In part 1, we talked about quests in general. Now it’s time to get to the heart of the matter.
Step #1: CLASSES of quests
As one player put it, quests have to be broken up into components. Think of these as the building blocks of a quest (or “bricks” as one user put it).
How are quests initiated? Here are the ones that come to mind:
1. Some tiles would contain an object that when a player enters that tile, triggers a quest event. These tiles would appear on both the cloth map and full map. We’ll call these MAJOR quests.
2. Random events. Player hits turn, and there is a chance that a quest opportunity may come to the player without having to do anything. We’ll call these MINOR quests.
3. Some tiles would have objects in them that when the player interacts with them would trigger the quest event. These would only be available on the full map (players will be able to move within a tile without using up a move on the full map because you can zoom in). We’ll call these INCIDENTAL quests because they won’t have a game-changing effect.
Step #2: MECHANICS of quests
Here we define the building blocks of these quests specifically.
Step #3: EXECUTION of quests
This is where we decide how these should be implemented. There are 3 obvious ways to do tihs.
One way is to simply code these in C++ but that eliminates modding.
Another way is to implement in XML which makes modding very easy but makes it hard for us to add additional quest types we haven’t thought of.
And finally, they could be implemented in a scripting language (Python) which makes it possible to create new quests but harder to mod.
I’m leaning towards combining the latter two. Python used to script the mechanics with XML used to provide the actual quests.
Step #4: ACTUAL quests
Quest 1: Kill the rats Type: Incidental Trigger: On main map, player can zoom in on a city and see a “!” above one of the buildings. Player can then select one of his heroes and take them there which triggers the event. Content: “Oh please help me, rats are infesting my Inn. If you can kill them, I’ll gladly give you 20 copper. Will you accept?” Execution: Player is taken to a tactical battle with rats in the Inn. Only the Hero is allowed in.
Quest 2: Rescue Princess Genica Type: Minor Trigger/Conent: Upon the beginning of a new turn, a local noble has asked you to save his daughter Genica from a group of marauding bandits who are operating out of the ruins of one of Curgen’s old fortresses to the East. Requires: Adventuring Level 2. Execution: On accepting, a fortress is added to the map to the east. Only an army with a hero can attack it. If successful, you have the opportunity to wed Princess Genica.
Quest 3: Recover the Dragon’s egg Type: Major Trigger: Dragon icon on the map, when a hero-equipped army intersects tile, triggers event Content: The Red dragon of Sythia is outraged that a manling has stolen her precious egg. Dragons only have offspring once a century or so. The dragon agrees to join your kingdom if you recover her egg. The egg was stolen by Calorax the Warlock who lives somewhere in the far north in the Pilgen mountains. Sythia does not know where Calorax is exactly but knows that the Witch of the Swamp knows someone who might know. Execution: On accepting, a hut is added to the map in a swamp nearby.
Quest 3A: Dragon’s egg part 2 Content: Upon reaching the witch, she tells you that she has a map that will take you to Calorax’s lair that she agrees to give you if you bring her the scroll of Poisoned Claws which she knows is near the bottom of the old dungeon of Harpok to the south. She points out that in getting the scroll, you will be able to make use of that spell as well. Execution: On accepting, the dungeon of Harpok appears on the map.
Quest 3B: Dragon’s egg part 3 Content: Upon entering the dungeon, you discover that a demon that fled to these deep places of the world after the cataclysm has taken refuge there. You can choose to battle the demon or exit and return later. If you battle the demon, the tactical battle screen comes up and you fight it out. If you win, you gain the scroll which you can then return to the witch. Returning to the witch gets you a map which triggers the fortress of Calorax to appear on the map.
Quest 3C: Dragon’s egg part 4 Content: Your army reaches the fortress of Calorax that you must conquer to rescue the egg. If you’re successful, you get the dragon’s egg which, if you return it to the dragon nets you the dragon (or you could sell the dragon’s egg for money elsewhere) who becomes a unit in your army.
