Whatever happened to progressive quest chains?

[Knightrose]

Why have we moved away from quest chains, which were fun with interesting named loot (most of which had unique textures I might add) to.... crafting?

I could go on for hours about my argument but I'd rather just ask a simple question:

Which do you think is more fun and would rather have:

A. Quest chains that open up to us as we progress in levels and in areas. That reward us with high-end loot and/or a list of named/unique items after completion. With a few toys and good chests thrown in along the way. With top of this hierarchy being fun and puzzle-oriented raids (like the good ol days)

or

B. Grinding Shroud (or any location) for Crafting materials so you can make superior end-game items that will only really be useful in the place you made them.


In my opinion I choose A.

Crafted items are so powerful they mock anything below a lvl 16 dungeon. Hell, they mock everything except the Shroud. Where they weren't even needed in the first place. Other then the Shroud the only other challenge left in DDO is the Abbot. And that's it.

Does anyone else see this irony? Grinding away at the Shroud in order to produce gear that makes you better at... *drum roll* grinding the Shroud.


I miss the days of Waterworks, Co6, Threnal even the boring Catacombs. Because those were quests that were not only fun (and challenging at the time) but highly rewarding. But more importantly those quests felt like D&D. Or at the very least the premise of it behind DDO.

I fear that everything from Mod6 on will be FedEx/grind.

Even rolling new characters has lost the excitement it once had. All I think about when I quest with my lvl5 Ranger is 'gee, all this **** I'm obtaining now is gonna mean nothing once I start grinding the Shroud.' Sure I'll need a couple vorpals and couple cursepewers but beyond that; it's the Shroud or bust.

It has to me, been very lame.

I for one am losing interest fast.

[Citymorg]

Well, I saw the Shroud as the next incarnation of the quest chain. One that I have wanted for a very long time, a multi-part raid. I understand there isn't a quest completion between each part, but they are seperate quests in all but name.

I do not think what you are asking for are two mutually-exclusive things. We can have crafting, and a raid (or area) to grind for ingredients and multi-part chain quests, at all levels. In fact, I would argue we do. Litany of the Dead is one example, 4 5 part multi-chain quests going from level 4-5 all the way to 16. This is the most recent, and thus the highest level one. There have been others added over the last two years, and I am sure there will be more. In the meantime, since those have come out, they added the crafting as well. If the crafting is not your thing, there are plenty of quests, options, raids, favor, PvP and other things to do that you might like better.

[Impaqt]

Uh, there hasnt been a single quest chain with a static loot list (Or the newer semi-static we al know and love now) since the game was introduced.

WW
STK
Catacombs
CO6
tangleroot
Delaras
Theranal

All around since the beginning.. They quest chain w/ Static loot concept went away a LONG time ago.

[Magnyr_Delorn]

Uh, there hasnt been a single quest chain with a static loot list (Or the newer semi-static we al know and love now) since the game was introduced.

WW
STK
Catacombs
CO6
tangleroot
Delaras
Theranal

All around since the beginning.. They quest chain w/ Static loot concept went away a LONG time ago.

This is correct, and it is a shame.

The reason for this is the devs developing style. With each update to the game, we get bug fixes, UI upgrades, non quest content, etc. and only a handful(lets say 3-7) new quests. If they were to introduce any new quest chains, it would likely become the only quest addition for that update. Thats not to say I'd personally have a problem with it, but I imagine they attempt to vary the quests significantly to appeal to a broader base. It makes more financial sense.

At least thats my theory. I can only hope they didn't axe them because they thought the playerbase doesn't like them, because judging by the LFMs up at any given point, this is hardly the case.

[Angelus_dead]

This is correct, and it is a shame.

The reason there's no new quest chains is because players couldn't handle them. Someone was always forgetting to update right and not getting the reward for the series, and he'd get upset and complain.

Obviously, the correct fix for that was to put a simple warning message when you enter a dungeon without being on the right phase of the quest. But they didn't do so for literally years and years.

