Do you prefer a linear or exploration quest?

vendryas

I'm a bit conflicted at the moment. I'm in the process of creating my first Foundry mission, and I can't decide whether or not I want to turn the pixie-trail off for certain parts of the quest. I have various little events that will occur if the player goes off the beaten path a bit and explores my zones, things that I'm worried won't be noticed unless I take the pixie-trail off and let them try and find the next objective themselves. They might then 'stumble' on them. I've heard some pretty bad stories about people giving low reviews simply because the author didn't point them in the right direction.

What do you all prefer? Do you like having a guide to tell you where to go for the next objective, or would you prefer if the trail remained deactivated?

drakedge2

Hello!

Personally I like options. If there is a fun story, I want to just follow the main story until completion. When I complete the main story though, I go looking for fun side quests.

chivash

Well I am trying to create my first Foundry mission and I am trying to take some concepts of my table top creations, then have to remember this is an MMO and the audience is nto all role players but people who want a little substance but still want to crack a few skulls and not be bored with to much dialog.

For this setting I would say keep primary to a linear aspect but at times throw in a little exploration aspect. Get a balance together. Once the reviews start coming in adjust it accordingly and republish.

zoustyx

It's very hard to create a rewarding exploratory dungeon because you cannot add more than one rewards chest. My advice would be if you're going to make an exploration quest, make it full of interesting side stories or lore geared toward your quest such as clues to character backgrounds or people that tell a very different story than what the main characters are telling.

top8

Yea can't really make exploration dungeons right now. So unless you are making this quest for specific friends or something then stick to linear. If your just making this for some friends that don't need to be enticed with loot then yea you can add exploration stuff just for fun with like fun encounter fights or something.

hercooles130uscg

I would like the option of exploration, however, since side quests really do not get you anything extra, sometimes they can be a pain. A fun way to do side quests, that I enjoy, is when they have a tangible outcome on the main quest.

Examples are certain objectives that if you happened to do the side quest, and got an item from it, it changes how that objective plays now, maybe is changes the dialogue, or maybe it cuts out a whole part of the quest.

I just set up something like this (not published the new version yet) where if you interact with an NPC, and click the right dialogue choice, then it opens up some extra dialogue that while has nothing to do with the main quest, does give an item that later on, allows you to bypass part of the quest if you choose. The key to this is having "soft" objectives. What I mean is, say you have to find a rare item and give it to an NPC. Instead of making getting the item an objective, make completing the dialogue with the NPC the objective, and then make only the giving of the item OR the giving of this item you found earlier, succeed the quest. In this way, the player who did not do the side quest has to still find the item, so it is a soft objective, but to the game, the real objective is talking to the NPC, which can not be completed until you have this item in your inventory.

fallensbane

IMO you can pull off a quest that both like. You can pull people along the main path in your story, say what you want to say and place in fun encounters to keep the people who prefer a simple linear pathway. To make it more fun for those who love RP and exploration you can place optional easter eggs, side npcs and lore items to flesh out 'your world'.

I am still learning the foundry, mostly I have spend my time designing some maps. I am designing my stuff to keep the hack/slash fans satisfied, but I am also designing from a PnP / Detail ***** / Exploration nuts point of view.

One example is... I have this tavern which is also a base of operations for a mercenary guild. All my quests start out from NPC's in this Tavern I am making. Now, someone who wants to just get going, all they need to do is walk in the tavern, speak to NPC and move on. People who want to explore and learn more about my characters/npcs/lore can wander around the tavern and speak to additional members of this order. Go to the library and read up on this and that. Also as I do more quests the library itself will get bigger and bigger with lore options to read up if you are so inclined. So for instance you may go into this place the first time and go to a bookshelf and it lists something like..

The Waterdeep Incident
Sister of the Blades
Anaotomy of a Dragon

BUT... next time you pop in here you can go to the bookshelf and it will have that info and several new 'books' to read up on.

If you do something like this I would just suggest in the quest description mention something like ... "This quests contains OPTIONAL lore for those interested, it can be skipped by following the main questline.

I haven't specifically looked at the ways you can pull off sidequests yet.. I am still newbish with the foundry.. however I would suggest if possible make each side quest option known to be optional in someway.