So these are the kinds of things we’re thinking about. Please feel free to add to this and discuss.
That is a super awesome idea. and Make sure that there is tons of flavor surrounding the parties, including info on the leaders profile (the duke of doom), quests they have done, reputation (bad boys, heroes, mercenaries, treasure hunters), aswell as their general allegiance.
I agree completely. To create a game with "soul" you need personalities, characters with individual style, history, flair, and most important, goals.
Factions are cool because they are meta persons and hence can be described in the same way, as individuals, Citys as well.
If you can get characters, factions, cities and kingdoms, with their own characteristics, goals and peculiarities, virtues and flaws, you have soul.
I would like to see a possibility to build a statue or a monument to victorious hero after some quests. I loved this in Baldur's gate 2. Such monument would be a part of the city city. The small monument/statue would bring (one ore more of the things randomly selected): increase in the happiness in the city, increase in prestige, increase the income. The small monument takes one tile and cost money and perhaps some other resources (stone). The large monument should have higher bonuses, it would take 4 tiles and is much more expensive than the small version. Perhaps there may be a monument, that takes 6 tiles in the game, but in that case it shall have huge bonuses and shall be very powerful. Large monuments may have bonuses above + bonuses such as created units are stronger (higher HP, attack etc., are experienced at the beginning...), healing powers (units in the city regenerate faster).Rules: the statue or a monument can be build only in the nearest city the thing has happened. The right to build a monument shall be added to the quest data (as the spoil of victory), but you need to use the right way to complete the quest to be able to build the monument (eg. dragon wants the princess. If you give him the princess, the dragon would disappear (with the princess), but you can not build the monument. But if you kill the dragon instead, you may build it). Graphical representation: a statue is the pedestal + the hero or the creature involved in the quest. You (= your graphics team) will already have them painted (for tactical battles), but they need to be grayed out (some stone texture). You may even probably choose from several positions (hero/monster is attacking, staying, dead etc.). The monument may be an obelisk or something like this.
That rat quest reminds me of the Warhammer novel "Skavenslayer", with the enhanced rats eating grain to starve the city.
Maybe it could be as you say: it indicates a significant problem but you don't know. However, if you decide it's too little a quest for your well-developped empire, after a few turns the city's starving, then Skaven invasion forces led by some Thanquol-wannabe take over the city.
You never know what these quests can unfold.
Even Dragon Age has a "rat quest".
A "hero party" concept is very important so there can be some middle ground between solitary hero and whole-freakin-army.Anyway, on implementation:- To meet other (non-quest) stated goals, the C++ code will need to expose getter/setter methods to python for pretty much everything in the game state- We'll also need to be able to add python methods to some kind of OnEvent callback list so the python can respond every time a unit moves into a square (to check if a quest starts, or whatever)- There's also some interface calls python will need like "pop up a box with text X and a Yes or No button, return 1 for a Yes or 0 for a No" or some such- with those tools, the python can handle the quest logic- nothing would stop someone from hardcoding the quests into python at that point, but as you say it would be much better to keep the quest data in xml; it would help if we could read the xml files directly from python but 3rd-party-script-hitting-file-system is a security issue; perhaps the C++ could read in all xml files on app startup and expose the xml document objects through a python method that takes a filename (but just returns the cached document object, doesn't go back to the file system)
I recommend...
Add to triggers:
Add to rewards:
Consider adding the ability to "pass of" certain quests to other factions, or perhaps to initiate some of your own. This may be best for the "fetch and carry" quests. "Hey, Faction A, make me happy by running off and getting me some X".
Keith - Those are great suggestions. If they do use a hybrid model, then if someone really wants, they can hard-code the whole thing in Python, but those of us with less programming skill can just hack some XML and call it a day.
One of the things I did not like in Heroes of might and magic and partially age of wonders is that the object of the game is not to manage an empire but rather walk around the map and collect stuff. Most of the time spent consisted in uncovering and looting the map. Personally, I find this pretty boring.
