Sorry that this is going to be a rather long post.
Trying to be original, even though it?s pretty close to impossible, I think I have come up with a way to build quests for the tree castle. The thought is if we go with a theme rather than free-flowing quests it will add color and dimension to the tree castle that can?t be matched in other areas.
All tree castle quests change your status in the tree castle community. Higher status means...
1, the ability to buy better equipment.
2, higher-quality freebies.
3, access to more of the tree castle.
4, better quests.
Tree Castle status may also help in other zones but hurt you in others. It is not good versus evil or law versus chaos but a natural versus nonnatural dichotomy. For instance a lumberjack who plants new trees will do well but a person that slashes and burns a forest won?t.
Quest 1 The seed and the sapling.
This is the one and only starter quests in the journey toward enlightenment. All others start with this one.
Find a tree Castle seed, a forest nut, a forest sapling and give it to the priest of growth. The priest will give you in return a tree with your name on it.
Now you have to journey to the plane outside the tree castle. There you must plant your tree. From then on if anybody inspects your tree they will see your name.
This tree represents your journey and is the basis for all quests from the tree castle. As you do more quests successfully your tree gets stronger, if you anger the forest or tree castle your tree gets weaker. And your tree can die. They don?t get smaller but they can get rotten.
Some quests ideas, I?m sure there is a lot more out there.
1: simple spell to locate your tree. If a lot of people of planted trees it?s important to be able to find yours.
2: a series of special mulch and fertilizers to make your tree stronger and larger.
3: a spell that get your tree to make something like a seed you eat to regenerate health etc.
4: a way to live in your tree. This is a big turning point in the relationship between you and the tree. It will probably wind up being the single biggest selling point on the whole quests series.
5: give your tree NPC intelligence, you get to talk to it. Lots of cool quests can be generated from this.
6: be able to teleport to and from your tree after it is your home. This requires you to find another tree to facilitate the transport. And then you cannot leave your home except to go back to the original teleport point.
7: allow others to enter your tree. You have to be very selective about who you let into your tree. Once you give permission you can?t take it back. The person inside your tree can destroy it or help it just like you. However some quests require that you do this.
This approach has several gaming advantages that make it relatively straightforward to implement.
1: since all tree?s pretty much look like the others, except age differences, you don?t have to develop a lot of new models. As time rolls on though it could be made more exotic.
2: if trees are not maintained they die. This will prevent the problem of having thousands of non-maintain trees. It also opens up the area for more planting by people who actually want a healthy tree. It also helps that a character is only allowed one tree.
3: this is a fairly straightforward way for a player to get a residence. Since the inside can be much larger than the tree diameter it can be expanded to be fairly roomy inside. Since the inside of every tree is exactly the same all you need is one floor plan. The floor plan is expanded by having a door appear on a wall which allows access to the next room. The same basic setup works for everybody. Since the furniture is really a part of the tree it doesn?t move either. However as the tree gets larger it has larger storage capacity. So you can put things into the tree and get them out later.
Not all quests directly apply to your tree. However completing any quest from the tree castle will improve the health of your tree. As I said before the health points of your tree is equal to the status you have in the tree castle. The size of your tree has nothing to do with the health points. It is dictated by a series of quests dedicated to your tree. So you could have a very large tree that is one point away from death. Not a very good combination considering if the tree dies you lose everything in it and have to start back from scratch.
A larger tree can store more health. If the tree has been fitted as a home the larger the tree the more rooms you can have. Higher-level quests are only available for people with really big trees.
However if you have a very large very healthy tree it will be some time before dies even if it?s totally neglected. A key aspect is if you spend a lot of time on your tree to make the reward worth the effort.
So this is my proposal for the quests structure in the tree castle. This took me a fair amount of time to come up with so I hope you like it. I think it fits with the tree Castle concept.
