Quest Showcase

For all talk about quest development - creation, testing, and quest system.
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Jay_H
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Re: Quest Showcase

Post by Jay_H »

Thank you for the ideas :) I'll never turn suggestions down, whether I use them directly or not. Often it's what leads me to a perfect complete quest :)
Interkarma wrote: Sat Sep 01, 2018 10:13 pmOne member is secretly organising a coup against the DB leadership. Our character has the option to assist or put down the usurpers. What does this splinter faction want and are their complaints justified?
The main reasons I avoid doing this is are (1) Permanancy, (2) Quest length, and (3) Reward shortage.

(1) One of my FG quests, before I rewrote it, had a killing scheme where a false client leads FG members into a death trap and collects their bodies for pay. When you come back to the guild hall the QG is understandably very surprised. However, if you take the same quest again, the same thing will happen, and he'll be just as surprised. No matter how many times you do it, he never learns :D One of the qualities I've tried to ensure in all my quests is repeatability, meaning the ability for the game world to offer the same quest multiple times without the narrative fabric getting worn. To meet the same kind of faction again with the same complaints seems like it comes close to the point. With City under Siege I'm actually able to randomize the knightly faction's name so as to make clear it isn't the same group returning once and again.

(2) I feel like the expectation most characters have with DF quests is something lasting about 3 to 10 minutes. When length goes beyond that and we're stuck in a Lord K'avar-esque quest with no end in sight, we sort of start to wonder when we can come back to the game we started playing. Does anyone else feel this complaint? If it isn't relevant I'll ignore it.

(3) One of the reasons I've tried to keep away from the huge, multi-part quests that I've previously planned (see JHMG00X) is because I don't believe I can properly deliver a conclusion that will make the journey feel like it was merited. I think this can be added later on with some additions to the item system. But, whether it's tossing 25,000 gold at the PC or giving an artifact or a big faction increase, there aren't many options to use for now. If I had some assurance players are content to play merely for the roleplaying experience and not, say, for powergaming or accumulation, I could proceed in this road for a good amount of time.

These three relate most to my concerns about a large branch-off quest.
A lifetime member has found a more peaceful religion and risks exposing the local chapter. But this person is connected to one of the higher ups and they expressly forbid you to kill them. Instead, you need to find the cause of their fall into grace, and help them remember how to be a killer again.
Heh heh, sounds like a reverse Godfather III :D I hadn't considered this since I figured DB members all tried to keep anonymous and stay out of personal lives; otherwise it would hard to be a homicidal maniac from 8 to 4 and come home to play catch at 5:30 :lol: The quest length might be something to consider, but I'll see how much of this I can easily put to use.
It's hard to poison people when certain ingredients run out. One particularly rare ingredient can only be produced by a monk living in a solitary shack out in the wilderness. He's started losing his mind though and rambles more than Nulfaga these days. Turns out he's been possessed by a demon trying to reconnect to an old flame in the guild. When the player arrives, this demon possesses the player instead and starts speaking to them. What starts as a simple fetch quest ends with the player trying to re-unite a demon with their former lover, and uncovering what drove them apart in the first place. Perhaps some target escaped them in the past, and they blamed each other. The three of you can team up to remove that target once and for all, and heal old wounds along the way. With two virtual NPCs along for the ride, and them having a past relationship, there's an opportunity for snarky/witty/fond exchanges between them as the quest unfolds.
This is mostly a matter of quest length, and I've only known demonic possession to be Daedric in DF. Ghosts come to haunt people but they do in their own forms. Daedra can also take the form of inanimate objects, like a candlestick.

Dialogue is also a matter which touches on repeatability. I hope I can be witty enough to write 3 or 4 versions of a very good conversation to make it last. I feel I got lucky with the marriage counseling quest I did recently, since alcoholic, overspending husbands and bitter, disappointed wives are fairly common sights in the human experience, so I've allowed a little leeway there for repeatability.
I think anything suitably dark would fit within the DB style. I imagine the guild would be filled with some interesting fictional archetypes to explore in between a light bit of assassination.
I guess I've been worried about trying to step outside of DF "canon" in my quests. I can try to be a little ambitious, and based on feedback, tune back some of the weirder things I come up with :lol:

EDIT: I just now thought of a completely new way to introduce a quest without monopolizing the questgiver. I think this can lead into some new and interesting things. It could make two of the quests you talked about possibilities.