The biggest loss from giving up quest chains is that it was a way to extend the gameplay experience of the same amount of level-design work.

[Pellegro]

I am glad to see quest chains gone ...

It would suck if you were in the middle of one and party fell apart, or whatever ... nearly impossible to pick up in same spot again so you'd have to start over.

Just my opinion, but I'd much prefer to have 5 thematically related but independent quests then any kind of chain. Ever.

[GlassCannon]

I enjoy Quest Chains and am frustrated at the apprehension that other players approach said chain with when starting in the middle or just after the beginning.

If they don't get "Their Reward"(Extremely egocentric, psychotic, and anti-social), they will abandon the quest without guilt or refrain, will wait for 30 minutes to join, then when the lead says "we started half an hour ago and are on part 3", after giving the group a rather detestable earful they drop... or simply avoid the "We are not starting on part 1" group like a plague ridden carcass and stand there stupefied waiting for a different LFM. This is a social problem, psychological in nature, and not a game design problem.

I want more multi-part chains with extremely powerful rewards. If I screw a part up, oh well. I learned, and will do it right the next time. Then again if I do screw up it's because I didn't pay attention, or RTFM.


Contrary to the fact that this occurs in 90% of the Quest Chain runs I have been on, there are many people who are willing to join partial parties if but for the XP and Chests alone. They are ones I put in my Friends list and are typically the more enjoyable ones to run with.

[Kargon]

If they don't get "Their Reward"(Extremely egocentric, psychotic, and anti-social), they will abandon the quest without guilt or refrain, will wait for 30 minutes to join, then when the lead says "we started half an hour ago and are on part 3", after giving the group a rather detestable earful they drop... or simply avoid the "We are not starting on part 1" group like a plague ridden carcass and stand there stupefied waiting for a different LFM. This is a social problem, psychological in nature, and not a game design problem.

I want more multi-part chains with extremely powerful rewards. If I screw a part up, oh well. I learned, and will do it right the next time. Then again if I do screw up it's because I didn't pay attention, or RTFM.

Kargon want point out that if more quemest chains had realamaly powermaful rewards, that would be a realamally powermaful encouragemament to drop any group if you mess up you advancaming or avoid any group like 'a plague ridden carcass' if it not startaming on the first part, because are much more likelamally the main reasamon you want do that chain ARE for the extremelamally powermaful reward.

That said, kargon still want more quemest chains with realamally powermaful rewards

[Vormaerin]

It seems to me that people like the static rewards list, but not the chains themselves. There is a ton of whinging about the chain quests. Either its folks upset about someone screwing up the quest chain or its figuring out some gimmick to bypass most of the chain. The same complaints that go into raid flagging go for the chain quests. "Waaaaah, why do I have to do Greymoon? I just want to do Co6!" "Ugh, can't I just do Threnal South without repeating East and West?"

[vainangel]

I like quest chains.

If more do not show up eventualy, I would have to = ddo to other 'grind' mmo's like WoW.
I like them because it makes you run the chain in place of farming the final rewards for that one item.

The time to create the areas and quests for a chain has to be massive. Not only that I would suspect they were trying to not corner themselves in as one trick quest developments. How crappy would it be if every quest was a revisit 2-4 times to one area? Some quests are hard enough...let alone worrying about the next part.... Raids are fine for me when it comes to higher level chains....just fine.

[Vardak]

Uh, there hasnt been a single quest chain with a static loot list (Or the newer semi-static we al know and love now) since the game was introduced.

WW
STK
Catacombs
CO6
tangleroot
Delaras
Theranal

All around since the beginning.. They quest chain w/ Static loot concept went away a LONG time ago.

The quest chain idea didn't die at launch... Necrolopolis which is also the harbinger of crafted rewards, came after launch. Only everyone hates Olympic gymnast phase undead with super stat draining glancing blows and 10000 HD.

