Quest Fatigue

[Azazel]

That and the random loot generator on instance for 5 man, 10 man, and more. I just hate admitting that I ran the said instance 20-30 times just for the sake of rep grind or shiny, but that's all is there to it. On the developer's perspective if every single run guarantees a reward to every class, then they'll have problems trying to churn out content. I just ran Mechanar twice today, the healer didn't get his mace nor boots, the tank didn't get his sword, and I didnt' get my cloak. 2 hours in total killing the same thing, running the same place, fighting the same boss. The warlock said, 'oh well it wasn't a total loss, we got rep' and the mage quit in disgust after muttering 'i'm fukin exalted'

That's why I liked EQ1's system of AA points. Some here hate them, because they feel theyd need to grind exp to keep up with their uberguilds, but I always liked always having some way I could improve my toon at max level. It gave you a reason to play your character besides grinding faction or raiding.

[Rithrin]

But then maxing out your AA points becomes the next max level, even though its not a level per se. Kind of like DAoC's "master levels"... it wasn't lvl 51, 52, etc, but it might as well have been. Instead of "LFM 60 only!" it becomes "LFM 60 500 AA points only!". Except you'd be in a guild at that point and not be lfg, but you see my point I'd hope.

I liked the AA points, though, because it gave variation between me and the next lvl 60 of the same class.

[Venkman]

Right it's the players fault for not liking the game. How silly of us.

Maybe, after 3 years of experience, some people have come to the conclusion that even easy DIKU is still PITA grind and BS cockblock mechanics?

That's after 3 years (or 8 in my case, or 100 in others) of paying a monthly fee. That's a crapload of money to the devs and publishers. People can bitch about something eventually, but if they gladly continued paying while they were achieving this self-actualization, then DIKU is a good business model.

Here's what I think a lot of people bitching about DIKU (not here, but in general) really want: For it to come:

• From someone as competent (which means as much resources) as Blizzard, so the game has a chance of "teaching those guys some manners", or the same such bullshit from SOE-dominant days.
• With an IP they give a shit about.
• With as much press coverage to validate their time investment ("hey, everyone is doing it!")

Basically, more of the same but from someone else. If people truly wanted something else, they'd be off exploring the rafts of alternatives out there instead of bitching about yellow exclamations vs blue. It's not bad to want more DIKU. It's just silly to not realize it.

Quests are only spoiled by fansites if you choose to frequent those sites for answers. If you want a deeper, more challenging gaming experience, just avoid the shortcuts.

One problem is that many quests aren't really "challenging" anyway - it's just a question of how long you have to run around randomly before you manage to find the quest-item/quest-NPC. I look up every single one of those quests on spoiler sites.

Both are real problems, perpetuated by the static nature of the games and the quantity of quests. Most quests are XP grinds wrapped in text, because it's very hard to design thousands of equally compelling quests. Some are worth the storyline. Most are forgettable new-zone-new-KillXCollectY. And all of this is based on the descension of new MMOs to basic CRPGs with occasional group requirements. Raiding is still niche comparatively, perfect for veteran Achievers and those who didn't realize they were but just as alienating and cockblocking as it was back in the day. I don't care how easy it has become compared to EQ1. It's still the same ass content over and over and over and over for the one shred of chance of continuing to "grow" a character when the levels stop. That is not universally appealing.

[Merusk]

I never said what you said I said.

[Venkman]

Fixed. I only ever read the first letter of names ;)

[Tale]

If in a persistent world I am a citizen of a player city that can be damaged by the successful co-ordinated efforts of other players, and such damage irreversibly hurts my side and helps theirs, and player cities lead to wondrous opportunities, and I can conspire to defend my city and attack theirs, and defence and attack benefit from long-term preparation, there is no quest fatigue, only care factor. If it's personal, I think care factor is easier to maintain than if it's all lore and levels.

[Tebonas]

The question is how irreversibly it hurts your side. The care factor all too easily turns into frustration if there is no escape from the situation. And if there is a reset at some time, the persistent aspect of the world is lost. Is a difficult balancing act.

[Tale]

Irreversibly doesn't have to mean "cannot be rebuilt". But it does have to mean "losing something permanently". Generally that's a currency, whether in the form of cash or points earned with a faction. And for it to hurt, things have to be preposterously expensive and remain so.

