Macro and Micro: Quests in the Romadi Steppes

The Escort quest type is the last, or near the last, of the quest types I have thought to implement. Getting the first escort cycle bootstrapped has been my adventure the past couple of days.

The zone I call the Romadi Steppes has a macro "public quest", and a micro "escort quest" now. Here is a description along with a bunch of pictures to illustrate what I've been working on of late.

First there's the micro event which you can run. This is a repeatable escort quest, "Escort Wife to Safety". You pick it up from Peflar, a farmer in the outpost town of Trevarium. He is concerned about rumors circulating about the Red Ssarg making ready to assault the place, and wants the player to escort his wife to a place of safety above the town.

It turns out there are at least two cases needed to handle even the simple type of escort I am designing for. The first type of escort is one where you have to locate someone and then guide them to a destination, and the second type is where you just have to lead someone to a destination. I implemented structures for both, but decided to write the second type first, because it was more direct.

Now, originally I implemented this requiring a trip to the town next door, but in testing it I decided it was simply too far to go without becoming a dull slog through the woodlands, and changed the destination location to a point atop the hill overlooking the fort among a stand of firs.

Anyway, once you have picked up the mission, you make it primary and your escortable is spawned. If you have the map open, a blue dot is shown to mark the destination point, and then its a matter of getting there through some light stands of trees where Red Ssarg scouting parties may or may not be lurking.

And I've run it so often in testing it seems I have also earned a level, getting another point to put towards my stats on this trip. The game lets you slot your points immediately, although you can save them for later if you want (I already had one point from my previous level, which is why there are 2 points shown.)

The Macro quest, implemented as a public quest, is spawned every half an hour. Anyone within range of the village will have it automatically dropped in their quest list while it is running. There is also a countdown timer which appears automatically onscreen while the event is active.

This one is more elaborate. A large number of Red Ssarg are spawned and sent along paths towards the walls of the fort. They light torches as they approach, and set the walls on fire. After 60-120 seconds of burning, the walls go down, and another squad of Ssarg come running in and enter the village.

They proceed to set huts on fire. There are three huts to protect from the incursion in this quest--its fairly simple. If a player or players wait within the walls, they can prevent the Ssarg from reaching the huts. The event times out every ten minutes, and restarts every half an hour. There is some variance in how things will play out, depending on the sheer randomness of getting the mobs to follow their pathing... if they hit bumps in the terrain, it can change things enough that they won't take exactly the same path every time, or their entrance through the hole in the wall may be strung out or clumped, so it is never precisely the same thing. Players can also egress through the hole and fight the larger mass of Ssarg outside the walls. After all, they aren't worth any points alive!

Building the quest mechanisms has been an interesting process. I wanted to get away from dialog box based storytelling with this game, so everything is handled in dialog and interaction like a MUD of old. It makes it more personal and engrossing when you are actually holding a "conversation" directly with an NPC. I'm itching to extend it, so the limit on sentence length can be lifted, and I am pretty sure I know how to do it. For me, figuring out how to do something is the game, rather than than the gameplay itself. The dopamine rush that comes with solving a problem is the best, but it doesn't last and I need another hit.

I hope that wasn't too many pictures for everybody! Website for the project can be found at World of Antra, you are welcome to sign up if you like, or follow #worldofantra on Twitter.