Quests; What you want and don't want to see.

[Haerski]

... They don't actually have giant exclamation marks above their heads in new games do they? :| You're just being flippant, right?

Actually in few games and in most MMOs (which are not games) they DO have exclamation marks above their heads to indicate they have quest to give for you. I'm sorry you had to hear about it this way... Take your time.

Edited October 1, 2012 by Haerski

[Macbeth]

I’m fine with a fetch quest or two long as they’re ‘dressed’ properly. A few lines of convincing lore can do wonders. Obviously I do hope there’ll be a lot of intricate quests that require the player to think things over a bit, rather than having him follow blinking quest-markers from A to B and back.

 

If there’s one thing I deeply hope is avoided completely though, it’s the bring-me-X-amount-of-Y quest variety. The horror!

[Muzrub333]

As long as the quest givers have huge glowing icons above their heads, and a magical golden wormhole appears leading me to my destination, I am fine with any types of quest. Oh, and uber loot too...gotta have uber loot.

 

 

Make a wide variety of quests, from the mundane to the epic. Sometimes I like to go kill 10 rats for a quick SP or two, other times, I want to grovel, grind, scream, and gnash my teeth for several long days/weeks to finish a quest. As long as the reason to begin a quest makes sense, I am good with it.

[Hypevosa]

I would like to see a quest revolved around putting a portable hole into a bag of holding and getting ripped into the astral plane. I think it would be fun :D

[beerflavour]

What I didn't like in most modern CRPGs (especially MMOs) where those Fed-Ex style quests. Collect X amount of Y and deliver it to Z. Or kill X of Y and report to Z. My all time favourite is faction favour where you repeat certain activities to increase your faction score........

 

Besides if there should be some highlighting mechanic for quest givers (e.g. floating exclamation mark or similar) then it would be really nice if you could turn it off in the options panel.

[Vargr Raekr]

Why did I ever bother?

Edited July 22, 2018 by Vargr Raekr

[Fooine]

As far as quests go, I really hate helping random strangers with matters that don't concern me the slightest. Some guy talks to me about that family sword he lost in a faraway thieves den, why should my character care? Who in their right mind would, out of nowhere, interject "I could fetch it for you, if you'd like"? There's a limit to being kind.

 

The best quests, I think, are those in which the player just stumbles into a situation by accident. A really good example of that was the Renar siamese twins from Arcanum. Starts innocently enough as a guy asks me to deliver a message. Being polite, I say I'll do it if I see the guy, with no intention of actually looking for him (Another great thing about Arcanum: the journal listing "mentionned" quests without me feeling as if I've made a commitment). Later I stumble upon deCesare by coincidence, figure I might as well deliver the message, and holy **** he just killed a guy in front of me and now he's holding me in a chokehold accusing me of being part of the conspiracy what the hell is this about I need to know. Then follows just about the best sidequest of any game, ever. It really wouldn't have worked as well if it was just "Hi. Can you find the skulls for me? I'll pay handsomely".

[Sylvius the Mad]

I do not want to see the game make any assumptions about why I'm completing or not completing a quest.

[PsychoBlonde]

As far as quests go, I really hate helping random strangers with matters that don't concern me the slightest. Some guy talks to me about that family sword he lost in a faraway thieves den, why should my character care? Who in their right mind would, out of nowhere, interject "I could fetch it for you, if you'd like"? There's a limit to being kind.

 

This is why I (somewhat) enjoyed the beginning of BG2 where they gave you a REASON to do all these little bull**** quests--you needed money. Granted, it wasn't that well done in BG2 because it was an absolutely trivial amount of money. They did it again in Dragon Age 2 and it STILL wasn't all that well done. And that guy in Skyrim DOES give you some training if you do his quest. But there are good ways and a bad way to do this kind of thing. Presenting it as you just randomly doing favors for every wandering idiot is the bad way. A good way might be to have this particular bandit lair be on your way to someplace else, and this dude offers to give you directions to a secret back entrance if you pick up his sword for him. Or you see him kicking ass in the training arena and when you ask him if he'll train you, he says, well, I really can't without my special family sword . . .

