Suggestion: Make some quests retroactive when appropriate

Something I've only seen in a few games such as Warhammer Online and a few others (that I can't remember at the moment) I found very neat, convenient and immersive is kill quests taking into account your kill count of the mob from before you accepted the quest.

It's super nice to pick up a quest and be able to turn it in immediately because while you were out exploring the wilderness you happened to already cull the population the npc is asking you to cull. Not to mention it makes some sense immersion-wise.

Edit: Not to mention it helps foster exploration, as people will be more open to exploring and killing random mobs that they usually wouldn't if they feel it's not pointless trash mobs.

Example in my next comment below

Edit2: To clarify, not all quests have to be retroactive, just the ones that it makes sense for them to be. And them being retroactive doesn't mean you can't accept the quest and do it normally if you haven't completed any of the objectives yet. (I think that's where @Noanni got confused)
(Also edited title to be more accurate)

Edit3: A perfect example of the type of quest that could be Retroactive is the Hogger quest in vanilla/classic WoW. During normal questing in Elwynn Forest, you might come across this named NPC and think, "Oh, a named NPC, he must be important later".

Maybe you then kill him just because he's there, but then later get the quest and have to kill him again.
Maybe you don't because you figure or know you'll have to come kill him later.

In the first case, why then should you have to kill him again later just because "suddenly there's a quest to kill him". You killed him... he should be considered slain, right?
In the second case, why should you even have to feel that way. Why should you feel discouraged (even in such a minor way) about killing something if you felt like it.

Both of those issues can be solved by making the quest retroactive. Anyone in this thread complaining about random enemies not making sense being retroactive, what about named npcs that are quest objectives? If you killed him before you were able to get the quest, the quest considers him already slain. If you haven't yet, the quest prompts you to go kill him.

I will say, another alternative to this is better quest writing, and having quest NPC's only spawn if you have the quest and things like that, but for non-named NPC quests retroactivity, when the quest writing allows for it, would fit nicely.

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Noaani

Dreoh wrote: »

It's super nice to pick up a quest and be able to turn it in immediately

Why even bother with quests then?

Dreoh

Noaani wrote: »

Dreoh wrote: »

It's super nice to pick up a quest and be able to turn it in immediately

Why even bother with quests then?

That's a weird take lol

You're still doing quests, you're just doing them before you talk to the npc. (if you haven't done it beforehand you just do the quest like normal)

Not to mention it helps foster exploration, as people will be more open to exploring and killing random mobs that they usually wouldn't if they feel it's not pointless trash mobs.

Instead of it being

"Go kill 10 wolves"
But I was just there exploring the cool grove area and collecting resources and killing them as I ventured into it...

it's

-See cool grove full of trees to harvest and possible extra exploration goodies, but it's inhabited by wolves-
Explore it, killing wolves as you go
Eventually get to new questgiver nearby
"Go kill 10 wolves"
"Oh I've already killed 10 of those
"Oh thank you! Well here's something for your trouble!"

It's that easy, obviously it would be better quest text

And if you happen to not have explored the grove and killed the wolves yet then you just do the quest as you normally would.

Suddenly, exploring has so much more intrinsic value without really adding much at all

Edit: Added some clarification for new people in the thread.

Ferni

The idea is interesting and maybe could be good to see something like this in some missions where it makes sense, like the example you already mentioned.

But at the same time it makes me wonder if some NPCs shouldn't reward you for already doing the job for free.
Some NPCs could say: "Thanks, take this reward for help us", but maybe others could say: "Oh, did you already do the job? Thanks" and don't give you anything.

I would prefer to have a pop up quest instead of be completing quests I still don't have. Something like a pop up quest which say: "This wolfs could be a problem for the nearby node, kill them and travel to the node to speak with the soldiers".

Dygz

I guess if you still have resources from the kill - so that you're really getting rewards for proof of kills.
Using the Nightbloom quest as an example. If I picked 5 Nightbloom while I was running around in the Cave and still have them on me when first speak to Eswyn, I should be able to turn them in to her and get credit.
But, if I have no proof to offer a quest giver that I've completed their quest, I shouldn't get credit for it.

Someone asks you to cull the Skeletons in the area and you tell them, "Yeah, I already did that so give me the reward." Even though there's still a whole bunch of Skeletons still running around. That's immersion-breaking.
Fits from a gamer perspective but not from an RPG perspective. Might be specifically from an MMORPG perspective, but I think even from a table top perspective that doesn't really work unless you have proof on you that you accomplished the goals of the quest giver.

