Forums Thread

 If you have any more concerns or ideas, write them here.
  James will take a look at it and give us soon some information about the concept.

@Zachary, having it be a click based game could work. I was just thinking that since it is a shooting game that it would feel better to be able to shoot by aiming with the mouse rather than just clicking on the enemy and having auto attack. Unless you think we could make a  click based movement and still have the user aim with the mouse. 

Hello thank you all for your review of the GDD.  To get started on this conversation I would like us to break it down part by part.

1. Map Auto Generation.

I do believe this is a feature that will set us apart from other games.  I like games that are not the same and if we can make this happen I think it will be a great goal to have.  I do understand the complexity of it in code as I am a programmer by trait.  With that being said I think yes we should start with a premade level only for sandbox and tutorial needs which can be used for these during the life cycle of this game.

2. Goal Setting

I think these pretty much should be our mail goals

1. In sure team based game play is preferred among the end user
   1. Tactics will need more then one member of the team
   2. Rewards will increase with team base objective given by the commander
2. Unique Mechs based off firmware and pilot skills
3. Commander is not dead weight that no practical player would want to be.

3. Concept

1. Arcade Real Time Strategy
   1. What aspect of the game make it an arcade game?
      1. No real stat monitoring, stats should be kept less then 8 to 10 different variables eg Speed, Armor, Heat
      2. Controls will be no more then a PS4 or Xbox One control will allow
      3. Also we will be supporting Xbox One, PS4, PC and Mobile this will make our game really unique if we can figure out how to balance the controls and game play so we can play one another on all systems.  Yes this is a major undertaking I am not disillusion about it.
      4. Scavengers
   2. What game does The Last Stand reference too?
      1. League of Legends, Mech Warrior Online, Battlefield 2 ~ 4
2. 3rd Person Over the Top View
   1. Much like and play like League of Legends
3. Why create this game?
   1. Dynamically created maps
   2. Time Based Power Ups
      
      1. This is done by the scavengers
   3. Meta Game
      1. Good concept but to much overhead at this point let keep it simple with death match and team death match to start
   4. Interesting Game Modes
      1. To start we will have Deathmatch and team deathmatch so we can beta test asap after that we will visit this topic again and throw idea out there
   5. Never Fully Conquered
      1. I want this game to feel like a new experience every time.  You may of master your mech, but team work and random activity like the scavenger to keep people engaged
4. What do I control?
   1. Mech 3D 3rd person view at all times with zoom in and out abilities
   2. Commander 2D
5. What game feature will be present?
   1. Map
   2. Mech Customizing
   3. Commander
   4. Game Modes

Thanks,
James Fleming

Hey Everyone,

So I think I've been getting a little confused with the perspective still. We all seem to cite League of Legends as a reference to the game's look and feel. From this I expected that the camera perspective of the player would be isometric like League of Legends and other games like XCOM. However its seems that the controls for this game are cited as WASD from a 3rd person 3D Mech perspective, which isn't like League of Legends at all. 

A game that springs to mind for me when thinking about League of Legends style gameplay with a third person camera would be SMITE. If you are unaware of SMITE it's a third person action MOBA very similar to LoL but with a proper third person camera implemented and using the mouse to aim/use auto attack. To me this seems like a much better way to explain how this game will look and control for players. Please feel free to correct me if I am wrong as I am getting a little confused by this.

@James, I'm glad you brought up the issue of the Commander in your previous post as a goal stating that he should not be dead weight and that we need to make sure the role of commander would be worth playing. I'm assuming you cited Battlefield 2 and 4 as references to this due to their commander mode feature. I would just like to point out the difference between these two games and why this feature worked in 2 but less so in 4. In Battlefield 2, one player could take upon the role as commander issuing orders to the rest of the team and calling in airstrikes and Battlefield 4 has the same functionality. However in Battlefield 2, the person playing commander STILL had the ability to run around as a foot soldier, take objectives and be a part of the team's ground work. This is what made the commander mode work in Battlefield 2 and also in Battlefield 2142 (same deal). Battlefield 4's commander mode only provided a 2D map for players to issue orders and call in airstrikes and removed the ability to play as a soldier at the same time. This also meant that it could be played on tablets too. As cool as it sounds on paper, it wasn't successful mainly due to the fact that people would have rather played the actual game than simply watch the game play out and place objective markers here and there (which people most likely would never follow anyway).

