How do you make a good traditional quest without it becoming a fetch-quest or a "go kill mobs" quest?
>>344731391
You don't do a fetch-quest or a "go kill mobs" quest.
writing
>>344731453
and how do you do that? I always felt as though quests usually fall under either one of these
You really cant. Every game not just mmos fall into this category.
>>344731605
Make it so the entire point of the quest isn't to fetch something or go kill something.
Come on.
>>344731391
Story.
>>344731716
like what?
Have the thing you're questing for available from the start, send the person out to do something that requires the item or thing in question to be activated.
>>344731716
give one example. Reaching an area is just as bad.
>>344731475
>>344731772
How can you do it without a good story?
>>344731605
thief 2 has some missions like this.
you simply listen and gather intel. not really "fetching" anything. or follow someone.
>>344731391
Interesting characters, story, gameplay, and an incentive for the players to go about the quest.
>>344731792
>>344731856
Witcher 2 has a quest where you go on an all night bender and walk around town half naked trying to find your stuff and talking to people to find out what happened.
There is an example of a good quest. Good premise, you interact with good characters during it and it's memorable. Even better that you can keep the tattoo he gets.
>>344732087
That was Skyrim.
Runescape's quests
>>344731391
>>344731924
Just like this guy says, I don't really think the problem is with the quest itself but with its justification. If the players are not provided with a good reason to tackle the quest or something, it will feel stale and boring no matter what it is. Basically, the quest needs to sound entacing and rewarding.
>>344732247
>>344731391
it has to have a well written story
>>344732087
Still essentially just a fetch quest (fetching the information from the people).
Next please
>>344731391
what about quests where you convert people to your cause?
quests where you infect/corrupt something or someone?
construction quests where you have to build something.
>>344732542
you could literally phrase anything to be "fetch x" you humongous faggot
>>344732428
This tbqh famalama
Just make it so it isn't go and kill 10 bears, or bring me 10 bear asses. As long as the writing isn't abhorrent or forces you to go through a dungeon filled with draugr, with a boss draugr and magic word at the end it should be ok.
It's a meme but it's true; Runescape had really good quests. Some of them can get a little samey, but they are great examples of not being fetch quests. There's even a take on a fetch quest with one small favour.
>>344731391
Make it a go fetch cowlicks quest and you're good.
>>344731391
Objective: Survive
>>344732920
>>344731391
You can't, all quests by default even if they try to avoid it end up in a "fetch it" or "kill x" style, the issue is not that, the issue is making the quests interesting, so even if they are similar you wouldn't care about it.
Also not making 13 fetch quests in a row.
What about a quest where you have to kill 10 bears and then bring their bear asses back to the quest giver?
>>344731391
>Take fetch/kill quest
>add "I don't know where it/they are"
>permit the player to find it/them in more than one way
bam an actually interesting treasure hunt/assassination quest
>>344731391
The problem with those quests is that it is usually brainless labor. You get a point on the map, go to that point, grab item/kill monsters, then come back. You make quests better by putting in some choices and/or puzzles. For example, you go to investigate some murders, find some clues on your own, and piece together who the murderer is. Don't make the clues too obvious, and let the player decide the murderer by doing something like hanging a person of your choice. Hell, make it more complex by allowing the player to report false evidence to try and frame a murderer.
>>344731887
>Go somewhere and listen to someone
>Go back to quest giver
>Not a fetch quest.
>>344733080
I love forging stuff in Dragon's Dogma for this
>>344732725
that's the point of the thread
quests are always fetch this or kill that
its problematic
therefore->but sequences
>>34473308 depends how they do it. can i do it while i run around doing other stuff or have i been able to kill and loot bears already throughout the game? that would be ok for me. if i have to make a run to a specific area because only there the bears spawn for no reason other than the quest says so then i'd be slightly annoyed.
>>344731391
>what skills does the player have, or might be able to get?
>how do i make a mission out of this?
Maybe your dude can cast fire. Make him go help with something that needs fire.
Maybe be can do [thing] and somewhere someone really needs [thing] for [stuff] to happen.
