Okay, so my original thought is to use a custom setting that I had made for a role-play, but a slightly different plot. There's several elements to the world (yet unnamed), so I'm going to go about listing them.

History/Lore

As far as anyone is concerned, there is only one continent, named Alteria. The only races being humans, orcs, ogres, and goblins. For the most part, humans are the only "civilized" race while the other three are anywhere from barbarians to evil monsters. To top it off, there are various sub-races of humans; Alter (what one might consider a 'normal' human), Kilee (Darker skin, known as the best sword arms), Cerins (physically weaker, but stronger magical affinity), and Barbarians (live in clans & tribes, but have the ability to increase awareness and perception).

The kingdom of Alteria is ruled by a single person - a king or queen of that generation. There are then lords and ladies, knights, and then commoners, with serfs and slaves being all but nonexistent. What makes this setting a fantasy setting, besides some spoilers, is magic.

Magic

• Magic: Magic is dependent on two things; focus and words. Focus is the act of literally focusing your magical energy into an idea. A word is part of an ancient, unknown language that all magi must study and after a time, depending on the magi's ability to learn magic, they will gain automatic understanding of it's functions. Words can only be studied in written format, therefore for another magi to teach the other, the former must write the symbol or word. Combining focus and the words, the magi can produce a wide variety of effects.

Focus: Focus is a strange thing to measure, but it is the measure of a magi's magical ability to manipulate the idea of the words. This being said, there are several general levels in which to describe a magi's ability to wield the words, though the higher levels have more focus to give up before feeling fatigued.

• Novice: Normally, novice magi can only use the smallest of the effects of words, but this is still a huge feat compared to normal humans, whom can use no magic at all.
• Apprentice: While more focused than novices, apprentices still can't produce any great or even moderate magical effect. More like being able to shoot fire in a quick stream.
• Journeymen: These magi are more noticeably different because of their ability to produce moderate magical effects, such as consistent fire streams or hand-sized firebolts.
• Expert: Experts define themselves even more by being able to cast spells like throwing full fireballs, which explode and if left unchecked, burn entire buildings down.
• Master: The masters are few, but very powerful in nature. These few masters are able to produce effects such as entire firestorms, engulfing multiple enemies at once and destroying entire towns if so desired.

Some Common Magi Words
• Farecus (Fair-coos): Flame. Depending on the focus of a magi, it can range from lighting a fire to creating firestorms.
• Fray (Fr-a): Frost. This can range from chilling a mug to freezing opponents in solid ice.
• Soka (Soo-ka): Force. From a simple push of a cup across the table to pushing entire brick walls down, this spell is very useful.
• Seka (Ci-ka): Lightning. To a small shock to creating lightning storms. A more uncommon, but powerful word.
• Helo (Heal-o): Healing. This can range from healing a small scrape to fully recovering a person from near death.
• Enta (En-ta): Energy. A less understood word, this can range from recovering from a sprint to allowing for a much larger magical pool of energy.
• Flua (Flu-ah): Organize. A very minor word that organizes spaces or things. The more powerful, the more things one can affect with this word.
• Vesta (V-s-ta): Move. A word that moves the user in any one direction, varying from five feet to one hundred twenty feet at the mastery level. Does not allow the user to move through objects.



With the obvious disclaimer of, if you have any questions or think something needs clarification from the information from above, feel free to ask / comment. Besides that, my thoughts on a plot are this - there is a civil war, a large group of rebels rise up against the crown and Lyna the main protagonist is a part of the king's army. At least 10% of the game is spent exploring this war (maybe bringing it to an end, unsure) and everything involved. However the real plot begins when things that were once fairytale stories, such as elves, start appearing for an unknown reason. Whether they were real before or something else is happening, Lyna finds out something that forces her to get involved with this unusual situation.

Here's some things that I'm having trouble with ...
• How to introduce the game and what Lyna's main goal at the start is. Is she ambitious enough to stop the war? Is she just following orders? Does something happen to drive her to the rebel leader?
• The civil war story. Is the rebel leader in the right by going against the crown? Is (s)he just greedy for power?
• What sort of politics might be involved in a civil war against rebels? Would Lyna get involved somehow? For that matter, what rank would she have in the army?

Also some mechanic things that are bothering me ...
• What sort of battle system should I use?
• Are there any good menu systems out there?
• How should I translate learning new words into gameplay? I was thinking of earning focus crystals from battles and using them sort of as a "payment" to learn words. Is this the best way of doing it?