If you rescue a kidnapped damsel and return her before being asked to do so, does the family still hand over a reward or do they just verbally thank you?

I think even in a high magic setting, quests just popping up out of nowhere when you enter an area is immersion-breaking... but, I tend to go with suspension of disbelief for that feature, when its implemented.

Dreoh

Ferni wrote: »

The idea is interesting and maybe could be good to see something like this in some missions where it makes sense, like the example you already mentioned.

But at the same time it makes me wonder if some NPCs shouldn't reward you for already doing the job for free.
Some NPCs could say: "Thanks, take this reward for help us", but maybe others could say: "Oh, did you already do the job? Thanks" and don't give you anything.

I would prefer to have a pop up quest instead of be completing quests I still don't have. Something like a pop up quest which say: "This wolfs could be a problem for the nearby node, kill them and travel to the node to speak with the soldiers".

That's a fair point, and in those cases it could make sense for those quests to still force you to go back to the grove.

Even if all quests aren't retroactive, having the ones where it doesn't make sense in character to go back and redo what you did could help a lot with immersion and just some general quality of life.

Though I guess there's something to be said for padding out content by having you rehash stuff, though I think that's not really a good excuse.

Dygz wrote: »

I guess if you still have resources from the kill - so that you're really getting rewards for proof of kills.
Using the Nightbloom quest as an example. If I picked 5 Nightbloom while I was running around in the Cave and still have them on me when first speak to Eswyn, I should be able to turn them in to her and get credit.
But, if I have no proof to offer a quest giver that I've completed their quest, I shouldn't get credit for it.

Someone asks you to cull the Skeletons in the area and you tell them, "Yeah, I already did that so give me the reward." Even though there's still a whole bunch of Skeletons still running around. That's immersion-breaking.
Fits from a gamer perspective but not from an RPG perspective. Might be specifically from an MMORPG perspective, but I think even from a table top perspective that doesn't really work unless you have proof on you that you accomplished the goals of the quest giver.

If you rescue a kidnapped damsel and return her before being asked to do so, does the family still hand over a reward or do they just verbally thank you?

I think even in a high magic setting, quests just popping up out of nowhere when you enter an area is immersion-breaking... but, I tend to go with suspension of disbelief for that feature, when its implemented.

I originally wrote this thread having that as another valid alternative, but then I realized that it had a major flaw in that how do you manage the worth of the resources you would turn in?

If wolves drop teeth, either the teeth are junk/trash items, or they are crafting materials.

If they are junk items the player's going to sell/throw them away probably before they ever meet the quest giver. If they realize junk items have that kind of worth, they're never going to want to not have them in case they need them.

If they are crafting materials, the player most likely isn't going to want to give those up for a quest.

If they are flagged as just being quest items, they just clutter the inventory, unless there's a quest item separate inventory, but then it's essentially just a kill record at that point.

You could have them be junk items but have an icon showing they are part of a quest, but that kind of breaks immersion because how would your character know such things?

I couldn't think of a good solution so I scrapped the idea mid-typing.

Noaani

Dreoh wrote: »

Noaani wrote: »

Dreoh wrote: »

It's super nice to pick up a quest and be able to turn it in immediately

Why even bother with quests then?

That's a weird take lol

Not really.

Many MMO's put the bulk of experience gain on quests, rather than on killing mobs. This is stupid.

If the bulk of experience is in mob kills, then going off exploring and killing what ever is in your way is intrinsically already worth doing - even if you don't find a quest associated with what you killed.

This seems to me to be a MUCH better way to make exploring more rewarding.

neuroguy

Dreoh wrote: »

If wolves drop teeth, either the teeth are junk/trash items, or they are crafting materials.

Neither, they are certificates. In this game you don't get straight up money as loot from wolves. You get 'certificates' like teeth and then you sell them to a vendor for money. The further the node you sell them to from which the wolves are located, the more money you get, but the higher the risk of getting killed and losing some of your wolf teeth.

In general, I understand the arguments for this retro-active quest idea, but I don't really agree with it ultimately. The lack of fast travel and weight makes being efficient a skill in the game. Remembering to clear up your inventory and lighten your load, picking up the quests and tools for gathering that you need before you embark on a journey, these are things the player is expected to do. Taking the time to explore the town/node, pick up all of the quests is also a part of this.

