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Just following the game lowkey-like, hoping it will do well when it releases.

I've gathered that the focus will be on a dynamic world empowered by location-limited marketplaces and thus a need for trade and then the node system that gates certain resources behind world states like having invested a certain amount of resources into improving a node.

A moderately big part of the PvE aspect of the game will thus be the quests you do in the node to progress your or its levels. These quests can be radiant / open-ended (kill [generic bandit chief] / collect [15 bear arses]) and they can be more narrative and prewritten.

I'm wondering what level of quality we can expect from both these categories of quests from the writers of the game. Mind, questwriting is a skill you can improve at, and which will thus likely improve as the game gets older and the devs more experienced, since quests are likely to be one of the main types of content added post launch (as is the norm for most MMOs).

I'm asking because most MMOs have sh*t tier quality quests. Go here, kill the thing that's not a challenge to kill, click the thing that's blindingly obvious, follow the dotted line to deliver the quest, use the neon-emblazoned item on the doodad while under 0 pressure. This holds true for WoW, FFXIV, New World and GW2 (which manages to be even worse by not even having NPCs with some narrative justification for it). The story behind the quest can be good, as in FFXIV, but the actual experience of playing out the quest is largely very poor.

I'm wondering if I should expect that when I play the game I'll be given some poor justification for why I need to kill 15 goblins, then I can go pick them off one by one and then hand it in and overall feel very little emotion about it, or if I should expect quests to be challenges at baseline requiring some manner of thought beyond bare repetition, or at least that they'll feature some interesting twists.

For examples of good quest design I point to the Witcher 3. Almost every quest is given a proper grounding in the world, a strong emotional hook and requires some form of thinking to figure out what the challenge is. Even in the cases where the actual execution of the challenge is relatively easy the quest remains engaging by virtue of its design. Lore and insight into the world and the personality of the characters around you are used as the main reward for quests, with loot being secondary. This is imo why TW3 was so satisfying to play. Few games do the core aspect of gameplay that is quests as well as that game. Both the Elder Scrolls 4 and 5 have some good quests also, but they tend to falter in the aspect of making them emotionally resonant, putting them a tier below the Witcher.

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about 3 years ago - /u/IntrepidStudios - Direct link

Originally posted by presto464

I like this distinction. Task and quest should be different.

There are also plans for "Events" as the third category under questing - more time-based and location-based scenarios, triggered by something, that can have pass/fail criteria. Failing an event could lead to...disastrous consequences 🙃