The Review Effects Tab

See below for some new screenshots and updates to Arthur's skills.

The Review Effects Tab

One thing I noticed is that it is really hard to keep track of absolutely everything that is going on to your characters. All characters now have a new passive skill tree: The Review Effects tab. All buffs and debuffs are explained and posted in here. To make this work, i need to redo... every skill in existence. That's fine. It's going to make the game better. Here's the passive Arthur gets at the start of every fight if he does not have his shield equipped.

Ready Shield!

If Arthur doesn't have his shield equipped, you can now spend a turn in combat equipping it. Once you equip the shield, you'll get a new passive and a new skill [Ready Shield! will also be deactivated once you have used it. This is done in RPG Maker by having the Gem Shield armor seal the Ready Shield! skill and teach you the Stow Shield ability.]

Shield Grip Passive

Now that you've used Ready Shield!, you can see that the Review Effects tab has updated!

Ready Shield! Disabled

With the Gem Shield equipped, you can now use Stow Shield to get the spear buff back. I made it this way since you can equip/unequip the shield from the menu, so I didn't want the skill teaching/unteaching linked to the spear. So, instead, all the buffs/ability information is linked to the shield. Which reminds me: You can no longer erase items in the game to prevent you accidentally losing something important, like Arthur's shield. Since you won't have 1,000 Iron Sword +2s roaming around, you shouldn't have to worry about inventory clutter. If you go back into the Review Effects tab after stowing the shield...

Ta Da!

... you'll see the Review Effects tab has updated again! Well, that's all well and good, but, a lot of effects have a time limit. How do we do that? I'm glad you asked!

A Test Zombie!

Above is the start of a fight against a monster that inflicts the test status with basic attacks. You can see that the Review Effects tab properly updated here too!

Ouch! I've been Testified!

Here, Arthur has been hit by the Test Zombie. Notice that he's got a new effect on the effect window? Most effects that decay will update here. I created this by making a skill of the Review Effects type with a mana cost that can never be used. Each skill is associated with the appropriate state, so for the Test state, there are actually three test states, each with a different Test Skill (Test 3, 2, 1). To make the duration count down, I gave the skills a mana cost, but made sure to disable them so you couldn't try and cast them. That "cost" reflects the number of turns remaining. When the state is removed by an item or spell, so long as the item/spell removes all instances of the state, it will wipe them all away. If, however, they fade due to their normal duration...

Countdown!

The player will get to watch the countdown. This will be useful for characters like Regina, who desperately need to line up buffs to do damage, or to determine if a key buff will persist through a turn or not.

The major downside to this is the massive rework of skills and states that needs to happen. It is going to be worth it though, because players will now be able to see the full duration and effects of things. Also, some characters, like Kiley, who normally had skills that built, can now be used by having them dismiss effects from the Review Effects tab to do things, though I may not do that just so no one gets lost navigating menus to find out where certain abilities are hidden.

So, there you go. After we do Alicia's skills sometime next week, this is the next big RPG Maker Project: The Review Effects Tab.