>Something happens, introductory dialogue/cutscene
>Protagonist needs to do something about it because it's relevant to him
>Sends you to an aread created solely for the quest
>Enemies if any are quest enemies
>Gameplay is specific to the quest, this may include the enemies having a partiular mechanic that makes them impossible to beat in usual ways
>More dialogue/cutscenes as you advance and things happen
>The new mechanics/enemies get combined and grow more complex as you advance
>The experience was interesting
To be noted is that I'm talking singleplayer games, quests in MMOs are just an attempt to patch an already broken idea.
Games that have "kill mob / fetch X" just want the game to be artifially longer, as they could be automatic as achievement, or just rebalance the game so they don't need to exist.
Furthermore they usually add fucking boring stories to them that nobody gives a shit about.
>>344733320
the point of this thread is good quests that aren't monotonous fetch quests, a quest involving the collection of an item is not inherently bad because it requires this. people categorize quests as fetch quests when the entire framework is the collection, when an NPC says go to this place and collect this rock. if the quest has an interesting premise, character and story to it then what's the problem?
>>344733113
imo pillar of eternity does this very good.
>let the player decide the murderer by doing something like hanging a person of your choice
this is good but i personally hate it if you have to decide but the decision is so unclear that it's basically a "who do you like better" decision.
>>344731792
Diplomacy? Like, settle a feud between two or more parties via dialogue?
You could make a quest for a Paladin or Cleric character where he has to do 10 good deeds at a day for his gods. Let him give money to the poor, heal wounded/sick people, get someone a ride on his horse, or help when someone gets attacked by bandits.
That's the problem with MMO's/RPGs, they're not immersive enough, the NPCs are bland and lack depth, just imagine all the shit that you did in the middle ages and a game trying to copy/represent the middle ages are always just yea kill that/get the super epic mega sword with 999 dmg. There's a lot of quests that could be made without fetching or killing shit, like rally a troop, persuade X to do that, breed fucking horses lol, rape the queen, you get it, too bad rpgs suck balls.
mfw prolly never will experience full body VR in middleages or shit
>>344733597
the problem is that the player is still just fetching something.
its boring, generic, and lazy
I have been doing that in games since I was 4, 22 years ago. I'm tired of it, think something better. 22years fetching shit, just kill me
>>344733738
Also the thing with fetch quests is that they feel so fucking useless and dull, the only reward being EXP and gold, why would I as a character in a world go fetch fucking flowers for a guy when theres a million things I'd rather do?
>>344732920
This.
Defence. Survival. Escape.
Jesus Christ.
>>344731391
Who the fuck is this guy?
>>344733974
some dude in shemale porn
>>344733761
Well, come up with something new and unique and share with us
>>344734087
Alright. I've just seen this guy quite a bit lately.
Gothic 3 is cool.
You can go in any direction and just naturally "quest"
Escort quests are highly innovative
>>344734229
sounds like someones been looking at shemale porn
>>344731391
make it interesting. give you more things to do long the way. go into this unique dungeon, defeat its guardians, solve the puzzles there, bring me the skull of the dead emperor entombed within it that I might summon his ghost and learn the secrets of my enemies. you get to keep the unique enchanted gear he was buried with'
is more rewarding than 'bring me twenty bear asses, because I hate bears. I will give you eighty gold for it. '
Majora's Mask
Lots of quests are just fulfilling life
>>344731391
Most fetch quests and kill quests are too similiar to jobs, if a guy told you to kill 10 wolves irl for a thousand bucks thats a job, if a guy tells you to collect 30 blocks of stone its a job, if a guy tells you to take over California thats a fucking quest
You can have fetch quests and kill quests. What modern games do is just give you a check list, the location of those items pointed on your map, and bish bash boom you're done. You don't care because you only did it because it was a quest, you got items, you got exp.
You do what this game did. It is literally a game of 100+ side quests. But the thing is, all the side quests are short, or long, stories. They all, well most are, decently thought out interesting stories that often times intertwine with each other. You care about the characters, you have to figure out everything yourself, and the endings are satisfying.
