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Extra Quest Templates

Posted: Wed Jun 18, 2014 4:55 pm
by Zelknolf
Something that I'll be working on in the next little bit is getting extra templates for types of static quests (as we currently only really have conversation-based quest advancement, a very narrow "kill this one thing" type quest advancement, and old/deprecated/oh-my-gawd-don't-use-this-it's-been-broken-since-2008 escort type quest advancemetn, and a "trip this trigger and get this thing out of the placeable" type quest advancement).

The three that seem like they would be the biggest bang for the buck would be
-- a search and destroy type quest ("find the goblins supply lines and break their wagons" -- valuable because it could be done stealthily),
-- an area-clearing type quest ("find the goblin scouting parties and kill off all of the scouts" [that is, unlike the current murder quests, you'll have to kill everything instead of just one thing -- valuable because it can't be beaten by shooting your best spell at the important guy and leaving a Looney Toons style dust cloud behind as you run away])
-- and a defense quest ("the goblin warband is coming down from the hills. You need to hold the ground at this pass [and will fail if you withdraw from it]" valuable because it puts a heavy reward on teamwork and gives opportunity to discuss strategy ahead of time).

I could use suggestions for others, but would say that I'm looking to do ACR-level work right now, so detailed storylines won't really help here-- we're lookin for more the level of story element or event here, and it would ideally be the sort that could be rewritten or rebranded into multiple contexts (that is, one doesn't have to defend agaisnt goblins, specifically-- though we are looking at roughly the level of specificity to say "you must hold this ground against something that will be trying to make you not," which is why ALFA could probably use some more)

Re: Extra Quest Templates

Posted: Wed Jun 18, 2014 6:11 pm
by Silvary
Love the defense quest idea! *thumbs up*

Re: Extra Quest Templates

Posted: Wed Jun 18, 2014 6:50 pm
by Castano
Silvary wrote:Love the defense quest idea! *thumbs up*
this is fricking awesome (as are the rest)


templates would go a long way to easing the build burden as they would teach others to make/modify quests.

Re: Extra Quest Templates

Posted: Wed Jun 18, 2014 9:50 pm
by Zelknolf
This might just be a misunderstanding of terms? The actual core/required ACR Quest system is just a library. This one, in fact (which is largely interested in making quest states persistent and filling out things like the journal, caching data about quest states, and integration with other systems like spawns). And the templates for that are the sorts of things written about in our existing tutorial, which is all of the functions in that library already put into scripts so that people can make quests without writing code, which I'm looking to make a few more of.

They are about as templated as they can get, though; we do still need to have a builder tell us which quest each piece belongs to, tell us what order the things in the quest happen in, tell us where each thing has to happen, and tell us what rewards to give when they're done-- optionally, you can also write up journal entries for each step of the quest-- and that's all that the existing stuff makes you do.

I wouldn't expect that adding more of them would make it easier to get into quests, in any case. The existing ones will almost certainly be easier to implement-- a search and destroy quest will require that you also understand placeables, and a defense or area cleaning quest will require that you define multiple locations for at least one of the steps. Compared to a FedEx, which is two conversation nodes for the whole thing.

Could probably rattle off examples of existing ones that work, if people learn that way? Mail on BG and supply crates on TSM are working fedexes, the Rivermoot/BG/Nashkel Guard chains are working scout and assault quests, the Rivermoot interior social skill quests are working skill challenges, and the BG herbs/hides are working collectable quests. And I hope that's not horrible meta to anyone, as the logs tell me that those are all things done frequently by a whole pile of people.