On open gameplay and organic quest design.

/!\NOTE/!\: This is not a thread where I berate and hate on SE for not doing things exactly how I want. There are many things I do like about this game; this is just a hopeful suggestion to get people to consider how they play, and maybe SE to think about how they present lore centric content. I ask that you hear, feel, and think before you consider dismissing this as "Just another whiner thread". Thank you.

Recently, the show Extra Credits had some episodes on quest design in MMOs. Specifically, how modern quests are centered around just pushing you forward with the 3-5 types of quests that have become standard, and how these games are capable of giving the player a much more organic and engaging experience.
Please give them a look:
Part 1
Part 2

They cover quest systems based on the player taking the time and effort to interact with the world itself. Quests that require critical thinking over the mindless mowing through trash mobs to push ourselves to endgame. Sure you could just look up the answers to these kind of puzzle based quests, but that's really true of any game, and the appeal of quests from those games is the story, lore, and environments they give you. Simply being able to look it up shouldn't mean you should shy away from content like it.

Game design has become so systematic and cold. We've boiled everything down to lists and tasks that we seem to have forgotten how to make a world feel alive and natural. I would like for this game to be more than just hubs and raids. Let me get involved with this beautiful world. Let me feel like my actions are more than
Even if I'm not rewarded for it, I want the quests and X to be something I want to do because of how engaging they are; not because I have to. And they have to replace the progression quests we already have, they can be something for the side. Things that really bring out the flavor of Eorzea's world.
I do want this game to be a success, but I think it can be something more than the standard. I leave this thread to open discussion and free thought about the subject.

Agreed. I'd also like to see fates given similar treatment. For example, Svara. It would be great if the success or failure of that chain determined the state of Steel Vigil. If players succeed, it becomes an outpost with unique vendors and maybe some repeatable quests that involve gathering supplies rebuilding/fortifying the outpost(which, at various milestones, would change the look of the area).

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Originally Posted by Vies

Agreed. I'd also like to see fates given similar treatment. For example, Svara. It would be great if the success or failure of that chain determined the state of Steel Vigil. If players succeed, it becomes an outpost with unique vendors and maybe some repeatable quests that involve gathering supplies rebuilding/fortifying the outpost(which, at various milestones, would change the look of the area).

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i know they did this in the south shroud with redbelly hive. if the FATE "retaking the hive" succeeded, a vendor would be added and the fort would be occupied by wood wailers. later, if another fate where poachers would attack the hive failed, they would retake control of it, and the wood wailers and merchant would run away.

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Originally Posted by saber_alter

i know they did this in the south shroud with redbelly hive.

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Same with Poor Maids Mill and Highbridge! :D

Just some ideas.

T(r)oll Bridge FATE
FATE Completed: Bridge is open to the public.
FATE Failed: Bridge taken over by bandits, they will block your way (invis wall) you either have to walk long way around or you have to pay a small gil fee.

Outpost FATE
FATE Completed: Contested outpost has a small detachment of grand company soilders with vendor NPCs.
FATE Failed: Beastmen tribe has taken over a contested outpost and have bunkered in, soilders/vendors not present.

Village FATE
Fate Completed: Small village is happy going/NPCs/venders/etc.
FATE Failed: Village is ran sacked, prices are higher, some NPC's are missing, etc..

Grand Company Outpost FATEs
Fate Completed: Which ever grand company had higher participation would take control of outpost.
Fate Failed: Beastmen control outpost.

Grand Company Territorial FATEs
Well basically the same as Grand Company Outpost FATE's but on a larger scale.

These could easily be 1 step FATES or multi-step FATEs (chained together).

Majority of the FATE's in the game are:

FATE spawns ->
(did you win?) - Yes -> Get seals, Exp, Gil
(did you win?) - No -> Try again next spawn.

Yeah it'd be really cool if certain FATE bosses were actually like dungeon bosses with crazy mechanics.

The secret world did a lot right with their quests and leveling. Personally I love the build system they have even though it can create balancing problems. It also did solo much wrong though.... I hope for a game with a hybrid quest system of everquest and the secret world. I feel its worth mentioning that kingsmouth, the zone in the video where the quest he refers to is in, is the best zone because after that I feel like the quality of quests go slightly downhill. Not bad but just not as good, and considering kingsmouth is the first zone it kinda disappoints afterwards.

I'm in general happy with the direction that quests have gone in this game, compared to 1.0, but I do agree with Gramul that they could be a little more. Extra Credits mentions five quest types but I actually just think that most quests can be boiled down into "fetch quests", in essence. I think now that the main scenario has acclimated players to the "quest hub" design, it's good to experiment with the way players interact with newer quests. I really liked the way that 2.1 quests encouraged players to replay some older content (Qarn, guildhests) as lv 50 characters to see how the game has changed since their leveling days. It would be really cool to see more of that kind of stuff in the future, and perhaps expanded to the point where joining a dungeon with the quest active changes the dungeon in some way (e.g. bring a quest item into the dungeon and interact with some element inside to progress the quest).