The biggest argument against this retro-active completion though, is that unlike theme park MMOs, quests in ashes will not always be available. You will have quests disappear and new ones come up as nodes level up, players will be able to commission quests via bulletin boards. This is a living breathing world and if you expect to do all the quests in one node and move on to the next, you are not getting the full picture here. There will be quests you simply can't do and more importantly, quests that you shouldn't do because they don't align with your other goals or are inefficient to path to etc. You should travel as you see fit and do quests that interest you and are efficient in terms of pathing etc. The game shouldn't really spoon-feed you xp for exploring, which btw requires no further incentivization than already is provided.

Tyranthraxus

@Dygz makes a good point with collecting resources from kills - but otherwise, would only support this for things like later-added Kill Collections-counts and the like.

Am hoping there will be a very comprehensive back-end metrics system, in AoC.

Bracu

i like the way you think, as it promotes exploration but the point of a quest is that someone asks you for help and you provide the service for them, maybe if they ask for 10 wolf furs and you got them already you cold turn them in instantly?, would also promote trade ;D just an example

Dreoh

Noaani wrote: »

Dreoh wrote: »

Noaani wrote: »

Dreoh wrote: »

It's super nice to pick up a quest and be able to turn it in immediately

Why even bother with quests then?

That's a weird take lol

Not really.

Many MMO's put the bulk of experience gain on quests, rather than on killing mobs. This is stupid.

If the bulk of experience is in mob kills, then going off exploring and killing what ever is in your way is intrinsically already worth doing - even if you don't find a quest associated with what you killed.

This seems to me to be a MUCH better way to make exploring more rewarding.

Bro, you're still turning in quests and getting that quest xp, I dont think you're understanding lol

You're just doing the quest before you accept it but still turning it in like normal. The only xp you might be missing out on is having to (sometimes arbitrarily) re-kill enemies you've already killed and getting that second mob xp

The thing is, this isn't even a new concept. It's been done before.

Dreoh

(sorry for such a long comment in advance, I tried my best to make it succinct while still addressing every point)

neuroguy wrote: »

Dreoh wrote: »

If wolves drop teeth, either the teeth are junk/trash items, or they are crafting materials.

Neither, they are certificates. In this game you don't get straight up money as loot from wolves. You get 'certificates' like teeth and then you sell them to a vendor for money. The further the node you sell them to from which the wolves are located, the more money you get, but the higher the risk of getting killed and losing some of your wolf teeth.

That's just semantics. Wolf teeth was just an example, I'm aware that loot is handled via certificates. If you want to be pedantic just replace "wolf teeth" in my example with "wolf certificates".

Though certificates aren't the only thing going to be dropped from enemies btw, as some resources come from enemies.

neuroguy wrote: »

In general, I understand the arguments for this retro-active quest idea, but I don't really agree with it ultimately. The lack of fast travel and weight makes being efficient a skill in the game. Remembering to clear up your inventory and lighten your load, picking up the quests and tools for gathering that you need before you embark on a journey, these are things the player is expected to do. Taking the time to explore the town/node, pick up all of the quests is also a part of this.

Nothing about this changes the efficiency of the game like you're conveying. You're still doing everything you mentioned from clearing inventory, picking up tools and other expected activities. I'm not really sure how what you're saying goes against this here? Maybe I'm just not understanding.

neuroguy wrote: »

The biggest argument against this retro-active completion though, is that unlike theme park MMOs, quests in ashes will not always be available. You will have quests disappear and new ones come up as nodes level up, players will be able to commission quests via bulletin boards.

I'm also very aware about the intended questing system, and I actually think it still fits very nicely into it.

Sure, maybe it doesn't make sense if an npc that appears after a node levels to Metropolis suddenly needs those wolf kills that you killed back when it was a Town node. To fix that you can just make the kills "time-relative" or in other words just have the kills essentially expire. This could be representative of many things. If a quest giver was wanting you to cull a population of wolves that had become overpopulated, and you say "oh I just did that" it makes sense. But in the Metropolis, if the same questgiver asks you that but you haven't touched wolves since it was a Town and your kills "expired" it would represent the wolves breeding and repopulating, etc. This is just a basic example of course.

neuroguy wrote: »

This is a living breathing world and if you expect to do all the quests in one node and move on to the next, you are not getting the full picture here. There will be quests you simply can't do and more importantly, quests that you shouldn't do because they don't align with your other goals or are inefficient to path to etc.

