Has anyone ever used this system?
 

Hello all,

I work on a system where there is an automatic questing system. I can set it up where the player has to kill a mobile, find a mobile, find a room, find an object, or give an object to a mobile.

I find that the possibilities are pretty endless with this system as far as being able to incorporate the quests with existing zones. As well as being able to create new mobiles for either social aspects of a quest, or a target mob to kill.

The rewards for the quests are pretty endless as well. I mean right now I am trying to create a whole system to replace the typical grind of experience points by killing a mobile. So, the reward is experience points, gold, and new player equipment. However, it could really be anything including quest points that can be exchanged for special equipment or just give out some new cool item.

Well, with all that being said. Has anyone ever used a system like this?

I’m looking for ideas on what I can do as far as using the quests as an alternate leveling system. Thanks in advance for any feed back!

-G

Re: Has anyone ever used this system?
 

Yes, quite a few muds use that sort of approach - it's been available in snippet form for around 15 years or so I believe. As with most systems it has its pros and cons...the risk is that, if overused, it can end up becoming just another type of grind, no more interesting than the the repetitive mob killing it was intended to replace.

Re: Has anyone ever used this system?
 

Almost all of the 2nd generation MMOs use this type of leveling, and our latest project supports an extensive system for what you describe. (We simply don't call it questing because I personally feel that quests should be epic. That's kind of irrelevent for this discussion, I guess!)

But you can check out any of the modern MMOs to see how they do it, or you can come visit and see how we did it. :)

Re: Has anyone ever used this system?
 

Perhaps a bit OT, but I remember reading in a few places there are only 5 different types of quests.

1) Kill mob(s).
2) Gather stuff
3) Escort NPC
4) Take Item A to Location B.
5) Activate Item (possibly in location X)

Whoever can transcend that system, that's where I see the real innovation coming from in the near future for hack'n'slash/quest based games.

Re: Has anyone ever used this system?
 

A few games have quest requirements like:

"Form a party"
"Get at least one person to join your party"
"Talk to another player"
"Send a whisper to another player"

You can link the quest system to basic commands. I liked those quest accomplishments since they helped promote player interaction. The current questing systems on all the 2nd generation MMO often result in quest grinding, which is really bad for player interaction besides screaming at each other for tagging mobs and griefing.

Re: Has anyone ever used this system?
 

Thanks for all the info!

-G

Re: Has anyone ever used this system?
 

I totally agree. I wrote an article about this a few months ago, and it got picked up on a number of gaming blogs.

Re: Has anyone ever used this system?
 

The MUD-Dev mailing list used to be a great place for discussion of topics like this. Indeed, this very topic was discussed many times during the heyday of MUD development. Nowadays, MUD-Dev is stagnant, but the older posts are a goldmine of ideas and notes on/for this kind of system.

Here's some related threads, which I have kindly interpreted a summary of for you:

: Started by someone who has a pretty decent generation system at their disposal, with detail on how it operates. It sounds very nice and employs some of the best concepts like in-game places and entities objects being database objects, that can be factored into the quests. It also scales the difficulty according to the player doing the quest (a feature of the computer game Oblivion that I personally found immersion breaking). A pointers to a previous thread is given (these posts seem to be missing from this archive of the list but may be found in another) and a comparison made between the approaches.

: Differentiates between static quests and dynamic quests. Supporting game systems to facilitate player awareness of quests they are engaged in. Involvement of in-game resources. Use of scripting languages and programming approaches including triggers.

: Thoughts on factoring story and plot into generated quests. Use of overarching plots. Involvement of in-game entities. A personal preference for manual systems and thoughts on rewards that appeal to a player. Believable responses by the game world to the side-effects of dynamic quests.

: The initial post of this thread is missing from the archives. Starts with the topic of keeping quests generated by a dynamic quest system fresh and interesting, and avoiding them eventually becoming stale. Making quests robust in the presence of gameplay concurrency - that is the interaction of other players in the resources involved in the quest. Possibility of generating quests for different players that compete against each other.

: Starts off slow, then veers towards noting Chris Crawford's what is now named StoryTron system. Also links to his essay "Interactivity, Plot, Free Will, Determinism, Quantum Mechanics, and Temporal Irreversibility." Mention of a proof that "interesting stories are not computable, therefore cannot be generated." Disagreement about this proof. More missing posts from this archive. Thoughts on designer tools taking care of the low-level details.

It's quite inspirational to read through this. While there are some posters in there who have written their own system, speculating about the possibilities is to some degree navel gazing. The real knowledge is in having implemented it and seeing where you can take it, and what changes you have to make to get there.

Re: Has anyone ever used this system?
 

Thanks for the links. Those are some very interesting posts. Long live, Mud Dev!