Another good example is Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning. Not the whole game no. Just one area. In one area you do fetch and kill quests but the reason you do them makes it interesting. First it starts out as a mystery, then it turns out there are wonky spiders. Then it turns out someone you thought trusted made a deal with a (demi? I don't remember)god. Then fight through that beings castle and resolve the quest. It was a side quest with both kill and gather quest in it but it was more entertaining than the rest of the game. The rest of the game was riddle with boring fetch and kill quests.
>>344734674
>take over California thats a fucking quest
>kill 10 politicians so you can have a chance to take over Cali
>rig 3 events to win over the civillians
>win 4 debates
etc. etc.
It's just one long quest of doing X
>>344731391
Miniquests generally end up screwed up on this sense because they're too small. But in essence the general idea is to make the quest's goal not the highlight of the quest.
Example, If anyone's played the Exile or Avernum series from spiderweb software. There's a campaign in path of exile where your goal is to find out why a valley is dying.
You explore the valley, find out that in parts of the valley the river is toxic, and in other parts the water is just fine, so you track down and figure out there's an abandoned wizard's school in the way of the river and then you get strong enough to go inside and fight your way downward to find out old badly stored refuse was poisoning the water.
The quest could technically be a wow style miniquest where it goes
>HEY THAT WIZARD TOWER IS GUNKING UP THE RIVER, SO TURN ITS AUTO CLEANING SYSTEMS ON
Where you run somewhere and press a lever to fix it.
Or it could be
>Guys, this fucking place is dying, go find out
and you have an adventure, finding out everything along the way on how to resolve it.
My concepts for games always encourage players exploring and learning on their own, rather than being told.
>>344734820
Yeah after I did this quest I realized how shit the game was and quit before I made it to the next area.
>>344731391
Make it so it doesn't have an objective marker. Have it so that either the player was listening to how the quest goes and places to get hints how to do it OR just dump the player into the quest relying on their knowledge of the game world at that time.
Like the bear ass thing, make it so the player has to think to themself "Where is the best place to get bear asses?" then put something in the mot likely location to reward the player for thinking of going there.
>>344733761
If you want quests that don't require your character going to [place] to do [thing], you're kind of shit out of luck because that is LITERALLY the definition of quest, you retarded motherfucker.
>>344734845
Yes but that's how real life is, its an RPG still so you have to roleplay. I think what really destroys rpgs is the lack of reward, when you finish a quest and get like 500 exp it doesn't feel fulfilling at all, also the npcs sucks most of the time so theres that
>>344735081
Yeah I fucking despise that, why do you have to know where to go with the help of a marker, this kills rpgs for me 90% of the time, its like "if you wanna forge this sword you have to visit the dwarf bla bla, but he's been missing for 80 years, btw ill mark on ur map where he is bb", neat
>>344734951
Not to mention you literally explore the entire valley beforehand, seeing the effects the river is having on the world and the changes along the way.
So it feels like you fixing the problem has an impact. Quests dont feel like you've impacted anything in most games.
>>344732757
And the one in Fremmnink Trials too.
>>344731391
I was contemplating an MMO in which npcs and resources don't respawn.
Then your fetch and kill quests would have an actual impact on the world.
require reading and problem solving without a huge arrow pointing where to go
the quest arrow ruined singleplayer games for me
>>344735132
you're right. on the other hand, it's like the formula for a movie. yes it's the same boring mcguffin over and over again. but the quality of characters and setting and etc make the same formula amaze. same with quests. the best quests don't feel like a quest because you're immersed in a story.
Here's another question:
How do you eliminate the desire or capacity to grind from players without trivializing the game's difficulty and or making fights seem pointless?
>>344731391
make those same quests but allow them to be completed in different ways that affect the world and the player
Bring 5 Boar Dicks:
>actually just kill 5 boars and rip their dicks
>lie with high CHA you already gave him 5 dicks
>enchant 5 bear dicks to look like boar dicks
>steal 5 boar dicks from a vendor or another adventurer
>bully the quest giver into giving you money or xp without doing that dumb shit
>>344735752
Good progression design. Give more reward for quests than just solo killing. Fighting won't be pointless because fights need to be completed for quests.
How do we evolve or improve the HP system for combat?
It feels like a "build a better mousetrap" kind of quandary.