Quest relevance doesn't really apply at all to what I was saying though. If a quest is relevant or not it doesn't matter.

The entire concept is "you kill some mushroom creatures on your adventure, and when you get back to town there's a new npc who suddenly wants you to kill mushrooms. So instead of having to go back out and kill mushrooms, you tell him you killed them already and he rewards you."
Or maybe even you only killed 3/10 mushrooms on that adventure, so now you only need to go out and kill 7 more. Whether this makes sense lore-wise is entirely up to the writing team and isn't difficult at all.
If there's no way to make a quest retroactive, just don't. Not all of them need to be retroactive, as I've stated before. Just having a decent portion helps with quality of life and immersiveness.

neuroguy wrote: »

You should travel as you see fit and do quests that interest you and are efficient in terms of pathing etc. The game shouldn't really spoon-feed you xp for exploring, which btw requires no further incentivization than already is provided.

This is exactly what I'm arguing for though. You're actually making points for the system here. "You should travel as you see fit".

What better way to allow players to travel as they want than to do away with arbitrary "gamey" systems that just have you racking up kills to complete a "quest". Retroactive quests allow players to feel more free with their gameplay choices and not feel restricted into doing those optimal quests.

And all those retroactive quests still function as regular quests if you never did any of it's goals anymore, so that doesn't change at all.

neuroguy wrote: »

The game shouldn't really spoon-feed you xp for exploring, which btw requires no further incentivization than already is provided.

Games always do things to incentivize exploration, because there's so many players who don't explore because they feel they are going to "fall behind" or aren't being "optimal" if they do go off the "optimal" path to explore. "Gamers will always optimize the fun out of a game" is one of the most accurate quotes I've ever heard and I see it happen all the time. If you allow more freedom and take away from the "optimal paths" you will find happier players and more immersed players.

neuroguy

Dreoh wrote: »

That's just semantics. Wolf teeth was just an example, I'm aware that loot is handled via certificates. If you want to be pedantic just replace "wolf teeth" in my example with "wolf certificates".

Though certificates aren't the only thing going to be dropped from enemies btw, as some resources come from enemies.

It's not semantics though. It's not crafting materials but it is not junk/trash either, it is literally the main source of income for players, especially early on. Again, you do not get money from killing shit, the certificates are how you make money in the game, it is how the economy will have new money generated.

Dreoh wrote: »

Nothing about this changes the efficiency of the game like you're conveying. You're still doing everything you mentioned from clearing inventory, picking up tools and other expected activities. I'm not really sure how what you're saying goes against this here? Maybe I'm just not understanding.

How does this not change it? If I don't have to pick up my quests before I go out adventuring and can just pick them up after to have them retroactively be counted for, how does that not remove an entire item from my to do list before I leave town to adventure? Am I misunderstanding something?

Dreoh wrote: »

Whether this makes sense lore-wise is entirely up to the writing team and isn't difficult at all.

No idea what I said to make you think I'm discussing lore here.

Dreoh wrote: »

This is exactly what I'm arguing for though. You're actually making points for the system here. "You should travel as you see fit".

What better way to allow players to travel as they want than to do away with arbitrary "gamey" systems that just have you racking up kills to complete a "quest". Retroactive quests allow players to feel more free with their gameplay choices and not feel restricted into doing those optimal quests.

And all those retroactive quests still function as regular quests if you never did any of it's goals anymore, so that doesn't change at all.

No you are arguing to not feel bad about exploring however you want if you forgot to pick up quests. What you are asking for reduces exploration as you don't have to revisit places in the world, which in this game can change with node lvl. Re-visiting can also lead to exploration by virtue of different pathing and leads to different adventures by virtue of different people being around etc. You are asking for a convenience feature that removes returning to places. It does nothing to help you travel as you see fit, it just removes the FOMO of not picking up quests. You are trying to help worry-warts explore who let FOMO prevent them from killing extra mobs lest they be quest objectives for a quest they haven't picked up yet. We do not need to pander to everyone's fears and anxiety to make them enjoy themselves...
Again, my main point is you don't have to do that quest if you don't want to return to the old location. You can explore all you want but the reality is if you forget to pick up a quest you could feel bad because you could have generated more xp per hour. But there is no clearly optimal way to lvl because quests are not static, so you can feel bad about not having had that quest but nobody is forcing you to go back and complete it, just play how you want. You will sometimes feel bad for your decisions, if you can't handle not being optimal in xp farming, there is too much risk/loss in this game for you.

