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FOR REVIEW: The Catacombs of Dread
wuhsin
Banned Users Posts: 0 Arc User
Quest Title: The Catacombs of Dread
Short Code: NW-DKQ7MB5AE
Average Duration: Over two hours.
Difficulty: Solo; Hard. Group; Easy to Moderate.
Description: Following the economic crisis in Neverwinter, these catacombs were built as a massive grave for the many who died of starvation. It is rumored that Lord Neverember buried a dark secret in the deepest part of this dungeon, along with priceless treasure!
Features: Virtually no waypoints. Many hidden objectives and items. Several NPC's have different endings. Plus, lots of D&D lore and humor!
Short Code: NW-DKQ7MB5AE
Average Duration: Over two hours.
Difficulty: Solo; Hard. Group; Easy to Moderate.
Description: Following the economic crisis in Neverwinter, these catacombs were built as a massive grave for the many who died of starvation. It is rumored that Lord Neverember buried a dark secret in the deepest part of this dungeon, along with priceless treasure!
Features: Virtually no waypoints. Many hidden objectives and items. Several NPC's have different endings. Plus, lots of D&D lore and humor!
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
Post edited by wuhsin on
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Type in the short-code, make sure all the letters are capitalized. For some reason short-codes are case-sensitive, and the Foundry search is broken so short-codes are the only way to find quests.
That would be greatly appreciated.
> http://mopp4.net/ <
was the humor good? yes
would i play through it again? no
didnt finish it and never plan on it waste of pots to be frank -.-
Thank you, and I apologize for the pots you wasted. My next quest will be much shorter due to the overwhelming complaints about this one being too long, and people being unable to finish despite liking a lot of what they do play. On a positive note, I've got 3 reviews now.
pvp is soo fun :c but it kills me in pve
Capitalize all the letters. Short-codes are case-sensitive.
Idk what the problem was, but I copied/pasted the short code again...quest found & accepted. Review to follow.
> http://mopp4.net/ <
The search feature is really wonky, hopefully the next patch fixes it. Hope you enjoy the quest!
There is no other water barrel present. I had to abandon, and up to that point, it took me 20 minutes already, so don't really plan on redoing it.
The distance is indeed too far, and a lot of back and forth
I've not had this issue, and no one else has either. Perhaps for some reason one of the fires consumed an extra barrel due to a glitch? I will play through it myself to see if it is bugged. I apologize for the inconvenience. Hopefully it is not patch related.
I'd be willing to try again but maybe later. AFter you try it if you don't get the issue, let me know if it's better to collect all 7 barrels first, then douse all 7. I was doing it in portions.
There are 8 barrels and 8 fires actually. And yes, it is faster to do that, but if your inventory is limited you might not be able to. That's why I always recommend clearing your inventory before trying this map. I'm in the process of putting out the fires now to see if it works. So far no problems.
Yes I meant 8, and I completed collecting 8 because that objective disappeared, and only douse 7/8 remains. Thank you for testing,I know you put a lot of work into this quest, so I'll give another try after lunch.
Thanks, I appreciate your support and feedback.
Starts with “go to next map”, bad first impression.
After speaking with the first questgiver, I went east, north, and ran into a door north I could open but was still blocked from going through by an invisible wall (past the first of the two tomb spider encounters). The other door to this room was also openable but blocked by invisible wall.
Spraying arachnocide does not have an animation, neither does cleaning the webs, or pretty much any of the various interactions throughout. This is generally a sign of lack of attention to detail, appropriate animations should be assigned.
Arachnocide is not removed from inventory when used.
There's no intermediate stage questgiver while cleaning the webs, he disappears once he assigns it only to reappear when it's ready to give the next quest.
The quest series related to the spiders and webs could be given as an “and” set of quests instead of a linear set. There's no logical reason it's not, and it would save a large amount of running around.
Because the first ??? quest is required, the quest it assigns should also be in the story using the and logic as you need to do it to get a required key. Since the quest is not in the story, you have to do something that is not listed as a quest in order to complete the main quest. Since you must do it to complete the main quest, it's not a sidequest.
Dynamic lights cause serious flickering lighting issues, particularly when stacked or put close together so the light spheres overlap. That's a game engine problem but one you can do something about. These should pretty much all be converted to static as there's no particular reason for them to be dynamic (the room is well lit anyway, so it's not really "dramatic" to have dynamic lighting).
