Starting quests could get a bit more depth, more surprising, with twists...

I posted a part of this this in another thread but I think that it belongs in feedback.

I was doing the Battle of Highvale quest and I was wondering why this quest isn't more complex and surprising? Basically it is talking to a bard who gives you the key to open the door.

I was hoping for a bit more complex quests. For example why not have the healer being involved in this, too?

The bard could say that Tracy has the key but he doesn't. So the bard tells you that he saw the healer rummaging through the corpses and carrying stuff to his house. As the healer is behaving strangely we visit his house and discover that he is a necromant, trying o revive the dead or something like that. There are zombies in his celler and we have to find the key there and confront the healer, too!

Such a quest would add more depth, surprises, twists to the situation than just talking to a bard who mysteriously has the key to the gate.

The same for other quests - for example finding Stanley and Cugel. You bring Stanley a letter who sends you to Cugel in order to deliver a letter... Couldn't there be more to this? Some surprises and twists?
What about the child that is missing in Solace Bridge? You find it and it is happy but nothing happens. What about she fell in love with this elf and wants to stay with him instead of going back home (which by the way she doesn't - she stays in the ruins until all eternity). Something that adds a little more depth to the characters and the stories...
Or why isn't there more to the missing hunter in Soltown? His wife could have cheated on him and the attack of the wolves was a trap to kill him so that his wife and her new lover can live together...

Hoping for such things for the "final" quests of the game.

 

The quest of Myra and Myron in Owl's Head has a surprising twist, but it's the only one I've found so far like you say.

 

Yep, so true ... I find the quest to be Boring .... but the then they are working on the quest, I hope.... ESO quests have twists to them, and they are fun and tell a story .... we need that here. I play games mainly for the quests, they are like solving puzzles to me... that and FUN Combat, exploration, etc ....

 

Yes, this is an area that strongly relies on the storyline. It needs a lot of work.

 

Without wanting to sound rude but right now it feels more like Fedex of the Avatar...

Those are all so simple MMO quests that seem to be tailored for those people who do not want complex quests with twists but just want to finish a quest as quickly as possible. Take item A to person B...

 

Yes....I'm hesitant to go into to much detail on this...but it feels like they added the quest system they had in UO.

This is one area I am very worried about....it needs sooo much work.

 

I've offered to help for free as I have about 3000 pages of lucid dreams that were inspired by my mystical adventures in UO and my admiration for Dragonlance and Tolkien... with many puzzles and twists and mysteries... I will humbly say I can make every aspect of the cerebral part of this game at least 10 times better, just out of passion, because thats what I wanted to do as a kid.

But I was categorically refused, they even rejected me to help translate the game in french for FREE, even if its only like 15% translated and they need people.

Some people prefer to think that I don't exist... ignorance is bliss.

I call it put a dozen shrouds on one Avatar.

 

Yeah! not only the starting quests but also... more quests! Things to do, that makes you travel and explore. Long term i'd love to see some kind of procedural system for quests.

You weren't accepted as part of the translation team? why?

 

For the starting quests, I would suggest the exact opposite. Have you checked competing products? Some put big symbols over the NPCs, highlight them, trace a luminescent path to the next step of the quest... and more! No need to read (by the way, this might lead to a localization free games, eliminating the need of translations. j/k). All this for a fedex quest where the avatar must travel but few seconds to reach the destiny. We can like it or dislike it, but it is the current standard, and people will compare SotA to it.

I would not call them "Quests", the term "Errands" suit them better IMHO.

Yet a tutor, for learning the game, that use these techniques (e.g. mark and lightning the NPCs so it is really easy to find it) will not hurt the game. Later on people might leave the game, but they will not post SotA has bugs. Exposing young players to actually read and write (!) might be too much without some really easy tutor.

 

Indeed. July 20, 2013. Pretty good discussion there about the realities of the UI and quest "types".
What it seems to boil down to is make your character do something in-game, or test the knowledge of the player. As testing the knowledge of the player needs to be dynamic/unique to be challenging (thanks, wiki's!), and procedural generation is not in-scope for SotA, that leaves 'make your character do something in-game' type quests.

 

That's hilarious

 

If you take a look at other RPGs, the starting quests are in most cases very interesting to make people interested in the rest of the game "Oh my god, this first quest was so cool! Now I can't wait to see what else will await me!"

In Skyrim you are about the be executed, have to flee while a dragon attacks the settlement.
In Ultima 7 you arrive at the scene of a murder.
In Ultima 8 you witness an execution.
In Ultima 6 there is an attack on the life of the Avatar and Lord British.
In Fallout 4 you witness the death of your wife.
In Diablo 3 undead attack the city.
In SotA we have to deliver letters or amulets...

 

To be fair, there's still a chance that things will be much better by release, but not final wipe.

However, since the quests and story line will not be complete by final wipe, we will be playing UO2 from the period of final wipe until release. There is no point to try to enjoy single player at that point.

Then the only option will be to go back in offline mode and experience it with all the content complete, unless you don't do anything from land rush to release (which could be a long time) and then delete your character and start over.

 

I'm trying to point out things that can be changed between now and "launch". I think that some quests are meant to be final so if they are not that interesting, now is the time to change them. The later it gets the higher the chance that there won't be enough time left to change such things.

 

I agree and I think the only place to do that will be in offline mode once final wipe happens, leaving the online mode for UO2. The only option would be to wait til release to play, and I don't think most would want to do that with the headstart possible from final wipe until release.

 

Another thing. I think it would be interesting to get an explanation as to why the bandits moved in to Highvale. Maybe we find a drunken bandit who tells about this or something like that. This would add more realism to the bandits suddenly being in the area.