>>344735081
Also have a nice journal. Like,
>man needs bear asses he was located in bunny district, he was upset with bears raping his wife. he told me that there's been a local bear gang hanging around outside of town
Then you go explore out side of town and come across them in some cave or something.
But now we have
GET 10 BEAR ASSES
>select active quest
BEARS R IN CAVE GO KILL
>>344735889Limb based HP
>>344731391
Make it a fetch-quest or 'go kill mobs' setup in a way that you actually care (ie Cook's Assistant in Runescape, or Whodunit? in Oblivion)
>>344735957
>Shoot dick
>Shoot dick
>Shoot dick
>Shoot dick
>Shoot dick
>Shoot dick
>>344736065
>Not shooting each finger
>>344733597
Stop replying to the mong idiot
>>344735752
Make the world an actually living environment.
Sort of what I do in my D&D campaigns. The world keeps moving forward so if you stop trying to find the devil, the devil will find you, or will find a nearby town and tear it apart.
the plot must always move forward
>>344735752
I'd give heavily diminishing returns to xp rewards for random fights based on what type of enemy you're fighting and how many you have killed so far, and balance it so the majority of XP is obtained though questing over pointless fighting, and giving equivalent rewards to avoiding combat over killing everything.
>>344736036
Oblivion's thief guild after stealing required amount to get in was great. You ended up having to steal a bunch of random junk. It turns out that junk is so you could infiltrate the most guarded thing in the world.
Then you have skyrim's thief guild quest which is nothing but the worst part of oblivion's thief guild quests, getting admittance to the guild. Oh and a long excursion through a cave that has nothing to do with thieving.
>>344736297
In the first real level of Deus Ex HR if you just wonder around the office the hostages in the next mission all die. Stuff like that?
Most runescape quests manage to avoid this trope pretty well adding in puzzles, story, exploration and all kinds of shit.
Also to help with fetch quests, when appropriate, have a time limit on them and a consequence for failing it.
For example, if you don't hunt the ten bear asses for the guy in time, the knights guarding that place take the guy since he didn't have enough payment for them. This results in the town not having a shopkeeper or whatever.
>>344736443
Yeah. Go slowly forcing the players to move forward as staying where they are gets increasingly more dangerous.
I've been playing Divinity OS with a friend these days and there is a good variety of quests, and most of them are fun and engaging. I think it's the nice mix of storytelling, puzzle/mistery solving and battle. There is this main quest where the party must solve a murder case, and investigating the city for clues, sneaking into prohibited areas, interrogating NPCs and going outside the city to find proof made us feel like detectives. Boy that was fun.
>>344735752
Reward players who don't grind somehow.
>>344736297
>>344736443
I don't think a lot of people liked timed things. It cuts people out of content or gives them anxiety because they feel rushed. It's why some people won't even give the atelier games a try. Even if it's a lenient time limit. In table top games it's okay because there isn't a set content to explore or complete. In video games it is.
>>344736812
>Reward players who don't grind somehow.
Be specific dork.
>I don't think a lot of people liked timed things.
I think a good balance is have timed things, but giving players breathers between timed things so they can take it easy. That is to say, have missions that must be done ASAP, but also have moments in the story where the player can suitably fuck off to do whatever from an RP/story perspective.
>>344736812
depends on the videogame.
quest based games like monster hunter work fine
>>344736812
Deus ex isn't a big clock on screen. Sarif constantly tells you something bad could or is about to happen if you keep just wondering around. When it does you don't fail, the hostages are just dead
>>344737012
well you can implement merchants smiths and shit, just buy material from players and craft swords and sell equipment to other players so he doesn't have to grind
Dude. Nigger.
All oblivion quests were interesting af. Like the one where you explore a mysterious village where everyone is invisible. Or the one where you have to kill people in a house discreetly and get them to kill each other.
ect ect
make something like the quest in fallout 2 new reno where you had to find out who sold the drugs to the wrights son
>>344737096
Did they do that? I remember dicking around a long time and none of the hostages died.
>>344737150
I wasn't thinking of MMOs, and in MMOs what you describe will require grinding for money from the players anyway.
>>344737248
Yes.