Sorry. This is me missing SWG.

Most of that game's player cities were crap. There were also player cities entirely owned and run by a person with multiple accounts. Ultimately they were irrelevant and if they put up defences, they were soft targets for the amusement of major cities. The action was around the successful player cities that created a community of players who lived, crafted, defended and based themselves in the city.

Expensive imperial or rebel bases were earned with community faction points and placed in grid formations. Day-to-day gameplay, hanging out and even roleplaying happened around them. The inhabitants defended their creations to preserve the layout of their cities. There was a lot of community effort lost when a base was destroyed, which is what I mean by irreversible. The penalty was not enough IMHO and the bases were dysfunctional like most of SWG, but it still hurt. The community could replace it, but it did not change the fact that the community took a hit.

[Simond]

So you want EVE, then? :)

[Raguel]

I haven't read everything, but I know I'm sick of DIKUs. The perfect mmo for me, if the designers had the talent and money to match their promises, would have been Seed.  I haven't tried many other games because they don't sound all that interesting. I have yet to see a crafting system I like and I don't want to spend my game time avoiding floating penises. :P

[Venkman]

If in a persistent world I am a citizen of a player city that can be damaged by the successful co-ordinated efforts of other players, and such damage irreversibly hurts my side and helps theirs, and player cities lead to wondrous opportunities, and I can conspire to defend my city and attack theirs, and defence and attack benefit from long-term preparation, there is no quest fatigue, only care factor. If it's personal, I think care factor is easier to maintain than if it's all lore and levels.

Shadowbane.

I wish SWG had anywhere near that level of immersion for PvP (it made up for having immersion in lots of other areas of course). At the same time, I've also argued most normal gamers would hate building up to something so big only to watch it get destroyed. I've long felt that SB even done well was not going to be anything more than niche. Niche can be good (see: Eve) unless you were SOE and wanting one of biggest licenses going (see: NGE).

[LK]

If in a persistent world I am a citizen of a player city that can be damaged by the successful co-ordinated efforts of other players, and such damage irreversibly hurts my side and helps theirs, and player cities lead to wondrous opportunities, and I can conspire to defend my city and attack theirs, and defence and attack benefit from long-term preparation, there is no quest fatigue, only care factor. If it's personal, I think care factor is easier to maintain than if it's all lore and levels.

Shadowbane.

I wish SWG had anywhere near that level of immersion for PvP (it made up for having immersion in lots of other areas of course). At the same time, I've also argued most normal gamers would hate building up to something so big only to watch it get destroyed. I've long felt that SB even done well was not going to be anything more than niche. Niche can be good (see: Eve) unless you were SOE and wanting one of biggest licenses going (see: NGE).

Guess that's why being able to save your game anywhere is such a popular thing in non-MMOs.  Imagine if you had to start over at the very beginning everytime you died? Works best for fast arcade games, extremely insane for any normal console game being developed, and bat-shit insane if you tried to apply that to an MMO where you can spend thousands of hours in the game.

[SnakeCharmer]

Irreversibly doesn't have to mean "cannot be rebuilt". But it does have to mean "losing something permanently". Generally that's a currency, whether in the form of cash or points earned with a faction. And for it to hurt, things have to be preposterously expensive and remain so.

Sorry. This is me missing SWG.

Most of that game's player cities were crap. There were also player cities entirely owned and run by a person with multiple accounts. Ultimately they were irrelevant and if they put up defences, they were soft targets for the amusement of major cities. The action was around the successful player cities that created a community of players who lived, crafted, defended and based themselves in the city.

Expensive imperial or rebel bases were earned with community faction points and placed in grid formations. Day-to-day gameplay, hanging out and even roleplaying happened around them. The inhabitants defended their creations to preserve the layout of their cities. There was a lot of community effort lost when a base was destroyed, which is what I mean by irreversible. The penalty was not enough IMHO and the bases were dysfunctional like most of SWG, but it still hurt. The community could replace it, but it did not change the fact that the community took a hit.