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Interkarma
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Re: Quest Showcase

Post by Interkarma »

No worries! Just throwing out hooks to maybe get the gears turning again. :)

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Jay_H
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Re: Quest Showcase

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And that is great, because just from your post alone I got about 3 great ideas on new ways to proceed -- not precisely on the nose with what you were thinking, but they'll be a big help to me. Thank you for taking the time.

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Re: Quest Showcase

Post by pango »

Hi Jay_H,
In my log I have:
I have been given 22 days to go to Stokworth and end a criminal mob that moves about in the night time. I must slay as many as necessary to stop them, and then return to Ipshead for my reward.
But I don't remember who was the quest giver :(
(JHNL001.txt)

I probably failed the quest anyway. Being only able to take down one or two thieves at a time I was taking shelter into a tavern to recover; After hearing a scream I ran in for cover, only to be attacked during my sleep (that was a first, before that thieves only spawned outside of the tavern). Maybe that was the nightblade? In any case I was promptly murdered into my room, unable to escape a swift dagger. And since I reloaded (I assume I quicksaved right after entering the tavern) it seems the mob has gone away? But I didn't kill the boss. I'm not totally sure what happened...

PS. Okay, it seems saving/reloading currently doesn't guarantee the restoration of dynamic NPCs, so that's most likely how the nightblade disappeared. I reloaded from before the scream, killed the nightblade on first try, and finally found the quest giver (the noble in Ipshead Palace). Missing accomplished!
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Jay_H
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Re: Quest Showcase

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A cool experience! :) NL quests come from nobles, such as kings and people in their court. If you got it from a regular merchant or innkeeper, that's something important to report.

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pango
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Re: Quest Showcase

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Well, beside the good ending, the main point of my report was that the log lacked some information to complete the quest.
I know this can be more tricky that it looks to record all relevant information in the log at the right step of the quest, and the main quest itself is lacking at times in this respect (for example if I remember correctly none of the useful information given by Prince Lhotun went you complete his quest are recorded into the log!)
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Jay_H
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Re: Quest Showcase

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Ah, good point. I'll add in the questgiver. Thank you.

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Re: Quest Showcase

Post by Jay_H »

Linked Quest #1: "A Modest Proposal"

Image
Image

This is based on a prompt Interkarma gave me a couple days ago. It doesn't go precisely in the direction he suggested, but I think the writing and quest flow come naturally.

Just so you know: this quest has several branching paths, and some of them can RUIN your Dark Brotherhood reputation. After all, that's how life is, isn't it? Spend years building a good reputation, and then one really dumb decision can tear it all down.

There are several ways to go about this, and it's the first time I feel like the PC is actually free to choose every step of the way. It's time-consuming, but a fun way to write a quest. This avoids monopolizing the Fighters Guild questgiver because it actually doesn't come from him. He only gives a letter, which does two things: ends the current quest, and starts a new quest that begins by reading the letter's contents. This means you could potentially have many iterations of such quests running at the same time. I therefore dub this kind of quest a Linked Quest. This quest has no time limit as such, but you can choose when to end it by giving the client a piece of jewelry back.

Lastly, I like the idea of cross-pollinating faction among the various guilds. There should be more opportunities to gain and lose reputation among them, I think.
Last edited by Jay_H on Sat Sep 29, 2018 4:39 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Hazelnut
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Re: Quest Showcase

Post by Hazelnut »

Jay_H wrote: Sat Sep 01, 2018 10:45 pm (2) I feel like the expectation most characters have with DF quests is something lasting about 3 to 10 minutes. When length goes beyond that and we're stuck in a Lord K'avar-esque quest with no end in sight, we sort of start to wonder when we can come back to the game we started playing. Does anyone else feel this complaint? If it isn't relevant I'll ignore it.
3 to 10 minutes using console commands? I certainly have no such expectation of quest length. As long as a quest is engaging and has the substance to warrant it, make em as long as you want. :)
See my mod code for examples of how to change various aspects of DFU: https://github.com/ajrb/dfunity-mods

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Jay_H
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Re: Quest Showcase

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Just last night I was putting together an idea for a long-term quest spanning several weeks. I'll be writing it as it comes together, and we'll see what comes of it :) Thanks Hazelnut.

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