I still don't understand how everyone misunderstood op
>>344731391
You make the quest interesting/memorable/engaging and important.
Doesn't matter what it is when you break it down to it's core, what matters is how invested you can get a player into it.
A poor example of fetch quests is MMOs, there is zero emotional investment and nothing is retained anyways.
A good example is having a fetch quest with multiple outcomes and have it play out different ways depending on what you do.
>>344737239
2hard indie devs can't do something of such scale, that requires good writing.
>>344737269
well you can do it in sp games as well? take a loan from kikes and do the same shit if it ever were like that
>>344737340
We did, it came to the conclusion to 1, don't hand hold and 2, give an interesting story that could potentially be main quests themselves.
We want to play role playing games, not job simulators.
>>344737503
Both of those points still lend to a fetch quest.
>>344737487
Won't that just remove all difficulty as well? The idea isn't to let the player skip the grind, but to work the game into a model that discourages grind and encourages more "healthy" game practices.
>>344737529
There is nothing inherently wrong with fetch and kill quests. What's wrong is how they're being presented. They're tedious.
>>344737529
So what is your idea?
>>344731391
ESO has an entire game built around it
>>344737630
I already said it, if you make the quest designed around the thing in querstion having some sort of mode of activation or triggered event; it's much more enjoyable.
>>344737487
well who's gonna buy a shitty forged sword, you still have to be a good smith and train smithing, and when you've done enough you'll eventually move up and craft shit for kings and shit
>>344737398
then they shouldnt be making a game that includes quests with a narrative. they should make a rogue lite or whatever. aimless gameplay always pleases but dont half ass some quests
>>344737612
>>344737725
answered myself accidentally lol
>>344731391
Can I get sauce on this gif
>>344737725
Isn't that just grinding smithing
>>344731391
You add an actually decent writing to it and reasonable motivation? Every quest is "got to X do Y", or we can go even further and just say "do Z".
It's pretty fucking stupid to complain about how live is.
>>344737872
Making a good rogue is hard too though. Like, it seems nobody makes it right.
DCSS is the closest one, and it still irks me a bit.
>>344737963
well yeah but its an rpg dude, how do you expect to get good with something if you don't put in time? thats the problem with rpgs being casualized, you get rewarded too much and too easily and the game dies in like a month
>>344732428
This for real
>>344736556
God damn runescape quests are amazing.
Although usually they require like 7 different inventories full of items.
>>344731391
Murder Mystery, never goes wrong, usually fun.
>>344731391
You can start by getting rid of the quest menus and UI, and removing 'quests' altogether. Remove the checkboxes and everything, just have stuff that players want to do.
Fallout did great by having computer terminals everywhere that were completely optional. You didn't have to go out and read them or even interact with them for the most part unless it was a 'main quest'. They were just there and they did cool stuff like deactivate traps/auto-turrets, or unlock doors to make things easier, or you can learn about the history of the world before the war. They aren't explicit quests, but you're always on the lookout for them. You don't have to fetch them or interact with them if you don't want to. You're not forced to accomplish a quest objective by looking for all of them.
Let the player decide their own goals based on what you've provided in your game. Make them want to play. Don't force them to play.
It's not about removing fetch quests or the basic clear this area formula. It's about making it feel like they aren't chores. The difference between chores and good quests are that chores are not fun. Good 'quests' are fun. Trying to box the player into generic and repetitive quests are not different from forcing them to do chores.
>>344738854
you're trying to remove quests altogether.
>>344734845
You can actually make it better if depending the player actions and random factors that are out of player's control could get a Y result instead of X
>>344738991
I'm trying to remove this rigid idea of what quests should be. I'm not removing anything. The quests are still there, but you're not treating the player like they're a pre-schooler.
Just because you give the player a 'quest' doesn't mean you need to alert them on their twitter. If the player walks through a town and listens to two NPCs talk about how monsters were occasionally raiding the village at night and stealing fish from the docks, that's all you need to give them.
You don't need to alert them on twitter and tell them:
"Something Smells Fishy Quest has been activated"
"Quest objective added to your journal!"
"Look for more clues."