 

The best quests, I think, are those in which the player just stumbles into a situation by accident. A really good example of that was the Renar siamese twins from Arcanum. Starts innocently enough as a guy asks me to deliver a message. Being polite, I say I'll do it if I see the guy, with no intention of actually looking for him (Another great thing about Arcanum: the journal listing "mentionned" quests without me feeling as if I've made a commitment). Later I stumble upon deCesare by coincidence, figure I might as well deliver the message, and holy **** he just killed a guy in front of me and now he's holding me in a chokehold accusing me of being part of the conspiracy what the hell is this about I need to know. Then follows just about the best sidequest of any game, ever. It really wouldn't have worked as well if it was just "Hi. Can you find the skulls for me? I'll pay handsomely".

 

That enitire quest arc was awesome. It was also buggy in a lot of cases because at least one other quest intersected with it in such a way that you could inadvertently make it impossible to advance the quest.

[PsychoBlonde]

I do not want to see the game make any assumptions about why I'm completing or not completing a quest.

 

Is it okay if the NPC's make assumptions? Like, they say, "oh, you're so nice!" when you complete the quest even if you were, in your head, doing it strictly for the reward?

[ogrezilla]

I do not want to see the game make any assumptions about why I'm completing or not completing a quest.

 

Is it okay if the NPC's make assumptions? Like, they say, "oh, you're so nice!" when you complete the quest even if you were, in your head, doing it strictly for the reward?

I think that would be fine if the NPC has no reason to think otherwise. If you are a flat out jerk to them that would seem silly though

[drain]

Most of all I just want interesting dialog in the quests. Hopefully many of them (not all) will affect the world around me as well depending on if/how I complete them.

[NOK222]

If I like saved half the continent already, I don't want farmers asking me to go feth bassilisk eggs.

[PsychoBlonde]

If I like saved half the continent already, I don't want farmers asking me to go feth bassilisk eggs.

 

Well, unless basilisks are REALLY BADASS. They should still let you OFFER to do the fetch quests, but it'd be nice if around a certain level people start being baffled when you offer to help them with their personal problems. :D

[PsychoBlonde]

I do not want to see the game make any assumptions about why I'm completing or not completing a quest.

 

Is it okay if the NPC's make assumptions? Like, they say, "oh, you're so nice!" when you complete the quest even if you were, in your head, doing it strictly for the reward?

I think that would be fine if the NPC has no reason to think otherwise. If you are a flat out jerk to them that would seem silly though

 

That makes sense. It's just hard sometimes to know what's going on in Sylvius' head. I wasn't sure if he was talking about people thanking you for saving their lives or a more meta system like the game awarding you good-guy points for doing it when the "real" reason you saved the village was because you want slaves for your evil empire.

 

But, yeah, if you're a jerk to them and then go pull their bacon out of the fire it would be nice if their response is less "OH I LOVE YOU MUAH MUAH" and more "Ummmm . . . thanks, I guess?"

[NOK222]

If I like saved half the continent already, I don't want farmers asking me to go feth bassilisk eggs.

 

Well, unless basilisks are REALLY BADASS. They should still let you OFFER to do the fetch quests, but it'd be nice if around a certain level people start being baffled when you offer to help them with their personal problems. :D

 

Maybe, I'd still it rather be lower level stuff only. But if has to happen, then what you suggested is nice.

 

"Oh hey, I know you must be totally busy and all that..."

 

Or maybe at that point nobles and royals are asking you for favors, and while the quest is a fetch quest, it has much deeper implications lore wise.

 

IDK...

[PsychoBlonde]

 

Maybe, I'd still it rather be lower level stuff only. But if has to happen, then what you suggested is nice.

 

"Oh hey, I know you must be totally busy and all that..."

 

Or maybe at that point nobles and royals are asking you for favors, and while the quest is a fetch quest, it has much deeper implications lore wise.

 

IDK...

 

Or, they could have it be that at higher levels the fetch quests are incorporated into bigger quests, so you can do them as you are doing something else, so it's less "yes, I will go fight the bandits in order to get your sword back" and more "Oh, hey, dude, while I was destroying the Bandit King I found this sword stuffed in a chest, is it yours?"

[BasaltineBadger]

Or perhaps make a fetch quest for something for yourself not for other people. A travelling merchant doesn't tell you to get him so item for gold, you discover that there may be valuable item hidden somewhere nearby. The money you get from selling the item is your reward.

Edited October 1, 2012 by BasaltineBadger

[NOK222]

Overall, I don't want them to be boring

[lobotomy42]

In general, I would like to see a huge amount of sidequests - huge in both number and in variety (dialogue, combat, stealth, magic, puzzle, combinations thereof!)