What I am suggesting is that quest should be more than wander around the map and loot stuff. There should be some target or goals that you could decide after a while to assign a hero to this task/quest or not.
Here are some example of quests:
A-Explore stuff (Like in MOM): there are abandoned tower, caves, keeps etc. Instead of sending an army, you send a hero.
B-Solve a problem: For example, A certain area is cursed by a witch, you need to send a hero to solve the problem. OR This road always get attacked by bandits, preventing you to trade with other cities.
C-Seek something: There is a legendary hidden item, you need to find clues or other key objects in the world to find or unlock that legendary item (many movies are like this).
So this is a bit the kind of quest I would like to see. There should be a couple of quest opportunities but not too much. You should be able to manage your heroes and decide when it really worths it so send a hero on the quest or if you prefer to let them manage internal affairs. For example, cursed land by a which is not much a problem unless it prevent you from expanding or if it prevents you from doing efficient trading.
I really like this - in particular, the incorporation of random outcomes to the possibility tree. Even if such a branched tree with multiple possible randomised outcomes would be too much hassle to include in many Stardock quests, modders would go crazy over it!
Yeah, that could be really exciting. The appearance of such quests might be somewhat similar to mega-events in GalCiv2 - suddenly everyone has to focus on destroying the emergent undead horde / tracking down the long-lost-but-recently-sighted Vorpal Blade or whatever. Could be very exciting.
It would also be good if participating in the majority of quests was genuinely optional. What I mean by that is that the player who doesn't like quests and mostly ignores them isn't at a significant disadvantage. Rather, focussing on quests is one of a number of possible strategic avenues.
For example, player 1 might be busy paying exorbitant fees for heroes and expending a lot of magical power on equipping them, but in return get very powerful magical artifacts and allies from the quests. Player 2, by contrast, is pouring his resources into his economic and military development. Very different playstyles, but neither is clearly better.
I say this because I foresee that not all players will really enjoy quests, or at least might occasionally fancy a game where they won't get involved with them.
I am just seconding or expanding on some thoughts already discussed:
Re: Timers: it would be nice to have some quests that are not timer oriented, but can only be completed by meeting some criteria. ie "who can draw the sword from the stone...", "The first player to have an heir with a bloodline of X and Y", etc.
Perhaps non-timer quests would fall into an EPIC class.
Re: Negative consequences: Some quests should be preventative quests. ie "An assassination attempt on Heir X was not fully successful, however Heir X was still poisoned, and has 25 turns to life, unless uber-anti-poison Y is found and brought back in time."
M
Not entirely on point to the current discussion, but tangentially related to quest implementation. What are people's thoughts on a "rumors" page somewhere in the UI?
I figure it would make far more sense for you to hear about say a rat problem through gossip or your information network than it would be for Matilda the tavern wench to personally petition the soverign for her pest control problems. You could have caravans bring in information from time to time "The crofters along the road to Someplace have been telling tales of a dragon in the hills of Overthere." and so on. It would also be interesting if opposing players could plant rumors through a tech of some sort in other's kingdoms in order to waste their time, set up an ambush, whatever.
1 thing about quests you REALLY need to avoid ending like civ 4 where random events totally sucked
the main problems are:
-quests too much randomic, you need to avoid at all costs this, or ppl will just disable if possible or get really pissed off if someone just doing a random quest get a imba reward, dunno how to do it, but the priority should be to balance someway everything, maybe make them a "great wonders like"
- reward not related to effort, ofte you could get a insane amount of troops or something too strong for the few things required
-quests too much "distracting", sometimes you had to stop producion in all cities or stuff like that, i dont like it, quests should be something "on the side" you dont need to disrupt your whole strategy to complete
On step #3 ... definitely a mixture of the latter two options, or one of the latter two options. Definitely. Need. The Ability. To Mod. Quests.
I like the outline for the Dragon's egg quest, although maybe that one should require a certain Adventuring tech level OR a specific tech in the Adventuring tree.