You don't need any more clues. Just by the conversation you know the monsters appear at night and steal fish from the docks. The player already knows to ask for more information from the NPCs or to just go wait by the docks until nightfall. They don't need a quest marker and a trail that leads right to the objective. The docks are by the water, and the town is only so big, just look for where the fisherman and fish are. You don't need to hold their hand and patronize them. You don't need to tell them they received a quest.
It all depends on the number of hoops you have to jump through to complete the simple objectives. Take Dying Light, for example: a simple fetch quest could require you to bypass security systems, evade crowds of zombies, and search through a dark building.
It's not the objective. It's the obstacles between the player and the objective that make good encounter design.
(Oh, and good AI helps. You can get away with even simple mobkilling if your AI is primo.)
Oblivion sidequests
Witcher 3, blood and wine's quest about the 5 virtues a knight must uphold
There's no real "go here do this" thing in the quest, it's all about how you act in other quests. You need to show generosity, honor, compassion, valor, and wisdom
You can fail or succeed this part before you even start the quest
While it sort of ends up as a "kill this" thing after, as you need to defeat the hermit to get aerondight but it's just a boss fight at the end of the quest, it's not really the main part of it
>>344733761
You are completely retarded. By your logic everything is fetching. If the quest was some fantastic whodunnit where you have to solve a killing, you'd just say "you're fetching evidence and fetching suspects and fetching a murderer lel."
>>344741151
Fetch quests are quests where the player must commit to the acquisition of items, locations or people.
A game should not reward you for fetch quests, a quest should be, in theory, rewarding, fun and enjoyable. Most things are fetch quests, especially in RPG's. If you try and design a game without a fetch quest, the core design of the quest is changed dramatically, see any game by Blizzard or id Software.
If you look at Breath of the Wild, the gameplay is taking liberties to give the player more room for management, instead of having him fetch everything. If you play Star Wars: TFU, the objectives clearly state and have you play through them, the tasks which you're setting out to do. A quest becomes a seme, a mode of meaning and metrical understanding instead of the actual sociological element of conquest. To the modern gamer, a "quest" is a small event to gain experience, when it should be a mode of adventure.
Look at Witcher 3 quests for examples.
>>344741859
Actually, this. The main/secondary quests in that are for the most part very well written and typically don't feel like "go here kill thing/collect thing" even though they technically are that.
>>344731391
Many things become clear by a rephrase:
>How do you make a good traditional quest without it becoming a fetch-quest or a "go kill mobs" quest?
So you want a traditional quest without getting an item for someone or killing monsters?
Both of those actions subtract; you're taking something or you're reducing a population. So the answer is simple:
Add.
Make a quest where you go and rebuild a town.
Make a quest where you breed monsters.
>>344742148
No, what I meant was where the aim of the quest isn't purely finding an item or purely killing monsters
>>344741859
Most of the witcher 3's quests are fetch or go kill quests.
What made many of them good was the writing put into the quests. The bloody baron was one giant series of fetch quests but the plot for them was interesting, hearts of stone was fulfilling 3 fetch quests that were each filled with their own "go here do this" yet the writing and characters made them worth playing
Fetch quests aren't bad, in the end most quests in any game can be boiled down to one, it's the context of what's going on in the quest that makes them great and the witcher manages to make even the basic contracts have some interesting thing going on to make you want to do them
>>344742214
My problem is that real life doesn't work that way. Someone doesn't ask you to do something and make a quest out of it. People send you on assignments to complete out of necessary evils of our human confines, in space and time. In a video game, you're not limited by those things nearly as much, you should be able to give the player a much more rewarding and fulfilling experience based on good game design.
If you think of a "quest" in the archaic way, you're always going to end up with the same design formula because a "quest" isn't a "quest" anymore, it's just a gate for content.
>>344733287
>doing NG+
>oh shit i don't want to give up this wyrm king ring
>make a forgery of it before the quest to be sure
>"WE NEED THE RING! ALSO, GRATS ON FINDING THE RING!"
>give forgery
This boring ass section of the game that I'll never have to worry about. It's great.
>>344742214
You can't.
Things are what they are.
How would you make a class that isn't a dps, healer, or tank? Anything you could come up with could eventually be reduced to one of those roles.
