in order to get some cool reward item. So I would say, this does help you in life.

[svemir]

• levelling up and not dying while doing so.
• Obtaining predefined gear that is no real challenge but simply a matter of time.
I cannot recall any game that has gotten me hooked on this basis. Any game I played for a longer time had some mechanics like getting better at something than someone else, or getting some cool looking gear with awesome stats.

The main points for me are:

• Actually keeping track of todos, habits, and dailies
• Setting up meaningful personal rewards that I now only allow myself to do when I actually earn them.

Everything else is just adding some fun to the process. I could do the above on my own with a pen and a notebook, but this is more fun.

Svemir Brkic

[Nelmalih0]

Oh sorry, i only read the first post :P

I read your next post and I really like the idea of random items being droped
Pets (instead of saying item dropped, it could say, "Dog followed you home.")
Chlothes for your character
Random Gold
Some Type of Collectibles
Skins for the website

I think it's a great idea

[wc8]

In-Game Item Rewards now votable on trello. (Description in Progress)

[wc8]

Here's the description I have:

Chance of gaining an Earned Item (stored in #100 Chest) on completing a daily, habit, todo or a #65 Complex-Todo/Checklist Quest

Some earned items lead to a mini-quest or Hunt: a list of items to gather which create a rare item.
List items can be found by completing tasks and good habits or spending gold for a reward item.

Example Mini-Quest/Hunt:

• complete daily: "read a paper", discover ruby
• Side-quest appears: "Dwarven craftsmanship: Collect 1 ruby, 1 magical powder, 1 golden ring, 2 emeralds. Reward: a Dwarven ring of wisdom."
• Tomorrow, magic powder appears in the shop, 5 GP
• Tomorrow or the day after, on completion of a random good habit, an emerald appears
• in the near future another emerald is granted for the completion of a daily
• On the completion of a red shaded todo or daily, a golden ring appears

Rare Items that do not lead to quests could include:

• Pets: Dog followed you home
• Clothes for your character
• Random Gold
• Some Type of Collectibles
• Skins for the website

Did I capture the idea?

[Pandoro]

Sorry for the confusion. I should have maybe edited the first post. I wanted to come up with something which gives it a little more of an rpg flavour and didn't come up with the items until later on. I think I like the items more by now, especially since boss fights have also been mentioned in other relationships with a stronger todo/daily integration.

@wc8 You captured the idea very well :) The only thing I see a bit different is the balance between direct reward items and quest items. I think it is more fun, more challenging and more motivating, to give a higher probability to the quest drops and a lower to the simple reward drops. This way we will not reduce the significance of the general store and you are more motivated to do more todos by the mini quests.

[StanLindsey]

Those who are opting for more gamey/RPG type stuff check out #252 - Personally I think that simple mechanic has a lot of scope and could incorporate many features/suggestions/mechanics in an efficient way,

[wc8]

I wasn't even thinking about the balance of probability between reward items type.
Removed "that do not lead to quests*, after all a dog following you home could be an interesting quest start. Updated section:

Random reward items could include:

• Pets: Dog followed you home
• Clothes for your character
• Random Gold (probably best when gold is low)
• Some Type of Collectibles
• Skins for the website

Ideally, items which lead to hunts would appear at a higher probability than one-off reward items.

[Pandoro]

Considering there are at least two trello cards for these features and we have discussed these ideas partially in other threads, I'm closing this one.