Enemy Design

Currently designing Enemies.  But what does that mean?

If you are using RPG Maker's default monsters...Most of Ace's monsters use Attack and another skill, though MZ at least sets a few conditions for the second skill.  However, RPG Maker tends to also had default troops of the same monsters, plus monsters progressively get stronger than their previous entries.  Some RPG Maker games default to this design, so when I fight a group containing a Succubus, I'm likely to fight a group of Succubus, so I lack variety.

Of course, if you read Yanfly's Dungeon Design, one way to design dungeons is to create archetypes of the monsters you're fighting.  While Yanfly uses a "party" example, I did play a game where each dungeon is focused on a group of States and two enemies generally cast one of the States (so there are about 4-6 monsters per dungeon).

Similarly, the monsters can be designed on gimmicks rather than architypes, based on a book I read.  In that book, I read that two example monsters were weak, but one could attack more times and another was designed to appear in mass numbers.  Of course, this gimmick can also apply to rarer monsters like the Mimic.

Currently, I am following the archetype design, but I will generally use five kinds of monsters:  Normal, two ranks of the State-appliers, and two ranks of Eaters, and because I want to make a tiered dungeon, there are three core groups, where each tier would increase in difficulty by adding a new archetype of monster (first tier accesses three types of monsters, the second tier accesses four types.)

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Using the first dungeon as an example, this one only has two bosses and the first half is intended to be a tutorial zone, so I actually have four monsters rather than five. Rather than straight attacking, I want to add some varieties.  Oh, and I intend for the dungeons to focus on one state, which in this case is Web (which turns into Cocoon after a few stacks).

-Rat - A simply monster.  While it will attack, it sometimes will Sniff and increases its Accuracy.

-Barnacle- A rather immobile monster, so it should have less Evasion.  It's one of the Appliers, so in addition to attacking and guarding, it also applies Web.

-Spider- The advanced Applier of Web.  What I mean is that, in addition to applying Web, it can also Entangle to have a chance of converting Web to Cocoon instantly and Bite will apply Poison when the target is Cocooned.  In the first tier, only one Spider may be in battle.

- Worm- The dungeon's Eater, appears inside the second tier.  While it attacks, it can also Swallow, and when it does, it is able to Squeeze the victim inside.