These all seem like questions you should answer yourself...

Story-wise, these details are what turns a plot into a story, so what is the story you want to tell. Giving a list of options on this forum is just going to get you an 'I vote A', 'I vote B' scenario.
In regards to the second bullet point sometimes its better to leave some things vague, it allows the player to come to their own conclusion. Before you say that sounds like lazy storytelling, consider any and every fanbased debate you've had with your friends, you enjoy immersing yourself with the world outside of the game by the very mystery.

Mechanics-wise, again, these define your game and should be your own thoughts. There's no right or wrong battle system, and I cant think of one that is specifically relevant to your case, as their really all more or less the same, just different ways of relaying the battlescreen. So look at a few and pick the one you like most or best fits your ideas.
Menu systems...define 'good'? What are you expecting it to do exactly?
Finally, I wouldn't go with that payment system myself. It seems illogical to pay for words, there'd simply be no business, as words have a way of getting about. If I buy a DVD, I lend it to my friends... get where I'm going with that metaphor?
You could always use books or scrolls the player has to find to learn new words and then some learnt through story based events (a villain uses one against you, you miraculously survive, and hey, you just learnt how to cast fire). Sounds cliche, but it is consistent with the whole 'words' thing.

Hope these suggestions helped

I want to address this, because I understand your mostly right about the story. Here is a better question - what battle systems would you suggest? Same with menu systems. I'm looking more for stylish menus, probably.

As for the words. The only reason I had suggested crystals is because I'm trying to translate a more book-format type of magic into a game, to where it allows the player to get words like they want. However, searching for words could work as well, I suppose. Maybe I'm searching for more of a "class" experience with the magic, as in you earn sort of 'job points' or focus crystals and spend them on abilities. Hope that makes sense.

The problem with these suggestions is you'll get half the answers being Yanfly's (I forget the name but frontview essentially) script and the other being the Tankentai Sideview battle script. That's why I'm saying there's no right or wrong, its your preference. You can't win everyone over, so you're just gna have to hope the other aspects of your game cover it.

For the class thing, there are a couple of skill tree scripts about; I just think with something as accessible as words if the format in which it was applied were a book, why wouldn't they read on without the required crystals? If its the traditional sort of skill tree route where the words essentially come from no external source then it doesn't make sense that the player didn't know the words without the crystals.

Maybe I'm looking too far into it, but the whole thing seems a little too sensitive.

I'd just make a massive list of words that you can type in using the Hero Name system, and scrap everything else. Although you could have anything not on the list simply not be learned, and charge for the more complicate/powerful ones.

The thing about this is that you have two competing sources of magic, so either make it so some people can use one and others the other, but no one can use both, or remove one from the equation. The means of learning are totally different.

That is, you have two routes:

Route 1: Skill Equip learning
Equip crystals FinalFantasy9 style, and learn new skills.

Route 2: Skill Word cration
Type in keywords (Treasure of the Rudras/Rudora no Hihou style), and learn new skills

Trying to fuse the two would be too complicated for most people (though you could make specialty crystals that make Healing, or Fire learning free, when normally it would cost comething), and allowing an either/or would make it so characters know too many spells.

I think you misunderstood. You need focus to learn words ... think of focus as magical energy or MP and words as the actual spells. I was just wandering how one would learn it outside of the default "reach level X, learn spell Y." Either you can earn focus crystals alongside Exp to sort of "buy" the words, like you "buy" skills in Final Fantasy Tactics, or you find various books/scrolls around the world and learn said words (spells).

In either case, what do you guys think of my mapping so far?

Well is there a reason for all that open space on the right?
My, admittedly limited, understanding of geography says there are too many types of trees for one area, and their too formulaicly dispersed; nature is random. Besides such dispersion kinda ruins the illusion of a forest (which are generally dense and shadowy). Also might want to stick more stumps around for the impact of man upon the environment.
That gateways a nice idea but tents inside stone walls...? Sorta goes without saying they'd have houses in such a structure.
There's plenty of detail going on, but it all just looks thrown in and inconsistent. Give this a look: http://dev.oceansdream.net/?tag=maps

Btw trying to get feedback on battle mechanics, plot devices and now mapping is just way too much for one thread. For detailed answers people typically just make an exclusive topic and stick to it.

If you want to discuss your game, make a project topic in the submissions forum. Theory and Design is for discussing theory and techniques, not individual projects. Closed.