What is the focus of the game? How much emphasis on each element of gameplay is Stardock aiming for? We have five general categories of gameplay. Strategic (map), Tactical (combat), Empire building (cities), Role Playing (character development), and Adventure (quests/discovery). In my interpretation of "Elemental War of Magic", wizards/mages (and champions/armies) duel constantly over both strategic maps and tactical battle maps. This is the core of the game. Empire building supports the strategic and tactical play with options that effect your strategic and tactical capability (units, unit-capability, production, spells, .. etc). The role playing portion is leveling up your wizards and champions with with new spells and abilities both strategic and tactical. Are we playing this game to build cities? Are we playing this game for adventure and quests? Lets first strive for a game that knocks our socks off with (polished) strategic and tactical depth. Three years from now I want to be reading about new strategies for some underused faction nobody ever expected. A quest for me is when PhatDaddy999 "casts Deathcloud over your city". Hmm I guess I need to do something about that!
What is the focus of the game? How much emphasis on each element of gameplay is Stardock aiming for? We have five general categories of gameplay. Strategic (map), Tactical (combat), Empire building (cities), Role Playing (character development), and Adventure (quests/discovery).
In my interpretation of "Elemental War of Magic", wizards/mages (and champions/armies) duel constantly over both strategic maps and tactical battle maps. This is the core of the game. Empire building supports the strategic and tactical play with options that effect your strategic and tactical capability (units, unit-capability, production, spells, .. etc). The role playing portion is leveling up your wizards and champions with with new spells and abilities both strategic and tactical.
Are we playing this game to build cities? Are we playing this game for adventure and quests? Lets first strive for a game that knocks our socks off with (polished) strategic and tactical depth. Three years from now I want to be reading about new strategies for some underused faction nobody ever expected.
A quest for me is when PhatDaddy999 "casts Deathcloud over your city". Hmm I guess I need to do something about that!
I totally disagree with that. I think that most people want that and in that way it will be made but that doesn't mean I cannot disagree with such limited experience. Why not develop a pure combat simulator instead? We could say to have something a la Dawn of War 2 (which I love no matter how much "trolls" hate it ) in which base building is close to not existant so you focus on combat.
*insert generic and in the end useless rant about all the elements of the game being part of the same weave and how they should be equally important and "equally" developed*
*shrug*
Wintersong, this is a message board, you can agree and disagree with anything you wish. This is why we are here. I probably tried to make too many points in the post above. I generally feel that these sorts of thread titles are unproductive without any general gameplay context. This is why I asked about about the emphasis of this game within the five gameplay types.
I look at it this way. If we build two games. One with excellent strategic play and tactical combat. Another with a lot of quests but no reason for doing the quests (no strategic or tactical gain), the game with the best strategic and tactical model will win hands down. I feel empire building and adventuring should support the core strategic and tactical play. Role playing or character development is critical and can be (should be) integrated on nearly any level to great detail. It's the adventuring aspect (quests) that becomes problematic.
Quest 3C has a few gramatical errors. They are obvious, so you should be able to correct them if you read it over.
I pretty much agree with this. I do think there is room for a full quest system, in fact we know that questing can lead to one of the Victory Conditions!, But for me, questing is still only going to be one of many paths to crushing my enemies! I think quests to fit within the game well need to provide strategic and tactical advantages (weapons, armor, allies, strategioc locations). I want the role playing element to be there, but it should nto be the primary focus for the game.
You are right, but it would be better, if you are more specific the next time and more polite too. Some of us are not native English speakers. So even if someone is as brilliant as I am, he/she may have problems with the spelling or the syntax.
....Participation
.....
How about creating a third class of participants? You could call this 'adventurers only' or something like that. These quests could only be done by heroes AND certain special units that have been equiped with an 'adverturer pack' (like the scout pack that is currently in the game). This pack would be too expensive to give it to your run-off-the-mill troops, but it might be interesting to give it to units like rangers and paladins (or commandos if you like ). These troops would be better trained to handle uncommon high-stress situations, like clearing out a pack of werewolves from a ruin, which your ordinary troops would basicly suck at.