And so it is the same with quests.
Adding to the beginning and end of a quest doesn't change the base objective.
>>344731391
>Create a quest with a seemingly simple objective
>Begin to introduce interesting character who complicate the quest
>Add multiple choices and solutions
Done.
>>344731856
Have you played RPG's? There are loads of quests where the ending resolution is that somebody is disgraced, empowered or arrested etc when the original objective was completely different.
Look at the Cannibal quest in New Vegas.
>>344742815
Yes there's story, but it's what the gameplay boils down to
>>344742690
>the woods have become restless. sort this out!
>kill all the monsters
>shoo them out with smoke, scary noises, natural predators that happen to quiet
>burn down the woods
>build a sound wall
I can dig it but you need some Metal Gear Solid levels of writing and TECHNOLOGY to pull it off or you end up with DSP wondering why he can't just kill everyone in the village. They can't hear shit anymore so it's the same difference, right? HUH HUH
>>344731391
By making it interesting, see: Witcher 3
>>344742918
Every quest can boil down to "go here do this" because a quest literally means "a long or arduous search for something"
Quests should have narrative arcs to them and logical progression. "Fetch x" and "kill x" quests are shit because they are arbitrary and detached from any part of the game. Why does the player accept this quest? Why does the player fulfill the quest? What does the player do during the quest, and why? Take for example, a generic "kill 10 rats" quest from a generic city guard. The player accepts the quest because he sees a quest marker. He fulfills the quest because he will gain XP. He kills 10 rats because the guard told him that's what he has to do. This isn't fun. It isn't exciting. It's just another menial task of chores to do because someone told him to do. There's no narrative arc to the quest. What's so important about 10 rats? Why does the player who's probably on a much more important quest go and kill 10 unimportant rats? Does killing these 10 rats even help anyone at all?
Or take an uninspired fetch quest. Maybe some random peasant NPC had his item stolen by bandits and he wants you to go kill some bandits and retrieve it. Again this is arbitrary and illogical. A much better version would be a friend of yours had their item stolen. He asks you to retrieve it in exchange for a favor. After some investigation you discover some bandits stole the item and are trying to sell it. You inform your friend and the two of you arrange a meeting for a trade. Now you introduce dialogue elements whereby it can either end with you paying back for the item, convincing the bandits to give it back for free, or deciding to take it back by force. This alternative quest line is much more involving and immersive. First there is incentive for the player to get involved because it's for a friend rather than generic NPC. The players reward is more than just XP but a potential favor that could come in handy later. It's broken into stages to present a more cohesive and logical progression rather than being reduced to a lackey. Finally the player has choice to determine the outcome.
>>344743058
the bank quest in Blood and Wine was my favorite part of that expansion. It was decently long, had multiple ways to do it, and was fairly entertaining.
>>344743108
I should add that fetch x quests and kill x quests are a sort of necessary evil to balance the adventure. If every quest you encountered was a grand narrative then that could end up becoming monotonous as well. Players need a mindless activity to do every once in a while, and those kind of quests fit the bill. That's why a lot of RPGs have a gambling minigame that is based purely on random luck.
>>344738854
>>344739747
This. Quests should be natural and represent both a player awareness of the world around him, and a world that properly responds to a player's action. That's how you create a true sense of adventure. The only problem with this is if a player gets distracted or stops playing the game for a long time. The player can then lose track of their progression in various "quests". This can be solved by having a journal that keeps information at a generic level, not tied to any specific quest, but this would require the player to read, and we all know players hate reading.
>>344731391
What the hell is this guy looking at?
>>344743952
Do you really want to know?a delicious femalecock
things that make quests good:
>an actual subplot
>npc interaction
>with interesting characters
>choices
>sense of progression
>interesting rewards
>exploring interesting places
>not giving you all the information right away
>big questlines composed of many subquests that occur over the game
>BONUS: it ties into or somehow effects the main quest
>BONUS: it's optional but it clears up some plot point
things that make quests bad:
>having to come back after you're done for no apparent reason other than to collect a reward
>having to collect rng items and not being able to run it beside other quests or just handing over the items right away if you have them beforehand
>arrows telling you where to go
The question isn't what kind of quest you could make besides fetch this or kill that, it's how well you mask it. 99.9% of all quests in RPGs can be trivialized into fetch or kill quests. With varied (good) writing and progression you could make a fucking adventure out of fetching the groceries.