It seems like for this game, we have opted for the Battlefield 4 approach to the commander role and while it sounds good I think we will have a tough time convincing people to play it if we aren't giving them the option to play the game in a mech as well. My suggestion is we can either have it so that one person on the 5 man team is either randomly selected, or delegated by the team themselves, as a commander and can use the commander functionality in game whilst playing as a mech (this would obviously need some really intuitive UI and balancing to work) OR we really need to figure out a way to make people want to play the commander role, possibly even more so than being a part of the actual ground team. We could do this by granting exclusive rewards to player's who play as the commander (special mech parts, skins, cosmetic rewards). We could also design game modes that require heavy input from the commander and possibly even require a good commander for success. In saying that we also need plenty of abilities for the commander to do, including the "move here" and "shoot this guy" commands. We could add the ability to order in supply drops on parts of the map, resulting in team fights over supply positions. If we do this right we could make the commander the most interesting and integral part of the core experience.

Guys-You have no idea how helpful it is to have read this. As a writer, I desperately need a a more detailed GDD and I have a lot of questions, since it is my job to tie game mechanics to lore. At any rate,I love the discussion and  the artifact search idea is brilliant.

I'm sure you guys aren't hurting for great ideas,but if you want ideas or opinions of ideas I'd love to help.Knowing it's like SMITE is very helpful, since before I was invisioning the love child of Hawken and LOL.

Hi Matthew!

I'm glad this discussion is helping you out too and I'm also glad that you like the artifact search game mode! I think it would be a great way to marriage the lore with the gameplay through asking player's to perform meaningful tasks that make sense within the scope of the game world. I've been fleshing out the idea a bit in a separate document I'm writing about all my game mode ideas so once that's finished I'll upload that here.

Also just to let you know, SMITE is just how I envisioned the game after reading everyone's input and discussing the document. I'm not 100% sure it's what everyone else has had in mind but when I think of a 3rd person action game with LOL elements, I think SMITE. It seems to me like that would be the best control scheme to suit this kind of game, what with the WASD movement, using the mouse to aim and auto attack and then having 1,2,3,4 mapped to specific mech abilities. I also thought of Hawken immediately though when I first read the GDD.

Awesome- I def look forward to seeing what you write.

Ok I've finished a first draft of writing up a few ideas for some unique game mode ideas. Where can I upload the doc for people to take a look at? Keep in mind what I've written is mostly communicating my thoughts outwardly as though I were speaking to a friend about the idea. I'm going to be adding to the document constantly with diagrams of flow and design.

The camera of smite is 100% wrong we will be doing an over top at a slight angle behind the right shoulder, just like the camera in LOL.

Thanks,
James Fleming

@Zachary, Instead of uploading the whole file, could you add the text and the pictures here in the forum, that would make it easier.

@Team, My next review will follow Wednesday.

@James Ok great thanks for clearing that up. In that case we need to remove anything in the GDD that states that this game will be in a third person perspective as that is not correct. I'll make the changes myself if need be.

@Team Here's what I have so far for some game ideas. I'll still be working on these ideas but I'd love to hear your thoughts.

The Last Stand is a top down/isometric mech combat game with elements of MOBA’s and a unique commander mechanic. To make this game truly stand out however, we need to design game modes that will be able to push the boundaries of what people expect from this kind of multiplayer experience and create something that has enough of a departure from classic game types to warrant its existence.

I believe the best way we can do this is to create organic game modes that evolve as the game continues over time. What I mean by that is that the game modes objectives will shift based on team actions/inactions as well as time itself. I have a few examples below:

Relic/Artefact

In this game mode, teams will be searching for an artefact hidden somewhere within the map. This can either be one of a selection of predefined points (if map is constructed) or random but with an algorithm to ensure no team has a particular upper hand. The game works in two phases.

