Corgimancy Games Development Blog

Magika Calamitia Development Blog 03: New Feats, New Core Update and More.

Posts have not been very consistent on the blog but that is because I’ve been hard at work on tweaking and toying with the new dice mechanics I’ve decided to implement into the system. While at its core the system seems to be sound, it posed a difficult question to me in terms of social dynamics: How do I balance this new system to compliment the changes made to the core to still be suitable for social dynamics as well?

The idea is to implement a “double up” effect on the Attribute dice. What this would mean is that, for example, if I am rolling a Charm roll with a d4 in Charm I would roll 2d4 to determine a Charm test. This takes care of the base problem at face value but has drawbacks of its own as well. The non-physical Attributes like Smarts, Will and Charm would not suffer any drastic changes other than major buffs as you increase their associated dice (you can imagine a 2d10 getting pretty crazy in a social situation even with the current success setup, but more on that later). But it begs the question how would this affect Combat? A character getting to start with a Strength of d6 at face value would, according to the current rules, be throwing 2d6+1d4 (the d4 being our hypothetical Magika die) while Transformed, right?

Currently, yes. This is balanced out by making combat more difficult in terms of landing hits to damage while also adjusting how the successes work in general. Which brings us to our next topic:

In my attempt to move away from “PbtA” and making Magika Calamitia become its own beast, we are adjusting the base success rate while adding in a “Critical Hit” system as well. While the number has currently been fluxing during this stage of development, the non-combat target has been between 3-5 while combat targets are similar plus the Threat Level of enemies. In the current setup, Threat Level would not affect Magika rolls. Critical Hits would add benefits for every interval of 3-5 hit over the initial (currently, if I keep the target of 5, you would roll a critical success on a roll of 10).

The next thing I have been working on is new Feats and ways to make them more appealing. During testing, it was noted that players would rarely take Feats unless they had no other option to, with only one player opting to take and regularly use a Feat in the last play test that was ran. This problem is being adjusted by allowing players to now have 3 points at character creation in an attempt to encourage players to take a Feat. Depending on how players use this additional creation point, I may nerf an overused function if I feel it is being abused by players (unknowingly or otherwise).

Along with this, I added a new type of Feat to obtain: Roles.

A Role Feat is the closest thing to a “class” Magika Calamitia will have access to in the current version. The current 6 available are Bruiser, Marksman, Guardian, Support, Saboteur and Specialist with 3 levels of each Feat that can be taken. There is always a chance these Feats will be adjusted or even eliminated completely, but it is an attempt to allow players to give their character direction if they choose to take that route.

While I am very excited to try the new changes out, I am unsure if we will make Magpie’s next Community Designer Spotlight for October ‘22 due to personal reasons in my daily life. Regardless, I will keep up the work on building a game that I am happy to share with the world!

Magika Calamitia Development Blog 02: Big Changes

Since the last play test I have been trying to figure out exactly how to balance magic in the system, as in its current state it is incredibly broken when built around. I’ve spent the last week going over a handful of possibilities with one major one finally sticking with me that will change the entire core of the game.

So as of today, we will be abandoning our attachment (what little we had left of it) to being a PbtA-inspired system and going hard into more SWADE now than anything else by ditching basic modifiers for attributes and assigning dice to them instead.

While this change will have major impacts on how the game will be played, it will not compromise the core of the original I had built, which is to be a more narrative system than miniature combat like it’s famous 20th cousin twelve times removed Dungeons & Dragons.

So what do I mean by assigning dice to attributes? As of now, each attribute will begin with a D4 die at character creation. Players will still be able to increase two of these attributes at the beginning of character creation by one die type up to a D6.

This rule will also apply to Magika now, which will start out at d4 as well. What does this mean for the game? Well, during combat, instead of adding a bonus from, for example, Might and Magika to a melee attack roll, you’ll instead now roll your Might and Magika dice together like you would originally roll the 2d6. While some bonus modifiers will still be around for the occasional Feat or Help action, it will restrict the rolls to being less broken overall and make hitting those challenge ratings for more difficult things tougher.

What does this mean for casting Magika? When casting a spell, your Magical Girl will get to use two rolls of her Magika die, so a base level roll would be 2d4 plus modifiers.

In order to make this change have a less intense impact to combat I’m going over averages rolled between all dice combinations I can think of and applying that information to combat encounters to make them as fair but challenging as possible.

However, this new mechanic is not the only thing added. I will also be adding in a Mana mechanic as well to reduce spamming of Magika while giving enough Mana to allow it to be useful still.

By spending a point of Mana, you will be able to add an effect to your spells casted. You can spend multiple points of mana to add more effects to it, up to a number of times equal to half your Magika die. So a d4 Magika would allow spells to have up to 2 effects on it for 2 Mana.

Additionally, Overdrive will be nerfed as well, allowing you to use it by spending a number of Mana equal to 1/2 the Magika die, making a d4 being added to your rolls cost 2 Mana to use.

With all these major changes, a question may still be lingering in the back of your mind: “This is great and all but does this mean I’m only rolling my attribute die when I’m not gaining my Magika die to it?”

Social rolls and non-physical rolls like Smarts, Will and Charm are still a work in progress with this new system build but I’m not without ideas! I’m experimenting with odds and determining what can be done and how to make this system feel just as smooth as PbtA while keeping its own personality.

That is it for the day, I hope to have more for you on Saturday for normal post day!

Magika Calamitia Development Blog 01: Play Test Update

Tonight, September 17th of 2022, was the second play test for Magika Calamitia, my dark magical girl RPG inspired by Madoka Magica, Magical Girl Raising Project and others like those shows.

Thanks to two wonderful groups, the game has made some great progress both in lore and mechanically, but still needs work to become everything that it could be capable of. This blog is being made via recommendation of my most recent group to help those interested track the progress of the game!

Let’s start with the first thing to discuss: What changes were made between the first and second play tests?

Firstly, the combat was revamped severely. Clarifications, sign posting on powerful enemies and their unique abilities and combat more focused on the player actions than the enemies were all added or adjusted to help combat feel more fluid and balanced. For the most part, this felt like a success in the second play test.

Secondly, Feats used in the game were buffed to have more power for less cost while also focusing on making some of the more specific feats far less redundant. This was somewhat successful in the second test, but was not thoroughly flushed out.

Finally, changes were made to the Magika system by adding in the “Overdrive” Mechanic, which allows players to spend Overdrive to add an extra die to their roll. While the base of this was effective, the use of this ability was drastically underestimated.

So what happens next?

Firstly, Overdrive and Magika in general needs nerfed. Then a way to make more use of Feats would also be handy to add. Finally, simplifying some of the wording for quality-of-life to help clarify the more complicated mechanics I’ve implemented into how combat works would be handy as well.

As these and other changes are made and more is added, I’ll post updates detailing each choice and the thought process behind it as well as how each play test goes.

-Austin “Vox” Moore, Corgimancy Games