Dreoh wrote: »

Games always do things to incentivize exploration, because there's so many players who don't explore because they feel they are going to "fall behind" or aren't being "optimal" if they do go off the "optimal" path to explore. "Gamers will always optimize the fun out of a game" is one of the most accurate quotes I've ever heard and I see it happen all the time. If you allow more freedom and take away from the "optimal paths" you will find happier players and more immersed players.

I understand what you're trying to say but AoC already provides so many reasons to explore it's ridiculous. It also prevents players from optimizing by not having DPS meters etc. Optimizing pathing sounds a lot more dramatic than what I'm talking about. If you want to go foraging by the lake north of the node, forget about the quest that takes you 20 min south.
You also don't want to remove all sources of 'optimization' for fear of people 'optimizing the fun out of games'... I've also seen how group finders and homogenized classes killed games. I'm sure a strong argument there was 'we shouldn't have to optimize group compositions etc'. There is a certain degree to which you can't control the player base and can't forcibly lead them to enlightenment. If people don't want to explore in ashes with 100 reasons to do so, the 101st reason won't make the difference.

Aerlana

the big matter of this is really simple to see ...

The game, and your character is 1 year old, you have 30+ from all ennemies of the game. So, the "kill ennemies" are mostly all finished the second you take them. Those quest are no quest anymore but instant free XP reward. and this untill IS add new ennemies, you will spend 30 killing a bunch of them again to have the related quest all done.

kill 30 wolf, and you can finish 100 time the quest "kill 30 wolfs" without moving anymore from the node.

Your idea comes from while you first explore the world, you had frustration of killing ennemies due to your curiosity and seeing after you have to kill them for a quest, and right, it is frustrating, but you just didnt think "what about after i played 1 years". and mainly because on other MMORPG, while you have finished an area quest, you won't see any ennemy of this region anymore while you do quest in the next region. the wolfs you killed in this lvl5 quest named "wolf" are not those of this lvl55 quest asking to kill "bloodthirst wolf"
On Ashes of Creation, this is different.thinking about "what in 3 month, 6 month, 1 year" with such idea is important

and the "kill count expiration" is not a solution. For a simple reason : it will never have a "good timing"
15 minutes ? Not enough if you really explored and the quest is about the first ennemies you encountered.
2h ? already long time. With randomized quest, you could do this on 2 or three quest with the sames wolves...

Dreoh

neuroguy wrote: »

It's not semantics though. It's not crafting materials but it is not junk/trash either, it is literally the main source of income for players, especially early on. Again, you do not get money from killing shit, the certificates are how you make money in the game, it is how the economy will have new money generated.

I already addressed this exact issue in the original response I made to Dygz from which you originally quoted, you just took one line out of that whole comment out of context of the entire comment.

neuroguy wrote: »

How does this not change it? If I don't have to pick up my quests before I go out adventuring and can just pick them up after to have them retroactively be counted for, how does that not remove an entire item from my to do list before I leave town to adventure? Am I misunderstanding something?

Nobody said you can't pick up those quests. You can still pick them up and do them as normal. Nothing about normal questing is changing when you ad retroactivity. @Noanni I think got the same wrong impression you have right here too. The only thing different is they also have retroactive functionality when applicable. If it doesn't make sense for a quest to be retroactive, it doesn't have to be. There seems to be some kind of misconception that I was arguing that retroactive quests are only retroactive or that they'll be the only kinds of quest. They're literally just normal quests that also take into account recent activity if they want to. This misunderstanding might have been my fault because in the original post I was too specific.

neuroguy wrote: »

No idea what I said to make you think I'm discussing lore here.

That was more of a pre-emptive line of thought I had to get in before someone might think it's not possible through lore/writing reasons.

neuroguy wrote: »

No you are arguing to not feel bad about exploring however you want if you forgot to pick up quests. What you are asking for reduces exploration as you don't have to revisit places in the world, which in this game can change with node lvl. Re-visiting can also lead to exploration by virtue of different pathing and leads to different adventures by virtue of different people being around etc. You are asking for a convenience feature that removes returning to places. It does nothing to help you travel as you see fit, it just removes the FOMO of not picking up quests. You are trying to help worry-warts explore who let FOMO prevent them from killing extra mobs lest they be quest objectives for a quest they haven't picked up yet. We do not need to pander to everyone's fears and anxiety to make them enjoy themselves...
Again, my main point is you don't have to do that quest if you don't want to return to the old location. You can explore all you want but the reality is if you forget to pick up a quest you could feel bad because you could have generated more xp per hour. But there is no clearly optimal way to lvl because quests are not static, so you can feel bad about not having had that quest but nobody is forcing you to go back and complete it, just play how you want. You will sometimes feel bad for your decisions, if you can't handle not being optimal in xp farming, there is too much risk/loss in this game for you.