PHASE ONE

Both teams are searching for the relic. This phase requires teams to most likely split up and search different areas of the map so that they can find the relic faster. This will result in many small 1v1 or 2v2 skirmishes occurring across the map as players from both teams run into each other whilst searching for the relic. Winning these skirmishes will mean that players will be able to more thoroughly search an area and will most likely find the relic first. Some teams may roam the entire map as a group in order to eliminate enemy player’s one by one however this limits their search and could result in the enemy team finding the relic first. Once the relic is found, the game will move into phase 2.

PHASE TWO (1^st iteration)

Once the relic has been discovered by a player, both teams will be alerted to its position on the map. The game then moves into a “king of the hill” style mode where a team must hold the relic and its position from the enemy team as long as possible. As a particular team holds the relic, it will grant points towards that team every (5 seconds? Number subject to change through balancing). If the attacking team manages to kill the defending team and take the relic position for their own, they will start taking the points for themselves. The team with the most points at the end of the game wins.

PHASE TWO (2^nd iteration)

Another version of this phase could be that instead of the relic granting points towards the team that is currently holding its position, perhaps the win condition of this mode could be time based. This could be either through a team holding the relic for a certain amount of time (e.g. 2 – 3 minutes) to win, or that the winning team must be the team that is in control of the relic once the game timer runs out (which could create an interesting mad rush scenario in the final 30 seconds). This might be a better win condition as it means that the game can still be winnable by either team even down to the last few seconds.

Last Mech Standing

This game mode is fairly self-explanatory. Each team only has a small pool of lives. When a team member dies, they will respawn (after the respawn timer finishes) and a life will be taken from their teams pool. Once all lives in the pool are depleted it will become a last man standing match. This game mode will need a twist however to make it uniquely our own. My suggestions are:

COMMANDER ABILITIES

For this game mode we could make commander abilities much more important to team success. Commanders will be able to activate special abilities every 30 seconds or so designed to support their team. These special abilities include:

• Damage Boost – Commander can drop supplies that boost the damage of his team. Supplies can be stolen by the enemy team.
• Armour Boost – Commander can drop supplies that boost the armour of his team. Supplies can be stolen by the enemy team.
• Recon – Commander can activate a recon drone which will display enhanced information enemy movements to the commander which he can communicate to his team through pings.
• Artillery – Commander can call an artillery strike as an AOE damage ability on an area of his choice. He must be careful though as this can damage his own team.

Commanders will only be able to activate one of these abilities at a time every 30 seconds so he must choose carefully. These abilities could also be the Commander’s tool set in general for other classic game types.

Super Mech

This game type is a mix between two modes that I think will create an interesting marriage for PvP. Essentially the idea is a capture the flag type match, however the “flag” will be in the center of the map and both team will be fighting over control of it when it spawns.

In this game the “flag” in an experimental power mech suit, capable of granting incredible armour and strength to its wearer. A team can only activate this power if they successfully obtain the suit from the middle of the map and activate it using the opposing team’s power core.

The lore I created behind this is that the suit can only target a team by using that team’s power core like a police dog can only hunt a victim once it has the victim’s scent. As an experimental weapon, it’s highly dangerous and volatile and as such much be dealt with with extreme caution.

So let’s break this game mode down into its phases and what those phases mean to each team:

PHASE ONE

Both teams move toward the centre of the map and start the game of with skirmishes and early control. After approximately one minute of this, the mech suit will begin to spawn. This is where player’s will be desperately trying to destroy the enemy team to get the upper hand or use area denial tactics to make acquiring the suit more difficult for the opposing team. Once one team takes the suit core, phase two begins.

PHASE TWO

The team in control of the super mech suit core will be looking to push through the defending team’s defences and running the core into their base and eventually their main power core. The defending team will be doing all they can to try and stop this from happening, creating a tug of war type struggle between both teams until the core is reached or the player carrying the suit is destroyed. If the suit is destroyed the game moves back to phase one. If the suit is matched with the opposing team’s power core, the game moves into phase three.