I make this suggestion because i really liked how in the original Age of Wonders you could bring your whole stack with you when you explored a dungeon (although it was a bit strange that you could use your mounted knights and even siege equipment to explore a crypt or cave). It made sense to give your hero some backup (or handy cannon fodder) when he went exploring.
I think it could be great if this was implemented, especially if Elemental gets an active and creative map making community like Age of Wonders had. You could have quests that only heroes could do, like killing a medusa, quests that you can use an army for, like clearing out a bandit camp or capturing a location, and quest that you need some specialists for, like the aforementioned clearing of a werewolve den, hunting a fabled beast, etc...
What do you guys think?
TL;DR: If it's not meaningful, core and balanced, why bother with it?
If the game is supposed to have city building, tech tree, diplomacy, magic, combat, dinasties and quests, all of those elements should be core. Those which are not, should be converted into scrap. And the same should be said about those not meaningful. Same tale for those which cannot be balanced with the rest.
If those elements I mentioned are "key features" I would expect to have to master all of them to be able to be successful in the game. In some playthroughs I might be able to favour some systems over others (one I go the diplomacy route while other I go all berserker) but in no way should I be able to ignore any of those "key features" when playing (using governors doesn't count as such).
If the game get a spionage system (supposition here), I should bleed to death each time I ignore that whole system because "I don't like it/it's not fun" and do nothing about it, and there is an opponent (real or AI) clever enough to find out and exploit it. And the only way for me to avoid that from happening should be to rush my enemy and destroy him before he has the chance of abusing my clear weakness. (or use diplomacy to force someone else to do it, or magic to destroy his kingdom, or buy my opponent's mercy/friendship... but never ignore the system, optional settings willing)
If Quests are a "key feature", a player that plays ignoring them (let's suppose no "No Quests" setting) should have a harder time winning if he doesn't compensate with more efforts in other areas*. I can joke about "Kill 10 rats in the basement" but quests are no joke. ASk to Bilbo Bolson. A (chain of) quest(s) can end with the opponent Sovereign losing an artifact that protected him from death or to lose a war he couldn't lose. They might give you access to exclusive branches of technology that no one else can use. There will be quests of killing rats, delivering wolf tails and other errands... but you don't expect low level heroes killing dragons and saving the world, right? And someone must do some minor taks because, you know, those 10 rats you didn't kill in the basement the other day have spread the Black Death in your core cities and become the beachhead of The Lord of the Plague.
Quests shouldn't be there to give you more cannon fodder or territory control tactics. They should add options to all the other elements of the game, some of which should be exclusive of the quests and in no other way available. Some can be random and scripted but they should shine in the dynamic department, some of them being generated as the world evolves and adjusting to the current events of the game.
And if Stardock were to add them to basically give us "A Dragon", "More cannon fodder", "Some gold and/or city" or similars, which I doubt but could happen, I'd be highly dissapointed. Lucky me that I value the whole package so I'd enjoy them anyways (I enjoyed the spionage system of Gal Civ II even not being the best thing in the world so go figure).
Oh, and if there is a "CORE" to the game, it's cities. No cities = Game Over. No population for armies, no tech research, no money... (Although it would be cool a mod called "Going Gandalf" in which you basically solo the game (with some mercenaries based on influence/prestige).)
* and can be considered lucky, because if you ignore any of the "key features" of your body, you die no matter what
Well, I think it would be good, if also general units may explore the dungeons. Think about that:
- We found an underground labyrinth, sir.
- Good! Send someone to explore it!
- Well, but sir, it may be dangerous.
- The labyrinths are allways dangerous. Find someone, that is clever enough to survive it .
- But sir, no one in our army can... Some hero, perhaps, but.... And there may be pits and traps and monsters!
- How dare are you servant! Send the whole squadron there! Every pit has bottom. Someone will survive.
Perhaps this, or alternatively there could be multi-hero quests, where you would actually be using a "party" of heroes up to 4 or 6.
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