There was alot of bragging rights involved in early SWG bases defense/attack.  There was a base in an Imperial city that stood for over 6 months of relentless onslaughts, and a base in a Rebel city that withstood over one year of continual attacks.  The results of said attacks/defenses spilled out in cantinas, starports, and quite a bit on the forums.  The Rebel base that stood for over a year finally fell due to a combination of a years worth of defense 'stress' and some creative distractions.  We had 200+ player battles over those bases.  The infamous "Battle of Senia" initially had over 300 people involved.  It lasted for nearly 4 hrs and eventually crashed the server it got so big (500+). 

The sight of seeing 200 players (plus pets - whether creatures or ATST's) marching towards the city is something I'll likely never see again.

Good, good times.

[pxib]

Nice thread, guys.

Reading between the lines it sounds to me like what WoW did wrong in TBC was they made the quests too attractive in terms of rewards. Once players realized that quests provided equipment wildly superior to world drops (and even many instance drops) they felt like if they weren't doing quests they were wasting time. So instead of popping online and thinking "what should I do tonight?" they popped on line and looked at quest lists in order to get the most bang for their proverbial buck.

That's what made fun into work. Choosing to do quests because you feel like questing is going to be fun... so is choosing to grind or to go to the battlegrounds or just to sit around talking to the guild. Choosing to do something specifically because it's giving you economic rewards? That's a job.

What's Raph's bit about player's seeing through the fiction? Unless there are similar rewards (and other character progression) possible from every available player choice, players will pick whichever activity gives them the biggest payoff... whether they enjoy it or not. If they don't enjoy it (even if... heck, ESPECIALLY if there are other activities they would enjoy) they'll say the game sucks. Don't make your players do things they don't want to do.

[Wasted]

I describe myself as a compulsive quester, I need to know that I have discovered all the 'secrets' and lore of an area and before I can move on to the next.  I think I learnt that from playing lots of single player RPG's where travelling through the storyline and completing the quests was the purpose of the game rather than reaching max level and having epic gear.

I still found myself at lvl 69 in WoW deciding to find a nice grinding spot to get my last level rather than go through any more quests for a while.

[Venkman]

I don't think TBC introduced this. I existed entirely on quest rewards until my 50s, and then only started getting instance drops along the way to solving quests or helping others do theirs. I never understood why people would farm Scarlet Monastary or other places. Why spent time trying to get uber crap you'd outgrow quicker if you just went off and quested to level.

It's still "work" whether you farm mobs or farm quests. But the quests in WoW and anywhere else with good tracking makes for a good directed-play experience. It allows for much more efficient play for the time compressed. People log in and have a task list waiting, in addition to other goodies like NPCs which direct players to new settlements, quest-NPC notification icons (everyone does this now), and so on.

Now, if the games would let people play with such things turned off, that would stroke the Explorer-types. But I suspect there just aren't that many who'd bother using that option. We only didn't use it in EQ1 and UO because it didn't exist :P

[Wasted]

Doesnt EQ2 allow you to turn off combat experience?

Quests ceartainly help to point out the majority of the content available, part of the reason I generally find myself doing them because I hate the idea that I am missing stuff.  I cant put my finger exactly on the reason why I got so sick of them by the time I was in my late 60's in WoW other than there was just a point where they seemed to be adding tedium rather than hiding it.

[Azazel]

Nice thread, guys.

Reading between the lines it sounds to me like what WoW did wrong in TBC was they made the quests too attractive in terms of rewards. Once players realized that quests provided equipment wildly superior to world drops (and even many instance drops) they felt like if they weren't doing quests they were wasting time. So instead of popping online and thinking "what should I do tonight?" they popped on line and looked at quest lists in order to get the most bang for their proverbial buck.

Well, not really. I haven't yet done much in terms of instances, but I've found that many of the quest rewards I'm getting in Netherstorm are inferior to stuff I've picked up in instances, and often inferior to AH/dropped greens "of the Bandit". At the same time, since I'm 70 and wanting to get 5k together for my fast flying mount, all quests are worthwhile in that they tend to give 10-15 gold plus an item I can't/won't use that sells for an additional 3-9 gold.

The initial quest rewards were great. The Hellfire and some of Zangarmarsh were great upgrading all the pre-BC stuff, then as you level and travel there were a series of small incremental improvements, with some sidegrades, and now it's almost entirely sidegrades. And honestly, none of the socketed stuff I've seen seems worthwhile.