PHASE THREE

Originally I envisioned this phase as becoming a 5v1 asymmetrical phase. Essentially the player that managed to fuse the suit with the opposing team’s power core would spawn as a SUPER MECH with a large amount of health and damage power. The game would then play out as something akin to Evolve with the SUPER MECH gunning to try and destroy the opposing team as much as possible and said team would be trying to work together with their commander to take down the SUPER MECH.

In this situation the SUPER MECH’s team would not be present in order to create more of a balanced situation, however this may result in player’s becoming frustrated with their lack of control over the match. As such the SUPER MECH’s abilities could be nerfed in order to make him become similar to a killstreak in games like Call of Duty. I believe this would be the best option.

I have however figured out a way to balance scoring for this game. Obviously as the team in control of the SUPER MECH will be objectively earning more score due to easier kills and increased map presence, the opposing team will still be able to earn plenty of score and still be within a competitive space by destroying the SUPER MECH. Destroying the opposing SUPER MECH will grant the defending team a huge score boon and keep them in the running to win the game. The SUPER MECH will a timed super ability for the team that scores it, therefore the opposing team will only have a certain amount of time to destroy the enemy SUPER MECH and earn the points before it is disabled and play returns to phase one until a team reaches the victory point total or until time runs out.

a

Thanks Zachary for your ideas, great work there!

High concept: Nicely done, this sounds very clear of what we want the game to be. But we have to make sure that the game modes are unique, but not too complicated, since we already have unique commander and customization mechanics in the game. The game shouldn't be too overloaded with new features and mechanics.

Relic/Artefact
Pros: 
Aiming for 1v1 and 2v2 in the early game and forcing big teamfights in the late game is always great, this way we can create a good suspension curve.
Cons: 
The beginning could be very random, the players will just run over the map and hope for the best. Maybe even the worse team gets the relic first, this gives them an advantage they didn't even earn. Also it could be boring until someone finds the relic, because there is no guarantee the teams find each other in the first 5 minutes.
Also the teams don't have many decisions where to go and what to attack. If you take a classical moba you can decide between 3 different lanes. This way this game mode doesn't have different scenarios, most rounds will be like the round before.
Also to the 2nd Iteration: This seems very unfair, imagine you lead the game by 20:0, playing 95% of the game perfect, but the last teamfight you make a mistake and lose the whole game. I think there should always be a chance to comeback, but still the better team should always win and get enough benefit.


Last Mech Standing

Commander: The commander should be a big part of every mode, since the commander itself is a unique and interesting feature.
I will talk about his abilities in my part.

This mode is also too action based, like James said, we want the game to be tactical not just like a action shooter. That means we should make a mode which allows the commander to make these strategic and tactical decisions.

Super Mech

Pros:
Another great suspension curve, leading to a grand finale. Also both team get great rewards, getting a Super Mech is very cool (like the Heroes of the Storm the Dragon Knight) also destroying the powerful mech is very rewarding for the opposing team ( I'm not talking about "real" rewards like gold, I talk about feeling rewards, because they feel very powerful if they fulfill any of the objectives).

Cons: 
Also missing some tactical decisions here, the game is just straight forward. Also this game mode is not unique enough, it's comparable to many existing shooter and moba modes, but thats not too bad.


Suggestion: I like the Super Mech idea, it's very rewarding for the players and could be a lot of fun. 
Phase 1:
Both teams want the Super Mech, but the problem is, it is split into 3 parts (could also be more). Both teams want to bring these parts together in a constructing point to create this weapon. When they have all 3 parts of it in the point Phase 2 starts.
Phase 2: The commander itself will take the Super Mech, coming down to the battle field way more powerful than the other players but still killable somehow.
With separating the parts of the weapon the commander can always decide which part he want to collect first, or steal parts from the opposing team, this way you have many tactical decisions during the game. Also most likely splitting the team in the early phase in small groups, but still forcing them to fight as a whole team in the second Phase. On top of that, playing commander is more interesting, because there is a way you can play as a Super Mech.