[Impaqt]

The quest chain idea didn't die at launch... Necrolopolis which is also the harbinger of crafted rewards, came after launch. Only everyone hates Olympic gymnast phase undead with super stat draining glancing blows and 10000 HD.

Necropolis has no set quest progression and doesnt have a static reward list.

You can do the 4 quests in any order you want.
Comleting the 4 quests opens up the fifth.
Beating the fifth quest gets you a chance at sone neat namend loot, but nothing static.

This is true in all 3 Lotd Series.

[coolpenguin410]

The reason there's no new quest chains is because players couldn't handle them. Someone was always forgetting to update right and not getting the reward for the series, and he'd get upset and complain.

Obviously, the correct fix for that was to put a simple warning message when you enter a dungeon without being on the right phase of the quest. But they didn't do so for literally years and years.

This has been implemented on Risia! If you starting a quest that you're not qued up for, you get a red warning message right aboe the OK/Cancel buttons. Very noticable too.

[vainangel]

This has been implemented on Risia! If you starting a quest that you're not qued up for, you get a red warning message right aboe the OK/Cancel buttons. Very noticable too.

I cannot wait for this to reach the rest of us.

[Lorien_the_First_One]

Necropolis has no set quest progression and doesnt have a static reward list.

You can do the 4 quests in any order you want.
Comleting the 4 quests opens up the fifth.
Beating the fifth quest gets you a chance at sone neat namend loot, but nothing static.

This is true in all 3 Lotd Series.

Actually I like that better. While some progressives are nice for story line reasons, the number of chars I have stranded on Von3 gets agrivating... I mean really, why does it matter which order I recruit the laughing knives in? Just make me do all 4 and then let me in to von5.

[honkuimushi]

The big complaints with quest chains were the time involved and the difficulty in completing the chain if you lose a player or 2. The new warning about not being on the right part of the quest is a big improvement. But there are still several problems.

I was in a Greymoon group a while ago when our cleric had to drop after part 2 for real life issues. He said he might be back, but it didn't work out. After that, we lost 2 more people, then had to spend a long time getting replacements. Even adding Co6 to the LFM didn't help much. We finally get some people, head into Co6, then one guy drops after part 2 with-- Thank's guys, I'm done for the night. And we had to find someone willing to join us for the rest of the quest.

Threnal is even worse. It takes a good while to get East, West and South, and if you try to break it up, it's hard to get a group together where everyone needs the same things. And that doesn't consider the popularity of East 3.

It also makes running things for favor a lot tougher. You can open most quests by having one opener. Ifyou don't have it on your level 8, grab your level 16 and you're ready to go. But with a chain, you have to have the opener go through the entire chain with everyone else. This is one of the big complaints about the Catacombs.

The linked quests that have to be done in order is a mechanic that should not be brought back. It Is not an insurmountable obsticle for lower level quests, but I dread the idea of a high level chain. In fact, VoN gives a good prievew of how that might work. You have 2 groups in VoN runs-- One group that knows the quest backwards and forwards and can run(literally) through all four of them in an hour, and another who may know what's going on but haven't mastered the quest for whom the run will take a couple of hours. One of the things that saves this chain is the fact that there's a raid at the end which is usually done with a different party than the one who flagged. Still, having to constantly reflag by running the same quests in the same order is a constant complaint.

I think the solution is to design more quests like VoN, but with a suggestion that's been floating around on this board for ages, the order is not fixed. In VoN, you have to reuinite the Laughing Knives. Should it really matter if you help out Haywire before getting the Oath of Droam? So all the quests are related, but you can do them in any order.

They almost got this right in the Necropolis, but the method of getting the capstone quest is a pain. I've reset the entire chain several times while trying to update to the last quest. (Very frustrating.) The Vale and the Shroud is even better in terms of flagging. But this shouldn't be limited to raids. Do a bunch of quests for one guy and one all of them are done,(the order is irrelevent)instead of unlocking a raid, you get an extra reward. You could even use different quest givers, but have the stories linked thematically. Maybe after completing Xorian Cypher and Dreams of Insanity, a Gatekeeper is willing to give you an extra pick from the Gatekeeper stores. That seems to me to be the way to implement future quest chains.