I think the problem for me at least in BC is that once I hit that point of "work hard for a microscopic upgrade or sidegrade" hits, that'll be it. I can't justify that kind of time (to myself) wasted on essentially nothing. It's like.. farming MC or Naxx or whatever for endless weeks on end. Only probably less interesting.

[Quinton]

I'm surprised you mentioned FFXI as one of the games that did questing poorly.  I actually though they made the quests that they did do very high quality and they all seemed epic with a nice cut-scene inbetween main segments.

The problem with them is that there were far too few and they didn't award enough exp and items.  You HAD to do them though, or you wouldn't be able to progress through the game.  Of course, as you mentioned, the rest of the game was based on a huge grind....huge.

I'd like to see more of the elements that FFXI had for quests (missions) and put more of the WoW aspects into it from a full gameplay perspective.  They need to be more than just tollgates through the game.

Very few FFXI quests have any XP rewards (though those that do tend to be repeatable weekly).  A number of the higher end spells (the WHM teleport spells, Sleep II, etc) come from quests and they are pretty nice rewards.

The Chains of Promathia expansion missions were largely hated by people as being difficult and having "no rewards", which was total cracksmoking.  Yes, they were difficult (which certainly made it feel like an accomplishment to finish them), but the rewards were great -- access to whole new contintents, new higher end content at the end, etc.  The mission storyline was nicely epic and tied into the world stroyline all the way back to the original opening movie for the original game.  Really great storytelling.

Leveling in FFXI is grindy (though they've done a lot over the last year plus to take the edge off of the grind), but for me, at least for the second half (50-75ish) it was serving the goal of being powerful enough to pull my weight in this crazy hard mission quest sequence which I did with a group of friends -- typically saturday mornings.  I had a great time and really felt like I was accomplishing something.

That said, I would love to see this stuff somehow impact the gameworld, if there's some reasonable way to do that...

FFXI has a lot of problems, but of all the MMOs I've played it's the only one to keep me engaged for more than a month or two
(probably about 2 years of playing it, with a few months downtime in the middle).

- Q

[LK]

Nice thread, guys.

Reading between the lines it sounds to me like what WoW did wrong in TBC was they made the quests too attractive in terms of rewards. Once players realized that quests provided equipment wildly superior to world drops (and even many instance drops) they felt like if they weren't doing quests they were wasting time. So instead of popping online and thinking "what should I do tonight?" they popped on line and looked at quest lists in order to get the most bang for their proverbial buck.

Well, not really. I haven't yet done much in terms of instances, but I've found that many of the quest rewards I'm getting in Netherstorm are inferior to stuff I've picked up in instances, and often inferior to AH/dropped greens "of the Bandit". At the same time, since I'm 70 and wanting to get 5k together for my fast flying mount, all quests are worthwhile in that they tend to give 10-15 gold plus an item I can't/won't use that sells for an additional 3-9 gold.

The initial quest rewards were great. The Hellfire and some of Zangarmarsh were great upgrading all the pre-BC stuff, then as you level and travel there were a series of small incremental improvements, with some sidegrades, and now it's almost entirely sidegrades. And honestly, none of the socketed stuff I've seen seems worthwhile.

I think the problem for me at least in BC is that once I hit that point of "work hard for a microscopic upgrade or sidegrade" hits, that'll be it. I can't justify that kind of time (to myself) wasted on essentially nothing. It's like.. farming MC or Naxx or whatever for endless weeks on end. Only probably less interesting.

I'm hitting that now as I play.  As you do a couple dungeon runs and get some blues, the quest rewards you get in the upper 60's turn into funding your epic mount.  At Lv. 70, it rains gold, because the experience to gold mechanic kicks in.  But we're doing Karazhan and I'm finding that the only difference between the blues I got on right now and the purples that are dropping are a couple stat points or changing the focus of the equipment from Crit to Hit or AP.

Oh, and sockets are awesome (even I can't tell if that's sarcastic).  The thing is you have to get gems that make it worthwhile.

[Azazel]

I was being serious about the sockets actually . Maybe it's because I'm not in Kharazan, etc, but what I've seen is basically stuff that's pretty much a very incremental upgrade to greens, and even that's only after they've been socketed with good gems.

[Ironwood]

Yeah, it's a shame.  The sockets stuff is a trivial bonus at the moment and not the interesting thing I was expecting.

[Xanthippe]

Yeah, it's a shame.  The sockets stuff is a trivial bonus at the moment and not the interesting thing I was expecting.