Commander
The commander should be one of the core features of the games, it's more or less unique and could be a lot of fun.
Goal: James said we want teamwork as a key goal as well as making the commander interesting. A great thing would be if could manage to let the commander focus on the macro game ( comparable to a classical RTS like Starcraft) and the players can fully focus on micro, instead of doing both. 

Abilities & Orders:
Abilities: will be something the player can decide which ones to take, comparable to Zacharys ability ideas in his Last Mech Standing part, this will give him the choice to directly interfere with the players. Which abilities we want exactly depends on what game mode we choose, this can be discussed later.

Orders:  the orders will be the most important part of the commander and the teamwork, and the thing he will be doing most in the game.
Orders are like in a RTS, you pick a unit ( in our case a player) and tell him what to do. In a RTS the unit will follow exactly what you said, for example moving to point A. In our case the commander will give the order a specific player to move to point A, the player will see where the commander wants him but won't be forced to follow it. But the player will get a buff if he follows, in this case a big speed buff if he travels to point A and  also a big reward when he reaches it.

This way the players should want to follow the orders of the commander, and the commander is trying to give the best orders so the players follow them and he also gets the rewards. These orders should have a low cooldown, and the commander should be able to give every player it's own order, aswell as giving multiple players the same order ( like in a RTS when you pick 10 units to attack the enemy base).

Hey! My apologies for not replying sooner, for some reason I was never notified that someone responded to my post! Nevertheless I'm glad you liked the ideas. Obviously they are rough as I was just writing down my thoughts but I think it's a great place to start in terms of bouncing ideas of one another and coming to some solid conclusions.

I completely agree about the game modes not being overly complicated as we want to keep the barrier of entry as low as possible. In that case I'm sure we can find alternate ways to spice up gameplay modes and create a truly interesting experience for players.

Relic/Artefact

I feel like even if the worse team managed to find the relic first, at least that would give them some hope that perhaps they'll be able to pull together and defend the relic and come out on top. In the end, if they truly are the worse team, once the relic is found the better team will eventually end up in control of it and win the match. 

I agree though that the first few minutes of the game mode may end up being a little random but I feel like once players begin to learn the spawn locations of relics on certain maps this will change into a "split up and search these areas" type situation.

We could make it so that the relic is actually constantly mobile objective moving on rails around the map, meaning defensive teams will have to constantly be aware of new angles of approach and LOS. We could also make it so that the relic's position is always known to the commander which would be especially useful at the start of each round so the commander can clearly communicate to his team where the relic is and in which direction it might be moving. We most certainly do not have to adopt the 2nd iteration if you feel its unfair. I merely mentioned it as a second option for objective completion. It does seem like awarding points at each interval of control would be a more sound and balanced approach.

Last Mech Standing

This idea was merely myself trying to justify the team deathmatch type game mode for the game itself as a basis. It doesn't really have any unique points to it (other than the commander of course) but I feel like as a standard game type it could be a great basic game mode for beginners to start with and get the feel and flow of PvP combat and controls.

Super Mech

I'm glad that you like the Super Mech idea since it was actually my favourite as well. I really like the idea of the Commander being able to control the Super Mech and the rest of the team acting as his cover, I think that would really help to bring the whole team dynamic into the forefront of the gameplay and make everyone feel like a truly important part of the team.

The part splitting idea is good too. I'm getting the idea that it would be three separate objectives on the match all which are neutral until captured by a player. That player would then essentially become a VIP for their team? I gather that they would need to hold the weapon piece on their person during the game and should be protected at all times by their team whilst they try to secure the other parts. If a player carrying a part is killed, the part respawns back at its original neutral location and must be claimed again? Or if a player is killed with a part, the part is available to be collected for a limited time at that position before being teleported back to its original position. This could allow for opposing teams to snatch up dropped weapon pieces or for defending teams to repossess the piece they just lost but with fewer to defend until their teammate is respawned.