[Azoralq]

I really only agree with you on one thing here. Greensteel items are killing the game, in my opinion. Why not just make a suit of armor with Disease/poison/paralysis/magic/pierce/blunt/slashing immunity, along with deathward, and throw in slay living as well. Then make a khopesh (Cause everyone uses 'em anyway) with Acid/Cold/Fire/Holy/Force/Air blast damage, with Acid/Cold/Fire/Holy/Force Air burst damage, that is transmuting, vorpal, disurpting, banishing, and cursespewing...and can kill anything with a 25% chance, as long as you succeed on a hit.

Ok...a bit overexaguration here, but seriously...what's the point of having other items, if you can make insane items to do it all at once? This game lost it's challenging feel the moment paralyzers and vorpals dropped like candy out in the Hold...but not it's just pathetic.

I know, I know...I should just quit DDO. Well, you're right, I probably should...but that doesn't mean I can't at least say this. Turbine should really stop finding more ways for us to kill something in one hit, and find more ways to make the game interesting.

[DasLurch]

The problem with these "quest chains" isn't with the length or rewards. It lies with the way that a player must update them. The number of times that someone "forgets" to update on part 5 of tangleroot or part 3 of delera's is incredibly high. That is the real problem with these. That is also why we will not likely see a new one anytime soon.

[Amabel]

Why have we moved away from quest chains, which were fun with interesting named loot (most of which had unique textures I might add) to.... crafting?

I could go on for hours about my argument but I'd rather just ask a simple question:

Which do you think is more fun and would rather have:

A. Quest chains that open up to us as we progress in levels and in areas. That reward us with high-end loot and/or a list of named/unique items after completion. With a few toys and good chests thrown in along the way. With top of this hierarchy being fun and puzzle-oriented raids (like the good ol days)

or

B. Grinding Shroud (or any location) for Crafting materials so you can make superior end-game items that will only really be useful in the place you made them.


In my opinion I choose A.

Crafted items are so powerful they mock anything below a lvl 16 dungeon. Hell, they mock everything except the Shroud. Where they weren't even needed in the first place. Other then the Shroud the only other challenge left in DDO is the Abbot. And that's it.

Does anyone else see this irony? Grinding away at the Shroud in order to produce gear that makes you better at... *drum roll* grinding the Shroud.


I miss the days of Waterworks, Co6, Threnal even the boring Catacombs. Because those were quests that were not only fun (and challenging at the time) but highly rewarding. But more importantly those quests felt like D&D. Or at the very least the premise of it behind DDO.

I fear that everything from Mod6 on will be FedEx/grind.

Even rolling new characters has lost the excitement it once had. All I think about when I quest with my lvl5 Ranger is 'gee, all this **** I'm obtaining now is gonna mean nothing once I start grinding the Shroud.' Sure I'll need a couple vorpals and couple cursepewers but beyond that; it's the Shroud or bust.

It has to me, been very lame.

I for one am losing interest fast.

/signed

Crafting is boring, boring, boring and it looks like we'll just be getting more of it. Not to mention the way it's been implemented makes even the previous DDO monty haul look underpowered.

For those that like that sort of thing... enjoy your big shiny hamster wheel. I'm leaving it for the hamsters.

[moorewr]

Uh, there hasnt been a single quest chain with a static loot list (Or the newer semi-static we al know and love now) since the game was introduced.

WW
STK
Catacombs
CO6
tangleroot
Delaras
Theranal

All around since the beginning.. They quest chain w/ Static loot concept went away a LONG time ago.

If you omit the catacombs, that's my list of the best content in the game.


(PS: VON, DQ.. Necropolis parts 1, 2, & 3, also fit the chin/reward bill in most ways)