Too bad there isn't a horadic cube.   

[WayAbvPar]

Yeah, it's a shame.  The sockets stuff is a trivial bonus at the moment and not the interesting thing I was expecting.

Too bad there isn't a horadic cube.   

Damn, that would rule.

[Rasix]

Yeah, it's a shame.  The sockets stuff is a trivial bonus at the moment and not the interesting thing I was expecting.

Socketable gear is the only thing that's really an obvious upgrade to me at this point. I'm mostly in quest gear (some from instances), AH blues and some instance gear (it's funny, most of my instance gear is off spec).   The quality of quest gear (there's some really high AC pieces for a feral), the quality of some BoE drops, and the underwhelming quality of instance drops (not counting heroics) makes upgrading a piece of gear an exercise in scrying.

I mean hell, one of the major tools I use for upgrading my gear is a spreadsheet some guy put together to compare gear for bear tanking, cat sustained dps, and cat burst dps.  Otherwise, how the fuck am I supposed to weigh 50 armor v. 10 stamina v. 12 dodge or 6 agility? Because that's all you get.  Points shuffled around.  At least when i'm given sockets I can push the stats in a direction I want.  I can throw on an 8 defense gem or 9 stam gem.  Hell, if the socket bonus sucks you can just push a single stat if you want.  BTW, up yours Blizzard for making the 12 stam gem recipe so goddamn rare.

The thing that's pissing me off about TBC quests are all of the 5 man quests with the very nice gear. No one does these anymore.  No one wants to help with these anymore.  Thus, those of us that leveled a second char to 70 aren't able to complete these.  SUCKS.  It's hard enough finding someone to complete a 2 man group quest without begging someone in guild chat.   The game just has a very strange social dynamic now.  No one wants to help others complete group quests even if they've got the same group quest (*crickets*), yet it's perfectly reasonable to send me a random tell while I'm in a PVP instance to go tank Shadow Labs.

[pxib]

You're still playing, and you're still paying, so Blizzard's still smiling.

[Rasix]

You're still playing, and you're still paying, so Blizzard's still smiling.

If my only reason for playing was frequent, sizeable increases to ePeen, I would have quit a month ago.  Alas, I still somehow enjoy the game.  Money still being well spent.

Edit: We're allowed to dislike portions of a game while still playing it.. right? 

[Nija]

"Here's our amazingly vast and open world!  It has a thousand places to visit!  Just remember that in 499 of them, the grey mobs will all die in one hit without giving you any challenge or benefit, while in 498 of them every bird and bug and boar will run over and murder you in one hit because they're boars with more levels.  Here's a list of the three places you can go.  Enjoy our expansive WOOOORLD!"

I'd play a Gothic3-inspired MMO game.

[tazelbain]

You're still playing, and you're still paying, so Blizzard's still smiling.

If my only reason for playing was frequent, sizeable increases to ePeen, I would have quit a month ago.  Alas, I still somehow enjoy the game.  Money still being well spent.

Edit: We're allowed to dislike portions of a game while still playing it.. right? 

Nope, you are a walking wallet. It's a binary situation.  Either your wallet is open or closed.

[ajax34i]

In truth, until the whole wallet wave-function collapses at the end of the billing cycle and he gets charged for one more month, he's a qubit: he could be cancelling and re-activating every 30 seconds just to spam them with good bye hate messages that some peon in some basement has to go through so that they can figure out how to increase retention.

[Calantus]

So I just hit 70 on my priest and I can now understand where some complaints are comping from. Lordy-lord but killing 30 of everything that moved in Nagrand was not really fun at all. I think the issue is that the grinding part of the quests comes so thick and fast that the grind is not hidden very well at all. It's like an XP production line where you just move along it and get your xp in measured doses at specific points, there's no real breaks like there was in the old world, just more "kill X of Y" every time you hit the quest hub. In a way it's a victim of its own success, Blizzard has refined the quest delivery so that you are always doing something, always fighting or searching. Now, this sounds good to me in theory, but I find I don't actually want to always be doing something in practice. When Linkin sent me to the other side of the world no less than 4 or 5 times I didn't really appreciate it, but I sure as hell would have appreciated a little of that halfway through Nagrand (but isn't it pretty though?).

