Yeah, another feature request...
Feel free to open as much as you see needed.
I think especially the ability to guard an ally would make it tactically quite interesting. What do you think? Yay, nay, maybe?
Like the Final Fantasy or Child of Light's defend skills, I guess.
- This particular skill (which is quite common in RPGs in fact) was first removed from the idea list, because it didn't really added to the game.
And not really in Final Fantasy either, btw.
When you say tactically interesting with that effect alone, I disagree, because just like in Final Fantasy, I was more in a hurry of dealing blows to enemies than to play overly-defensive, and I almost never used that skill. If you've got interesting play-cases, just tell me, though.
In Child of Light, they've "fixed" that by making the character's next wait turn quicker, so you could protect yourself, while using this to prepare your next blow.
Now, let's not think (yes, you and me ;]) in term of specs (what it does) but in term of game design (what it adds to the game).
What you're describing is simply put the "Shield" spell with more complicated scripting to make it look nice. Like Bronann jumping in front of Kalya to take the hit.
So with the effect of adding to a character defense only, I won't add this because Shield is here for that.
In final Fantasy also, there were formations aka I-put-my-character-at-the-back-and-it-should-take-less-hits. But in fact, the change wasn't really visible and people tend to forget about it.
So I'm not convinced about that part either.
Also, there is the reverse skill having the same effect: The "Hey-attack-me-and-nobdy-else" skill. I'm not convinced either since it usually tend to make the poor character triggering this skill die rather quickly in battles where it actually matters to trigger it.
I'll be honest, what is planned is rather to add side-effects to the characters attacks based on their role. Like adding counter attack or mimic the last spell targeting the character, or send back the spell on the enemy depending on the character you've got and the skill you've selected.
I know that for Episode I, the two characters have a very limited set of fixed skills, but starting with Episode II, they discover true magic spells, team skills, and allocation of magic spirits on equipment to unlock skills. I hope we'll be able to discuss once you've got a party capable of all that.In the meantime, have a look at the files in: dat/skills and parse the different spells and skills already planned to be added. I'm all open to help in the implementation of those.
Best regards,