The other way I see this working is that when a neutral piece is picked up by a player, it is immediately transported to that player's team base. This could create an interesting capture the flag scenario mix, whereby sneaky players could steal opposing team's weapon parts as they collect them and bring them back to their own base. I feel like this iteration would create a much more interesting play style with Commander's ordering team mates to defend weapon parts at base and sending out others to collect the other parts. This is probably what you had in mind in the first place but I'm just going over things and making sure haha.

I think it would be a great idea to get started on designing a lot of the core abilities and orders of the commander and how they will effect the game. Once we have a better understanding of exactly what the commander will be able to do, we can design plenty of game modes around these abilities to support that.

This was posted as an asset on an agenda I just want to make sure everyone see it.  It was posted by Yeri.

Goal:

The goal of the game on GDD already give clear guidelines about what we want to achieve by playing this game. It also also answer the question “if I play this game, what should I expect” kind of question.

Concept:

In my opinion, the game concept section on GDD serve as general and brief explanation about the game before get into detailed explanation and also become a baseline how to develop this game later on. The information given in the concept section still doesn’t answer the question “how this game will look like”. Even I can get the answer by reading more through the GDD, but I expect that I can get brief explanation first before jump to more detailed and technical explanation.

Interface:

Interface section already give enough experience so I can imagine how the interface of this game will look and what thing I can do in this game.

Stats:

After reading about stat section, hate to say it, but I still don’t get the idea the purpose of this section. I mean, it explain about the things such like weapon, gear, equipment, etc, but, with more explanation, I will get what’s mean by the stats.

Mech:

Mech section in GDD already explained what mech that I can choose use on game and give brief explanation about it. I get the idea and what makes one class is different than another class and what suitable role of that class. This section give me more understanding about the game.

Commander:

I think what is the unique thing about this game is commander concept. Even on GDD still not explained how commander role will be implemented and is commander some kind of class or a title for some role on team, I get that explanation on the discussion. We should give more explanation about commander and make sure that this thing will make this game different from the other game and enhance experience while playing this game.

Pilot skill & Firmwareer:

I still more explanation before I understand about this.

Game play:

Game play section give clear explanation hence make me feel the game and get the picture about how this game will be played. It is easy to understand and have detailed explanation not just about the game play mode, but also the technical stuff regards to the game play.

Control:

Yup, I got the point.

Level Design, Sound Story, Asset Listing & E-commerce:

Even though I get the idea about this section but I hope we can give more explanation about those section.

Question:

1. Do I understand the game play?

I do, the GDD already give explanation about it and I can understand how this game will be played, what kind of experience I expect to get when playing this game, and even what thing I expect to see on the game. Even though there are still some part that I don’t understand, but overall, I understand the game play.

2. If I give this to my parent will they understand it?

I still don’t thing if I just give them the GDD, they will understand right away. But, after some explanation I think they can understand about it. If we want my parent, or just say average reasonable people, will understand about it, we need to explain it more, in simple word that they can understand.

Thanks,
James Fleming

:) ok johannes is on vacation this week so I need to figure out what we are ready to start doing to the GDD.  Will all of you put in a list format what you think needs to change on the GDD please so we can make agenda for these items and get them done.

Thanks,
James Fleming

hey team, I'm back.

@Zach James told me I should help you to add the parts into the GDD.

@James, some of Yeris question should be answered by you, because right now we don't have enough information about it. The following parts: The stats (what was your purpose on adding it), Firmware & Pilot (are these just a "normal" skill tree with abilities, could you make an example?) Asset Listing ( A list of assets should be made, but not in the GDD) E-Commerce( how the monetization works?

James, some of Yeris question should be answered by you, because right now we don't have enough information about it. The following parts: The stats (what was your purpose on adding it), Firmware & Pilot (are these just a "normal" skill tree with abilities, could you make an example?) Asset Listing ( A list of assets should be made, but not in the GDD) E-Commerce( how the monetization works?

@Johannes The stat where added as a place holder of what stat we will be using in the game as a general starting place.

Yes both are one is geared towards the human part of the mech and the other is the mech mechanical aspect both are skill trees to add more customization to each mech.