I still say it's better than grinding. :P


EDIT: I said "real world" when I meant to say "old world". I'm hoping that isn't some kind of freudian slip.

[Nebu]

What you describe is the reason that a skill-based system is so attractive to me.  You select skills that engage you and you perfect (gain points) that skill by applying it. If someone could just develop an engaging game with a well-balanced skill system, I think we'd all be happy.   

Though like anything else, I'm sure even that would get old after a while.  Tough to find variety and balance with a good storyline these days.

[Merusk]

It seems most of the "Go to the other side of the planet" quests were reserved for the group-based quests.  For example, I did the "Buying Time" questline in Nagrand last night on my priest.  There was a bunch of running around in the middle of it that would have been tedious if I haddn't been grouped with a mage at the time.  I seem to recall a few others being the same way when I was doing with my wife when BC first came out.

There do need to be a few more 'rest' bits worked in.  The lack of/ ease of traveling around makes things really busy all the time, and is kind of burning me out.  Also, they didn't integrate pathing people into dungeons nearly as well as they did in the Pre-BC game.  I blew past Anurochdown and Coilfang dungeons before I realized, "Hey, I really want to go back and see those."   Yeah, they kind of lead you there, but they aren't the 'ending' of the zone story the way they were with VC:Westlands, the keep in Silverpine, the one in Deslolace, Scarlet Monestary, Scholo/ Strath in Plaguelands and BRD, L/UBRS for the Searing Gorge & Burning Steppes.  (Note I didn't mention Ulda, Gnomer and several others.. which coincidently were also underplayed.)

[Calantus]

Also, they didn't integrate pathing people into dungeons nearly as well as they did in the Pre-BC game.  I blew past Anurochdown and Coilfang dungeons before I realized, "Hey, I really want to go back and see those."   Yeah, they kind of lead you there, but they aren't the 'ending' of the zone story the way they were with VC:Westlands, the keep in Silverpine, the one in Deslolace, Scarlet Monestary, Scholo/ Strath in Plaguelands and BRD, L/UBRS for the Searing Gorge & Burning Steppes.  (Note I didn't mention Ulda, Gnomer and several others.. which coincidently were also underplayed.)

That's a pretty interesting insight right there. I did Hellfire Ramparts & Blood Furnace and also did an Underbog. From what I can tell doing Hellfire Citadel is pretty common, less so for Coilfang, and the other 2 instances are pretty rarely done on the way up. If we look at Hellfire the main thrust of the zone leads into that instance. Zangarmarsh leads you to Coilfang but then kinda drops it with most of the quests coming from the Sporeggar, all of which are totally irrelevant to the naga problem. Terekkor leads you around Auchindoun and has you do some related quests but there's no main thrust leading into the instance, I got a couple of quests saying to go there but nothing that screamed "this finishes off the zone". Tempest Keep is kinda tacked onto the side of Netherstorm and I'm not even sure I've seen a quest to go there.

[Rasix]

It seems most of the "Go to the other side of the planet" quests were reserved for the group-based quests.  For example, I did the "Buying Time" questline in Nagrand last night on my priest.  There was a bunch of running around in the middle of it that would have been tedious if I haddn't been grouped with a mage at the time.  I seem to recall a few others being the same way when I was doing with my wife when BC first came out.

Buying time takes like 45 minutes (this is assuming folks have their epic ground mount by now).  Not too bad for a fairly long quest line.  All of the parts of the quest are in zones connected directly to Shattrath or right near Altruis.  Only real pain in the ass part of it is the guy in bone wastes, where you have to run through a bunch of aggro mobs (that place is too tightly packed).   Of course, I've done this quest so many times for guidies it's become mechanical for me. 

Blades Edge, Netherstorm (god I hate this zone), Shadowmoon Valley and Nagrand do have a decent number of quests with stupidly long travel times built in.  I'm just thankful that flight paths seem to be a lot zippier in Outland.

Tempest Keep is kinda tacked onto the side of Netherstorm and I'm not even sure I've seen a quest to go there.

There's a quest that originates in the ghost village that ends up there.  A few others go there that I've seen but they didn't originate in Netherstorm.  Auchindoun is kind of grating.  It just seems like they threw it in there.  And does anything at all lead you to the Caverns of Time besides the Karazhan quest line?