Active Turn Battle System

1. Shared ATB Gauge

Both the player's party and the enemy's party now share a common ATB Bar, although it's less of a bar and more of a measuring tool. The units start at the left of the bar, where their speeds are at zero, and move towards the right, where once they hit the end, they're capable of performing their action. This has its advantages and disadvantages over having a gauge for every single unit on the screen, like you usually see for most standardized RPG Maker games. The biggest of which is that it's far easier to compare how far along each unit is in respect to the other units. With gauges all over the screen like you see in other RPG's, it's difficult to see where they really stand if they're not aligned vertically. The other advantage is that the ATB Bar is much larger. When using a measurement tool, the larger it is, the more detailed information it can direct to the user (which in this case is the player). This offers a much better respective of time compared to the smaller gauges we usually see.

The disadvantages, however, are few but still exist. Because so many units share the same ATB Bar, there's without a doubt, a point in time where units would overlap one another. This can prove difficult in determining who is where in what position. Fortunately, because the ATB system constantly updates, this won't last for any bit longer than maybe a second or two and therefore, this disadvantage becomes quite negligible in the long run.

2. At 80% Bar

Taking on the mechanics and rulings of Grandia, there exists the 80% Gauge property. This point in the ATB Bar is sectioned off in the screenshot by the red part of the bar. What significance does this part have?

Until reaching 80% bar, actors and enemies travel at their usual AGI rate. If they have any skills or items queued up, their speed bonuses will not matter and will not apply to the rate their AGI positions update at (however, any AGI boosts from status effects like "Haste" would still apply) until they reach 80% bar. Once they do, the extra speed will add or subtract from the usual AGI speed associated with the the battler depending on the item or skill queued. If the skill has a speed bonus, the time to complete the travel will finish earlier. If the skill has a speed decrease, then the time to complete the travel will finish later. There's two main reasons for this mechanic:

1. This is to prevent a poor decision made early on by queuing a slow skill to make the battler travel at an extremely slow rate for the whole bar's distance. Setting it at 80% enables the battler to continue traveling at a relatively fast rate until it's almost time to take action.
2. This is to prevent cheating where a player would purposefully queue up a fast skill to make the battler travel extremely fast on the bar and then suddenly swap to another action that may function at normal or slower time.

For actors, there exists another mechanic present. When an actor reaches 80% bar without an action queued up, the actor will stay and wait at the 80% bar. Before you ask "Why?", it's so that the player can input a command for that actor and have it move on. The reasons for this also have to do with the two reasons listed above. Furthermore, when actors reach 80%, they can stay on stand-by, a strategy that involves keeping a unit on reserve until the time is ready for them to act. Such an example would be to keep a healer at 80% so that the healer can react quickly when someone suddenly takes damage.

3. Left and Right Button Presses

What's different about Battle Engine Melody from the other standardized ATB systems is that now, you can input commands for your actors ahead of time. Commands can be inputted for Ralph no matter where he is on the bar. This is to lessen the need for the player to stress out about choosing an action and to give more time for the player to partake in choosing an action. Pressing Left and Right will allow the player to toggle amongst the actors to choose which actor to input a command for.

Commands, however, that are inputted when the actor is past 80% will be set into a queue. This queue does not override the current action (even if the current actor has not reached 100% bar), but instead, will set the next action after the actor performs the current one. This means if Ralph is using "Attack" this round and the player selects "Thunder" while Ralph is past 80% or currently attacking, the next action in line will be Thunder.

4. Active Command Window

The command window is almost always going to be active. It is accessible even while battlers are attacking, casting spells, or doing whatever. The only times it will disable itself is while another window is open. This window can include skill windows, item windows, status windows, equipment windows, option windows, etc. For this reason, the player no longer needs to wait until reaching the end of the ATB Bar before inputting a command.