 

And, if I may re-post myself from http://forums.obsidi...pg/page__st__60, I'd specifically love to see:

 

One of my favorite ideas first appeared (AFAIK) in Neverwinter Nights 2: the "other" party of heroes. In NWN2, once you got a keep, a band of adventurers would start appearing and asking for work. If you wanted to mess with them, you could send them out on made-up quests and watch them get all beat-up. In NWN2 it was largely a joke, but what if it weren't?

 

Imagine showing up in a town and discovering that there were another group of heroes accomplishing similar things as you:

 

"Hi there, I'm new in town! Have any work?"

 

"Funny you should ask! Until yesterday, my basement was full of rats. But just yesterday, this lovely group of heroes showed up and cleared them out. Wasn't that nice of them?"

 

This could become a game mechanic: grabbing and completing quests before the "other" group gets to them. Eventually you could deal with the party by recruiting some of them, killing them, convincing them to go home, tricking them into taking lousy quests, or just letting them be and continuing to watch them snatch up your quests. Perhaps you could even manipulate them into doing all the hard work and then you and your party could swoop in to claim the rewards and credit.

Edited October 1, 2012 by lobotomy42

[Labadal]

As long as we don't get many fetch quests or quests that tells you to kill x amount of monster, I'll be happy.

[Lysen]

I would like to see complex quests with multiple solutions (combat, stealth, persuasion), quests that require you to travel to different areas and look for clues. The already mentioned quest from Arcanum is a good example of the latter.

[Metzger]

I don't want one-sided quests. Even if it's bandits vs town guards or abolitionists vs slavers or opressed villagers vs tyrant or whatever. I want to choose a side myself, not be dictated by developers.

[moridin84]

ESCORT QUESTS.

 

I'm amazed no one has mentioned it as a not-to-do quest.

 

In general, I would like to see a huge amount of sidequests - huge in both number and in variety (dialogue, combat, stealth, magic, puzzle, combinations thereof!)

 

And, if I may re-post myself from http://forums.obsidi...pg/page__st__60, I'd specifically love to see:

 

One of my favorite ideas first appeared (AFAIK) in Neverwinter Nights 2: the "other" party of heroes. In NWN2, once you got a keep, a band of adventurers would start appearing and asking for work. If you wanted to mess with them, you could send them out on made-up quests and watch them get all beat-up. In NWN2 it was largely a joke, but what if it weren't?

 

Imagine showing up in a town and discovering that there were another group of heroes accomplishing similar things as you:

 

"Hi there, I'm new in town! Have any work?"

 

"Funny you should ask! Until yesterday, my basement was full of rats. But just yesterday, this lovely group of heroes showed up and cleared them out. Wasn't that nice of them?"

 

This could become a game mechanic: grabbing and completing quests before the "other" group gets to them. Eventually you could deal with the party by recruiting some of them, killing them, convincing them to go home, tricking them into taking lousy quests, or just letting them be and continuing to watch them snatch up your quests. Perhaps you could even manipulate them into doing all the hard work and then you and your party could swoop in to claim the rewards and credit.

 

Or maybe a garry oak?

http://i.imgur.com/O8X5W.gif

[Lohi]

Well, there are the old style single player RPG quests that took weeks to finish, and modern MMO micro-managed quests. For the former you have things like "rescue Imoen", for the latter you have "take this cup of coffee across the street".

 

The old style quests were very broad and leave it up to the player to figure out what to do, new style tend to be hand holding quests with rarely any thinking. Nothing tells you how to rescue Imoen, you have to figure that out yourself, earn some money, get a bit tougher, etc. In an MMO for instance you may discover that a certain enemy is the one you're looking for but if you kill it early you get no credit, instead you go see the quest giver who only then tells you "oh ya, now that we've figure out who it is, go kill him". Another good example of old style quest is Fallout, where you just have to find a water chip. Nobody tells you how to do this, you just figure it out and do it in any way you can.

 

Similarly old style quests gave you freedom of how you solve them: fight, steal, bypass, get someone else to do it for you, etc. Side quests were really side quests, as in you could do them right away or just wait until you're in the appropriate area or when you stumble across the objective. You don't even need to turn in side quests, keep the persons magic cloak instead of turning it in for a reward. Very often in older games the player is left to make up their own objectives.

 

That's what I want to see in quests again. Open ended, long term objectives, no hand holding, no being on rails, many possible solutions, make the player think if they want or brute force it if they want.