>>344731391
>How do you make a good traditional quest without it becoming a fetch-quest or a "go kill mobs" quest?
Exploration.
That said nothing wrong with "go kill mobs" quests as long as the gameplay is fun. DMC3, 4 and Bayonetta are proof of this.
>>344743952
>>>/gif/8892327
I wonder if I did that right?
>>344731792
The romeo and juliet quest in runescape where there's a plot twist and he ends up with her cousin
>>344735957
fallout does this well desu, too bad enemies are bullet sponges anywhere past fallout 2
>>344736065
Did Fallout 1/2 have groin as a selectable target?
All I remember is that I always aimed for the eyeswith a super sledge
>>344744137
but that's a penis!?
>>344731391
story doesn't negate the possibility (more like probability) that it will be done by going here and killing this or going there and delivering that
make it a puzzle that requires thought
make it a fresh, unique encounter instead of a normally encountered enemy
>>344744149
Runescape had some pretty good quests, much more funny dialogue than most people remember.
>Hey this room I'm making you is pretty nice can I sleep here?
>You're an adventurer you don't need sleep, or most bodily functions for that matter
>>344735752
>How do you eliminate the desire or capacity to grind from players without trivializing the game's difficulty and or making fights seem pointless?
guild wars 1
>>344744137
Doesn't sound like I imagined him.
>>344731391
Make the default a "go kill this guy" quest and then just put him in a place with mobs.
Though I mean honestly, if the combat is fun and the quests have a decent amount of interesting context then it doesn't actually matter what the quest can be boiled down to.
>>344735752
Get rid of traditional experience-based levelling mechanics.
It's a shit system anyway.
Remember the only good quest in all of Fallout 4?
It was a fetch quest, but you liked it because it was neato and funny. You wanted to see what happens when you give that robot parts to fly his ship away.
>>344744137
Yes you did anon, did you felt like you were doing a fetch quest?
I think not, thats the context that makes you think that you are not making a fetch quest.
>>344733169
If you want to stretch the definition a little, sure. But the thing is, the information you gather is done through dialogue or character interaction and is often more relevant to you, the player, rather than some fictional schlub who just wants his thing back.
I guess any quest is a fetch quest because you're 'fetching' victory or some shit, huh?
>>344732920
>you can't
>>344732920
>tfw you can
>>344732920
Have this, use it as example.
>>344731391
OHHH MYYY
>>344731391
More versatile gameplay mechanics. It can't be just combat and press whatever to pick up item.
>>344731391
Doesn't matter, reductive retards are always gonna boil things they want to hate down to their most base elements just to shit on them.
>>344731391
instead of making it a short quest that is done in minutes, make it a bigger campaign
like the quest involves going to some cave and killing a dragon, which means travelling a long way there and finding your way through the cave, and while you do that you have to face tons of other enemies and some story development happens
you are introduced to characters etc.
basically like an actual game, not like an MMO
>>344731391
With good writing you can make fetch quests and killing mobs fun and unique.
>"Goblins are attacking this village. Drink this and go kill them all"
>kill all the goblins
>turns out your employer drugged you and you actually murdered all the villagers
>ordered to assassinate someone
>have to sneak into his bedroom and replace his medicine with poison
>have to kill a guy in his own home
>you get a bonus reward if you sneak into the crawlspace and drop his trophy head on him
>"if you fetch me these magical artifacts from dungeons around the world i'll pay you"
>get all of them
>he betrays you
>you can pick one of two rewards
>go sneak into this party and use this spell to strip everyone including yourself
>afterwards you have to run back to the quest giver without all your gear
>"do all this shit to convince this small village that the world is ending"
>>344731391
break the norms
>>344731391
Whoah. Its strange to think of games as bits and bytes, strings of 0s and 1s... dang this weed is strong, im feeling the buzz well and true alright.
>>344731391
Puzzles.