5. ATB Types

There are four ATB types that the player can select from. These neither change the way mechanics run, but rather, change the rate at which the battle goes for them. A reason why a player would want to change the ATB type is simply because it's not comfortable for them. The four ATB types work as such:

• Full Type
  A full type ATB will always have the ATB Bar updating so long as the options and confirmation windows aren't active. This means the ATB Bar will keep updating whether or not the target window is open, the skill and item windows are open, and whether or not there's an actor ready for a command at 80% Bar.
• Semi Type
  A semi type ATB will have the ATB Bar updating even when there's an actor at 80% Bar, the skill or item windows are open, but pauses when selecting a target. Some players prefer to wait in the skill or item menu to select an action and the Semi Type allows for that. Like all types, the ATB Bar will pause if the option menus are active.
• Stop Type
  A stop type ATB is the default type. The ATB Bar updates so long as there isn't a major object window open. These windows include the skill and item windows, the target windows, and the options windows. The ATB Bar, however, will continue to update even if there's an actor at 80% Bar.
• Wait Type
  A wait type ATB will pause if there's any object windows open. This includes the skill window, the item window, the target window, and the option windows. If an actor reaches 80% Bar, the ATB will also pause until the player inputs a command for that actor. Once an actor reaches 80%, a chime will play and the actor command window will instantly move to the actor. Note that this ATB Type prevents keeping actors on stand-by at 80%.

6. ATB Speed

There are ten available speeds available for the player to choose from. These speeds range from 1 through 10, where 1 is the slowest and 10 is the fastest. Not all players prefer the same type of ATB Type. Likewise, not all players prefer the same ATB Speed. The options window lets the player adjust the ATB Speed to their liking so that it's not too fast nor too slow for them.

7. Quick Settings

And for the players that don't want to travel into the options menu, they can quickly change the ATB Type and ATB Speed from the Party Command Window or the Confirm Command Window. A simple confirmation tap to either of these options will toggle them back and forth between the various available options. And just as a reminder, the ATB Bar stops updating whenever either the Party Command Window or the Confirm Command Window opens up.

8. Item and Skill Notetags

<atb change: +x>
<atb change: -x>
<atb change: +x%>
<atb change: -x%>

Changes the target's current ATB by x value or x%. If it's just the normal x value, then the value will be a set amount. If it's a percent, then it will be affected by the gauge's percentile value. Both can be used, but calculations will tally up the percentage changes before the set changes.

<atb reset: x%>

This will push the user's ATB gauge back to x% after usage instead of 0%. x is the percentage of the maximum ATB bar gauge and not a set value. If the value exceeds the threshold value, it will reset back to whatever the threshold value is for an actor unless the actor has an action queued.

9. Equipment and Enemy Notetags

<atb change: +x>
<atb change: -x>
<atb change: +x%>
<atb change: -x%>

Changes the target's current ATB by x value or x%. If it's just the normal x value, then the value will be a set amount. If it's a percent, then it will be affected by the gauge's percentile value. Both can be used, but calculations will tally up the percentage changes before the set changes. The effects are cumulative across all equipment and enemy attack effects.

<atb reset: x%>

This will push the user's ATB gauge back to x% after usage instead of 0%. x is the percentage of the maximum ATB bar gauge and not a set value. If the value exceeds the threshold value, it will reset back to whatever the threshold value is for an actor unless the actor has an action queued. The effects are cumulative across all equipment and enemy attack effects.

10. Status Effect Notetags

<atb reset: +x%>
<atb reset: -x%>

This will cause the battler to have more or less ATB speed in preparation for the battler's next action. The effects are cumulative and all of the stats added together will affect the upcoming ATB reset amount.

11. Periodic Common Events

Every battle system in Battle Engine Melody has the option of setting common events to fire off periodically. In the ATB system, they can occur at four instances.

1. At the start of battle.
2. At every clocktick instance.
3. At the end of each action.
4. At the end of battle.

These settings can be adjusted in the Configuration portion of Battle Engine Melody. They are found under the Common Battle Settings and Active Turn Battle Settings parts of the configuration.