A lot of the setting to the game is found on the main site but remember if you want to know more about the setting doing a few quests or talking to the npcs is the only way to find out more they can help you come up with more role play options then just going with what you see on the main site.
Is that 100% guaranteed to be part of the settings? I have heard rumors that NPC dialogues aren't necessarily part of the settings, anyway. Especially the Ojaveda "quarantine" doesn't actually sound like part of the settings, and more like well-meant but ends-up-confusing dragging of OOC into IC.
Edit: OK, thanks, Caarrie.
@ Options: A way to have "options" in a free-form dialog would be to not provide options as one knows them, but possibly an assortment of hints or hunches. These could possibly be auto-entered in the quest log for the quest they belong to.
It is a nicer form of the "diary" that other games commonly feature. An example:
You want to do a quest, but you don't know where to get one. You might start to poke random NPCs, as you do now. However, you might also have, in the quest notes, some "rumors" about stuff. Like "A guard in Hydlaa is missing his pet". These may be based on where you spend a lot of time, or the general vincinity to NPCs. Better results could come when the NPCs are actually being talked to.
Obviously, the best way at this stage of getting a quest would be if the NPCs could tell those rumors themselves, like "I don't have a job for you ATM, but I hear that some guard misses a pet.". This would allow you to narrow things down to quests that you might prefer at the time. Obviously you could narrow things down more easily by going to the guards in Hydlaa and asking "I hear someone of you is looking for his pet?", and the answers could point you to the right one much more natural than ATM. Plus, you could ask the NPC directly for that quest, instead of the general "can I help you?".
Assuming that you got a quest to retrieve a stolen Groffel from NPC Percy. You have been talking to Percy a bit, and he has been rambling on about this and that. Now is time for some hints. The quest log for "Percy's stolen Groffel" could include some hints (based on the ramblings of Percy you have heared):
Percy said that Arleena might have done something to it, because she hates Groffels.
Harnquist needs feathers for his swords and may have kidnapped it.
Sharven breeds Groffels for a hobby.
etc.
So you have some hints that you can look at if you want, and follow. It's more or less automating the log-review.
Now you could also have these "hunches". Under a separate tab, you could get, for example:
Ojaveda Outfitters might be a place to ask.
Hide merchants?
Magic shop?
Some of the "hunches" may lead nowhere.
Once you asked some NPC that is related to or part of the quest, the lists can grow. Especially the hunches can then have the "options" that are desired:
Ask Sharven about Groffel training?
Tell Sharven that you want to buy a Groffel?
etc.
IOW, you augment the dialog system by way of the quest log, rather than replacing it by an option-based one.
Quite obviously this would require some additional work. However, this seems to be much more feasible than a truly intuitive freeform system that also works with broken english.
Speaking of unfinished things. I am not sure if restricting access to areas is such a great idea, both right now and in the future. Especially now there is rather few content, so artificially restricting access to it means locking major parts of the game. It's similar to having access to glyph combos, but more elementary and more significant. It also makes less sense as, as has been stated, you can easily find a way into any area that is not watched like a fortress. Especially at nighttime, I think one could sneak in or fly in or dive in or climb in (the winch area itself may be fenced off, but certainly not the entire center hole).
To be honest, I'd much rather "make my own quest" like this than asking NPCs hoping they might give me permission (unlikely, even if only by accident).
Anyway, I think that it's too early to lock areas.
This brings me to the lockout-timer: this doesn't integrate seamlessly at all, and there isn't a real reason for it, anyway. Firstly, we all know that each and every task would
realistically be given only once or twice. Then we also know that we must treat every player equally, and therefore not only give the quest one time, to one character.
So a lockout timer tries to make for a sense of exclusiveness, but it doesn't do a really good job at it. If worse comes to worse, it even
emphasizes the mechanics instead of hiding them, because instead of a few people doing the same quest, you get a bunch of people at the same NPC, waiting. This problem will obviously lessen once the initial inrush is gone, but in this case I think the timer won't even be required anymore. In a way, this is the quest-equivalent of spawn-camping.
Quite obviously the same quest should be available to the same character only once (or at least based on some realism; I don't think one should be able to get the pet quest more than once, at all, while the rat infestation can be a frequent thing, even per character). However, different characters should not need to queue up for things that are otherwise designed as individual instances that can be paralellized arbitrarily.
IOW, it doesn't make sense to me: The game pretends that I am the only one to ever get that quest. However, I know that I am not, and others may even RP that quest, and then there will be "Oh, I'm doing the same thing!" (Which is why I never refer to specific quests in my RP; if anything, I add the general idea behind the quest to my char's perception of the NPCs involved). So quests IMO integrate with either MM or RPG, but not both. This means that unless a solution for this problem is found, there is no reason to serialize characters onto a quest.
On a more general quest related note, there was the problem that quests block NPCs for other quests. If this isn't fixed, then some people may get more or less permanently locked out.
I'm not sure if it helps, and I think this is more or less the way everyone feels about it, but I suppose adding why I personally don't do a lot of quests doesn't hurt.
- Quests can't often be used in RP
- I'd rather RP
- one can't deviate (quest items can't often be used as expected)
- extreme linearity (need to do X before NPC Y will even recognise the question; need to reiterate the entire dialog if you restated the start phrase, can't refer to different, unrelated quests at the same NPC)
- NPC interaction is too tedious (as explained above, plus you never know if the NPC knows what you have said and what you haven't, one can't refer to different points of the dialog chain without losing NPC memory)
- things have a very static and impersonal feeling (NPCs don't even recognise you, regardless of how many quests you have done for them; maybe this will change with the "NPC reputation")
Please note that this isn't intended as a put-down or somesuch. I know it's infinitely much easier to come up with why one dslikes something than is to make it better, even if only slightly. It is really just stating my reasons for informational purposes.