I would argue having to not feel bad about exploring is EXACTLY the point. "Gamers will always optimize the fun out of a game" is something that happens because they feel bad about exploring because they aren't doing things they "should" be doing and perceive themselves as falling behind players that are doing only optimal gameplay. They way you counter that is by removing opportunities for optimization or making more things actually viable. You're actually arguing for a theme-park MMO experience when you try to restrict freedoms in the argument you're using.

The Re-visiting issue is also not a problem. When nodes level up it's already confirmed new enemies spawn in areas nearby and zones change and evolve. That enough is a reason to go back and explore again.
If that's not enough, the "kill count expiration" idea I mentioned earlier also helps fix that issue.

Yes. This does help "worry-worts" who let FOMO prevent them from doing things. You say this like it's a bad thing. It honestly comes off a little "gate-keepy". You're saying "If you aren't playing as hardcore as possible you're not doing it right". You're quite literally embodying the "Gamers optimize fun out of a game" persona here.

I honestly don't understand why this seems like such a bad idea to you all. It literally changes nothing about the normal MMO experience. It only adds more freedom to actually enjoy the world. The only thing I can attribute it to is fear of change or gate keeping arbitrary "hardcore" game mechanics.

neuroguy wrote: »

I understand what you're trying to say but AoC already provides so many reasons to explore it's ridiculous. It also prevents players from optimizing by not having DPS meters etc. Optimizing pathing sounds a lot more dramatic than what I'm talking about. If you want to go foraging by the lake north of the node, forget about the quest that takes you 20 min south.
You also don't want to remove all sources of 'optimization' for fear of people 'optimizing the fun out of games'... I've also seen how group finders and homogenized classes killed games. I'm sure a strong argument there was 'we shouldn't have to optimize group compositions etc'. There is a certain degree to which you can't control the player base and can't forcibly lead them to enlightenment. If people don't want to explore in ashes with 100 reasons to do so, the 101st reason won't make the difference.

I don't understand how this goes against what I'm saying. You're arguing that because we already have reasons to explore we can't have more? That makes absolutely no sense. The argument is essentially "They should be inconvenienced because I was inconvenienced in the past". It's not forward-thinking at all.

It's not a zero-sum scenario. You can continue to remove optimization sources where applicable. Sure there should be some avenues in which optimization is nice, but you're literally arguing "we have x of z so we can't have more z because more z is unnecessary" but giving no valid reasons why it's unnecessary.

And sure, you can't control the playerbase, but you can very well direct the flow.

Dreoh

Aerlana wrote: »

the big matter of this is really simple to see ...

The game, and your character is 1 year old, you have 30+ from all ennemies of the game. So, the "kill ennemies" are mostly all finished the second you take them. Those quest are no quest anymore but instant free XP reward. and this untill IS add new ennemies, you will spend 30 killing a bunch of them again to have the related quest all done.

kill 30 wolf, and you can finish 100 time the quest "kill 30 wolfs" without moving anymore from the node.

Your idea comes from while you first explore the world, you had frustration of killing ennemies due to your curiosity and seeing after you have to kill them for a quest, and right, it is frustrating, but you just didnt think "what about after i played 1 years". and mainly because on other MMORPG, while you have finished an area quest, you won't see any ennemy of this region anymore while you do quest in the next region. the wolfs you killed in this lvl5 quest named "wolf" are not those of this lvl55 quest asking to kill "bloodthirst wolf"
On Ashes of Creation, this is different.thinking about "what in 3 month, 6 month, 1 year" with such idea is important

I've addressed this in one of my previous comments

Dreoh wrote: »

Sure, maybe it doesn't make sense if an npc that appears after a node levels to Metropolis suddenly needs those wolf kills that you killed back when it was a Town node. To fix that you can just make the kills "time-relative" or in other words just have the kills essentially expire. This could be representative of many things. If a quest giver was wanting you to cull a population of wolves that had become overpopulated, and you say "oh I just did that" it makes sense. But in the Metropolis, if the same questgiver asks you that but you haven't touched wolves since it was a Town and your kills "expired" it would represent the wolves breeding and repopulating, etc. This is just a basic example of course.