The asset list can now be found on the menu under "Downloads > View Gameable Asset" link.  However the programmers also have a auto generated sheet that is only accessible in the code so they dont have to keep coming back to the website when working offline.  This also is a one stop shop so they can review what is ready to go. This is a sample of that document but is not the current one.

The ecommerce is used to spend your XP point or reward system we develop you earn in the game to get more mech and equipment.

Thanks,
James Fleming

Johannes Can you provide a list of thing left on this forum post that need to be done to the GDD that still remain?

Thanks,
James Fleming

Hey Team,

Here is a list of features and parts in the GDD that need to be discussed, added removed etc.. I will also mark the departments depending whom it concerns.

Done parts:

Some of these will still be improved during the progression, but are fine for now.

• Goals: this should be finished, also not changing very much. This way we can aim these.
• Concept: Good for now, could be improved during progress of the game.
• Modes: Good for now, have to be improved during progress.

Missing parts:

•   Mechs, Classes: The main differences of these classes and how the player picks them is still missing
  It should be discussed with James and the GD Team, what classes we think are necessary and which are not.
  We could also think about cutting classes out, since players should be able to customize their mechs, why should we force them into classes.
•  Commander, Buffs: How exactly do we want to commander to interfere with the game, do we need buffs, if yes we have to create more.
•  Control: Define precisely how the controls work.
•   Story: What's the main goal for the story, how will it affect game play, also a small summary would be nice.
•  Rewards: Think about the rewards during a match and outside of it,
  Rewards are the most important part in a game, we should create short, mid and long term rewards and challenges.
• E-Commerce: First of all, how exactly does the customization work (we need more references). Also what items and how many of them do we need.

• Skill Trees: Is there a reason to we have 2 different Trees. Also to customize your own mech it could already be enough to have the other features, skill trees could be fully removed.
•   Stats: We should think about what stats are really necessary and try to keep it simple.
• Mech Classes: Already talked about it in the missing parts.

@Johnannes Mech Classes: Yes I would agree but I think we should keep the classes as the frame of the mech that is chosen will be different per class.  A tank mech is going to have a much bigger frame then a sniper mech would.  I agree we should define these now, the ones I have thought of are on the GDD lets list them and run though them to see what we come out with on this sprint.

Lets address each of these one by one.

Thanks,
James Fleming

Hey team, its been a while.

Still some feedback from my last post is missing, would be great if you guys could participate.

I also started with the first part of the list, the classes. I made an update of them to the GDD, please take a look at it.

Regards,

Johannes

I may be a bit behind times, I thought the 2 skill trees were one for the mech and one for the pilot.This may be superfluous, but from a story point of view, improving a pilots skills directly would blend the game play and story together in a direct and mechanical sense. A blended skill tree, that maintained a human element alongside the technical advances of the mech might work. Anyhoo, something to consider.

Guys- Do you have any specifics as to tech  upgrades or pilot skills that should be in the game? I will have to something solid to write up accurate outlines in the future.For now I am doing some research ans throwing a few ideas together which I will submit to you before adding to any outline.
My basic approach(and I have no idea if this is a good idea or not,but it is a starting point) is to make a blended tree that develops the pilot,the mech and the RTS units.My reasoning is to unite gameplay with story,drive the idea that AI is a rising influence in the TLS universe and perhaps come up with an upgrade system that is a bit non linear and unique.
Please let me know what you think,question,comment,critique or nix altogether :).
-Matthew-

Matthew based on the GDD i know we will have 4 skills and too abilities per each mech in game.

Outside of the game the tech tree an skills are up to the story to mainly to define.  At this point I dont believe we have anything solid.

Thanks,
James Fleming

@Johannes I want to get us into a meeting on this next sprint so we can run over the GDD together and review the Theater Outline.  What times do you have open I am open Weekend almost anytime and on the weekdays any time after 630 PM CST.

Thanks,
James Fleming

Right on- I will incorporate those abilities into my idea and present it to you guys.
-Matthew-