Weapon Research and the Unstable Arena

@Grand: My over-wording and over-thinking of a re-hashed idea that you've probably already thoroughly considered

So I was thinking how it should be a relatively minor thing to add a "hyper-mutable" match. This would be a regular game match between two people (or one vs AI) -- although in this case only specifically requested/accepted opponents, with a disabled clock (because it takes an unknown amount of time to do the extra actions -- you'll understand in a moment... probably).

At this point, most abilities conceived are combinations of ones already in game, possibly with extra execution rules. So if we take a regular match and allow a player to apply those abilities and rules where and how they like, you can approximate a new piece concept without having to go through the hell of coding all that rot just to find out it is unviable (glass-half-empty-san says). I assume that there is actually some external testing that is done prior to coding, but either way, this should not only make it easier (in the long run, anyway) to test a sizable influx of ideas, cost adjustments, and what have you, but also enable things like PieceMaker contests where the players can play with/against their ideas and see how they do/don't work -- which should, in turn, result in better piece ideas overall to begin with.

Description cards could be editable so that the opponent can be sure you're doing what you're supposed to be doing, according to your own piece rules (or the other way 'round), and that those rules are laid out in an understandable and succinct manner. Not sure how difficult it would be to import from PieceMaker (or if you'd want to), but even uploading an image could do in a pinch -- though personally I would only recommend that for the most trusted. Obviously an in-game editor would be the most ideal (but the most work, if you don't have one implemented for yourself already).

In every turn, the user must specifically request a cessation of the turn. This allows any and all desired effects to be applied during a turn (decreasing Value and/or Morale of one or more units/sides, applying a status effect to one or more units, etc, which may or may not come directly from a piece's activation (I say this because I was initially going to write that you could auto-end the turn when standard currently in-game CEO pieces are used, but then I thought about effects that might "linger" from previous-used abilities and passives)). All abilities and effects would need to be available at all times, of course, and it would be up to the player(s) to police whether or not they are being applied properly. If this were to be used for PieceMaker contests, though, letting the contest organizer(s)/judge(s) monitor a match would obviously be ideal.

Because of status-specific interactions, it would probably be best to split some actions into component parts: Freeze and Petrify accomplish the same thing for a different number of turns, but may have different counters/cures/side-effects, so being able to apply an [n]-turn generic "cannot act" order coupled with a "Frozen" or "Petrified" attribution would allow for more complex interaction possibilities (not to mention new attributions, like main_gi's Crystallize -- though in most instances, those attributions aren't relevant). Then again, if you wanted to go the easier route, you could leave the piece as is and just apply a visible tag indicating its status (and the number of turns that status will be in effect) and let the players keep tabs on it-- though that would require a bit more GUI jiggery-pokery, I think...

OK, so looking back on it, at its best implementation, it's not a "minor thing" -- though it is at its most bare-boned, which should still serve as a base for when/if you want to add the functionalities to progress it toward the best implementation.

TL;DR
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