Edit: And as I've stated before, retroactivity would only be added where applicable. It seems everyone thinks I was saying every quest needs to always take into account everything you've done before. That's not the case at all.

George_Black

Agreed.

Player finds strange item. Happens not to sell it. Player comes across npc looking for some1 to recover said item. Player goes "here you go".

What is the argument against this?

neuroguy

Dreoh wrote: »

Nobody said you can't pick up those quests. You can still pick them up and do them as normal. Nothing about normal questing is changing when you ad retroactivity. @Noanni I think got the same wrong impression you have right here too. The only thing different is they also have retroactive functionality when applicable. If it doesn't make sense for a quest to be retroactive, it doesn't have to be. There seems to be some kind of misconception that I was arguing that retroactive quests are only retroactive or that they'll be the only kinds of quest. They're literally just normal quests that also take into account recent activity if they want to. This misunderstanding might have been my fault because in the original post I was too specific.

I don't understand how I'm not being clear enough. I never said you are suggesting that we can't pick up those quests anymore, nor that it should be the only way to do quests, reading his comments it doesn't sound like @Noaani had that misconception either... I think overall you strawman people's arguments a lot. The arguments I posed are completely valid without your strange concern of misunderstanding that I thought you meant they are the only type of quests or quests are only retrospective (I don't even know how anyone could possibly think that's what you are proposing, that sounds like an impossible system... you'd have to predict quests and kill random mobs or something).

Dreoh wrote: »

I would argue having to not feel bad about exploring is EXACTLY the point. "Gamers will always optimize the fun out of a game" is something that happens because they feel bad about exploring because they aren't doing things they "should" be doing and perceive themselves as falling behind players that are doing only optimal gameplay. They way you counter that is by removing opportunities for optimization or making more things actually viable. You're actually arguing for a theme-park MMO experience when you try to restrict freedoms in the argument you're using.

The Re-visiting issue is also not a problem. When nodes level up it's already confirmed new enemies spawn in areas nearby and zones change and evolve. That enough is a reason to go back and explore again.
If that's not enough, the "kill count expiration" idea I mentioned earlier also helps fix that issue.

Yes. This does help "worry-worts" who let FOMO prevent them from doing things. You say this like it's a bad thing. It honestly comes off a little "gate-keepy". You're saying "If you aren't playing as hardcore as possible you're not doing it right". You're quite literally embodying the "Gamers optimize fun out of a game" persona here.

I honestly don't understand why this seems like such a bad idea to you all. It literally changes nothing about the normal MMO experience. It only adds more freedom to actually enjoy the world. The only thing I can attribute it to is fear of change or gate keeping arbitrary "hardcore" game mechanics.

I'm saying there is already no way to be optimal in this game, you can't write lvling guides because the world is constantly changing so nobody can test or prove what is optimal. If anything I'm saying it's not practical to try to optimize so there is no point having FOMO about it because it's all in your head. But somehow, again, you completely misrepresent my argument with such confidence...
It doesn't add any freedom, it just has that illusion because people expect AoC to be like the other MMOs they've played where there is a clear 'optimal'. The world changes too much and too fast, and OW-PvP makes it such that any good strategy to farm (xp, resources, w.e) gets dangerous as it gets popular so people won't share strategy or it will change by virtue of being shared. You are trying to solve a problem that AoC won't even have. Either that or you hate backtracking but then you say the revisiting is not an issue, so I don't know what to tell you.

Dreoh wrote: »

I don't understand how this goes against what I'm saying. You're arguing that because we already have reasons to explore we can't have more? That makes absolutely no sense.

It's not a zero-sum scenario. You can continue to remove optimization sources where applicable. Sure there should be some avenues in which optimization is nice, but you're literally arguing "we have x of z so we can't have more z because more z is unnecessary" but giving no valid reasons why it's unnecessary.

And sure, you can't control the playerbase, but you can very well direct the flow.

I'm truly amazed as to how you can twist my written arguments, which you can re-read. I didn't say you can't have more reasons to explore. My point is if the many many reasons we have to explore don't motivate someone, this single additional reason will not do the trick either, so if (one of?) your arguments for this change is "it will promote exploration", it's a weak argument. The burden of proof is not on me to explain why your proposed system is unnecessary... the burden of proof for any addition to a game which is threatened by feature creep and is already going to be massively delayed from what was originally proposed is on you. If you don't have enough compelling arguments as to why your addition to the game is good, and it only marginally further motivates exploration, then it's not worth implementing.