The quests in this game are extremely well written but I think some of the complexity has been sacrificed in the name of "accessibility". Accessibility is not a bad thing but post-main story, I think even the most casual of players have learned how to interact with the quest log that they can handle more complex quest design. There's tons of cool story bits hidden throughout the environment and I'd love to see more of it get surfaced through quest design.

I'd be more than happy with getting more FATEs with consequence, but I was thinking about more quests with puzzles and tasks that have less to do with fighting a small group of trash mobs or picking up piles of glitter from a marked range.

the idea of these quests would be fun when i am bored and wanna run around just doing random stuff, but other then that it is not that interesting i don't feel like having to convince a npc to give me a quest or to happen upon a item i need to start it, i am not all that into lore, but i guess it wouldn't be much of a problem since we have alot of quests already in game so i wouldn't need to even look for these quests to lvl. so yea not a bad idea (i mean as long as i keep my simple do what i ask quests)

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Originally Posted by Gramul

[COLOR="yellow"] Recently, the show Extra Credits had some episodes on quest design in MMOs. Specifically, how modern quests are centered around just pushing you forward with the 3-5 types of quests that have become standard, and how these games are capable of giving the player a much more organic and engaging experience.
Please give them a look:
Part 1
Part 2

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I take the music at the end of the first movie as a subtle reference :)

-Lak

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Originally Posted by Musashidon

the idea of these quests would be fun when i am bored and wanna run around just doing random stuff, but other then that it is not that interesting i don't feel like having to convince a npc to give me a quest or to happen upon a item i need to start it, i am not all that into lore, but i guess it wouldn't be much of a problem since we have alot of quests already in game so i wouldn't need to even look for these quests to lvl. so yea not a bad idea (i mean as long as i keep my simple do what i ask quests)

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Oh yeah, I'm not asking to get rid of the old quests. They're fine for leveling when you don't want to just grind without cause. I'm just looking for non mechanical and mentally engrossing story centric content as an aside. Things to keep the "explorer gamer" like myself, invested.

Have to agree after watching both videos very true hopefully SE will take this in consideration thanks for the post very informative. Allot of the sugguestion in that video to me is so very true I have played Secret World also and I have the same opinion I still like ffxiv but allot could be expanded on it fine to have the learning quest their but add also all the other types like what was suggested in the video would go along way also imo.

Hey Gramul thank you for this! I hope they see this idea is good. It would also be great to have more player interaction on the field too!

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Originally Posted by saber_alter

i know they did this in the south shroud with redbelly hive. if the FATE "retaking the hive" succeeded, a vendor would be added and the fort would be occupied by wood wailers. later, if another fate where poachers would attack the hive failed, they would retake control of it, and the wood wailers and merchant would run away.

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Wait, seriously? I think I've seen that FATE failed all of once so I never noticed but that's pretty freaking cool.

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Originally Posted by Gramul

Oh yeah, I'm not asking to get rid of the old quests. They're fine for leveling when you don't want to just grind without cause. I'm just looking for non mechanical and mentally engrossing story centric content as an aside. Things to keep the "explorer gamer" like myself, invested.

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Hrrgn, I see a deep inherent problem to those types of quests coupled with one of the design paradigms of XIV and I simply do not have a proper way to handle it myself.
Yoshida is trying to avoid having the players needing to search outside the game in order to complete things within it. A thing XI suffered a lot in with the way their quests were very esoteric and without outside aid from the internet almost impossible. They're trying to avoid that sort of thing.

How would one handle making a quest in those molds shown in EC while avoiding it become... Victim to the avaiability of information out there right now? Quests involving exploration and discovery in that manner would become obsoloted extremely fast as soon there would be data on how to accomplish it and what is avaiable all over the net, the actual effect of the quest is, the wonder of discovery, would be lost on the grand majority of the playerbase, mostly making it, then, wasted effort to make a quest such.

CAN that be avoided? Furthermore, are the devs already in a point in the game's life where they can afford to make a quest for the sheer love of storytelling? (like that one quest in 1.23 made by Ferne himself)
I'd like to think someone out there has an answer to that first question. And I am sad to say I believe that for that second quest, the answer is a no. But we should still cling to hope for the future, at some point it would get there.

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Originally Posted by FJerome

Wait, seriously? I think I've seen that FATE failed all of once so I never noticed but that's pretty freaking cool.

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There are some other instances most people don't notice of such things. There are some completely unannounced vendors out there such as the qiqirin in Old Maid's Mill that actually travel between places, and will get attacked while travelling! They run away and vanish for a time if they end up dead, but if they arrive safely there are rewards, I believe the Baby Raptor comes from him. But those are also completely unannounced events, I saw him while I was running a class quest there, there was no announcement, no quest marker no nothing.

There is another trader that makes the trip from the Observatorium to Dragonhead, although I haven't seen what happens with him.