Anyways, you have an uncanny ability to twist arguments so I doubt I'll reply again. Ultimately I think it won't have much of an impact one way or the other if you have retroactive quest tracking, I personally don't like the idea but won't give a shit if it makes it in the game. I think the questing system is fine as it is.

Edit:

George Black wrote: »

Agreed.

Player finds strange item. Happens not to sell it. Player comes across npc looking for some1 to recover said item. Player goes "here you go".

What is the argument against this?

How else would that work? Nobody is saying you should have to destroy the item, and go find it again to turn in the quest. That's not what is being discussed here, the discussion is if you are told go kill 10 ogres and you already killed a bunch should you be able to say, oh yeah I already did that where is my reward? Or should you have to go back and kill 10 more ogres.

bloodprophet

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wx3gQe7I8KM

Aerlana

Dreoh wrote: »

Edit: And as I've stated before, retroactivity would only be added where applicable. It seems everyone thinks I was saying every quest needs to always take into account everything you've done before. That's not the case at all.

Why this wolf killing quest could be retroactiv, and not this other one ? What makes them different, what justify to not have a simple "kill 10 wolf" sometime have this retroactivity, and sometimes not ?
This is why we think you are saying "every killing quest" because there is no reason some does and some does not

George Black wrote: »

Agreed.

Player finds strange item. Happens not to sell it. Player comes across npc looking for some1 to recover said item. Player goes "here you go".

What is the argument against this?

There is already some games where first you find an object lost, and then you give it to a NPC you didnt see before... there is no "retroactivity" the items gives the quest.

And if you say "i killed the bandit chief, and fount a letter or his body that could interest the local guard captain" Yes... but this way, lets have all quest item lootable, and lets see if our bag likes it. But, again there will be things that will feel really absurd... i kill a strange monster and drop the heart, i don't know what to do with it, but i have it. i travel it and randomly after 1 month, i find a NPC that could use that heart... ok but her speak about "logic"... in one month the heart i fount is not as fresh as i fount it, does it continue to work?

and putting timer to everything to limit retroactivity will just add lot of useless thing to character data just for an idea that will help exploration.

Also i read "Gamers will always optimize the fun out of a game" Some yes, other don't do this.
Here the fun getting out is exploration
but... No you change nothing about this. ok, the 10 minutes you spent to fight wolves are not lost... lets speak about the 30 or 40 other minutes you lost just running here or there to try to get to the spot you wanted to see, and then coming back. Instead of losing 40minutes you lost only 30... it remains clearly "unoptimized" gameplay.
Some people just play to win, and... i have no problem with it. some others just play to enjoy what they want to enjoy.
Most of time, there is variation between both. at different level.
You consider than rushing the highest level is not fun so... ok, some like it. Also, some does it to ... do exploration after and enjoy it after the "not fun part" of reaching max lvl is done.

Exploring even with this idea will totally remains "non optimized" just a little less...

Dreoh wrote: »

Sure, maybe it doesn't make sense if an npc that appears after a node levels to Metropolis suddenly needs those wolf kills that you killed back when it was a Town node. To fix that you can just make the kills "time-relative" or in other words just have the kills essentially expire. This could be representative of many things. If a quest giver was wanting you to cull a population of wolves that had become overpopulated, and you say "oh I just did that" it makes sense. But in the Metropolis, if the same questgiver asks you that but you haven't touched wolves since it was a Town and your kills "expired" it would represent the wolves breeding and repopulating, etc. This is just a basic example of course.

BUT the quest will come back when the node will return to village/town.
So, there is 2 way to do this
1) each time a node level or delevel, for all character of the server, the counter of ennemies related to the quests of this node are reset to 0 => heavyweight for server. Also, i think some ennemies will be same for close nodes. how to do it for one node and not other. bigger and bigger database for each character? (wolf for quest A, wolf for quest B, etc)
2) each ennemy you kill is considered kill for X time. or a real timer (like 2 hours?) but it will do a LOT of chrono turning in background. All reset at defined daily time ? Maybe the less worst way to do it.

I don't know how quest are generated, so it will works with id and other shits, but your idea feels really heavy for servers just for small profit...

tautau

Two thumbs down on this one.

The point of the game, and of the quest, is to do things in the world. Speeding things up by avoiding living in the world is not good design, in my opinion.

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