The light rays are used all over the place, but there is no logical reason for them, no cracks or holes in the roof or anything.
Missing texture on door to duergar area, Cryptic's fault but under your control so it needs to be fixed.
Traps right now do negligible damage, my rogue was being hit for as many as 50 hp of damage when I have 9000+ hit points, so that section just isn't effective unless Cryptic changes traps.
In the room with the guy trying to sell you a diseased horse, the connection to another room is visible. The connection between rooms issue happens for pretty much all the cave rooms. Yes, it's Cryptic's fault the connections are so bad, but this is still a visible issue that is under your control to fix.
The rooms are way, way to large. Most of my two hours time was spent running around. I would rebuild the entirety of the dungeon using much smaller rooms.
Similarly, the rooms are way too empty, more decor is needed since a lot of time is spent running around.
Thanks for the in depth review, and the rating. I did not use any light rays, so I have no idea where those are coming from. I've tried covering up most of the holes in the cave walls, but there are a lot of them, and I think they may vary depending on what your graphics settings are. I know when I lowered mine due to lag from too many people in Protector's Enclave I started seeing more of them. Most of the drow houses and dwarven architecture you'll see is placed over a hole, so they are plentiful. I just now fixed the two doors that could open, the invisible wall wasn't doing it's job of blocking line of sight, so I had to put fake doors that disappear once you reach the right point in the story, and have the regular doors appear at that point. Since I was new to the Foundry when designing some of the quests at the beginning, I made an oversight when it came to the animations. I will see about finding some appropriate ones to assign to each detail. Later on in the dungeon I do make better use of the animations, however.
Firstly I'd like to thank you for creating this quest, as I appreciate any author for their work. This must have been time consuming and no matter what I am glad for content.
I know you are working on another quest, so I hope my suggestions will help you improve the next one.
1) The most important one I can make here is there is a lot of backtracking/backtracing required through huge rooms. For example, right off the bat with NPC Skane, I had to go back and forth 5 times at least retracing through the same, empty rooms again. I think this design can be improved. I don't mind big rooms, but these rooms are empty and boring, so if smaller ones can do, why not? Unless you want to add more stuff/interior decoration to bring it to life.
2) I don't mind long quests, I like immersing myself in long quest, but only if the length is compensated by interesting and relevant plot/story with it. Unfortunately it is a bit lacking. I know about the cats and Neverwipes references, but things like the Spider lady, the Golem, Skane, the pony, there is no relation at all. There is no conclusion to their roles and their purpose. It seems like a bunch of random things thrown in.
3) Some of the things that took time, and may frustrate players, are minor annoyances such as having to open every coffin to find the spiders, and the lack of direction. This may seem old-style RPG, and some people may like it this way. But we now live in an instant-gratification, Angry Birds and Twitter, generation of kids that will not enjoy this. Maybe need to rethink how to present this challenge so it doesn't become annoying.
That's it from me. It was a nice challenge, but definitely there are things that can be improved for the future.
- Titania Silverblade, the Iron Rose of Myth Drannor (Lvl 60 GWF, Destroyer)
- Gwyneth, the Cowardly Cat Burglar Drowling (Lvl 60 TR, Saboteur)
- Lady Rowanne Firehair, Heartwarder of Sune (Lvl 33 DC)
- Satella, Sensate (LvL 44 CW, Renegade, Non-Active)
Check Steppenkat's Foundry Quest Reviews!
Before I begin my review, let me add that I hate the boring left-click combat of Neverwinter but play a level 15 Rogue to counter that. I also run tabletop games of B/X D&D weekly, so read my review with that in mind. Without further ado, on to the review! (Also thar be spoilers ahead!)
I spoke with Skane Soulbane and told him that I was afraid and the quest wouldn't proceed, so I had to try this conversation twice. The second time, I told him that he should pay me more and he vanished in a huff. I think this conversation could be improved so there's a point in having it. Maybe multiple ways to end it and no dead end options that get me stuck in limbo?
After that, I was told to kill 2 spider-infested chambers. The north and east door both worked, but the west door just kept saying I couldn't see the interaction item. I fiddled with it a lot but couldn't resolve this issue so I went and killed the spiders. The quest forced me to return to the kobold claiming to be a Dragonborn, so I acquiesced. After a linear conversation, he told me to get an item that turned out to be an open crate with nothing in it. I'd suggest placing a lid on the crate and making the lid the interaction object!
After using the item on the spider egg clusters and being forced once more to return to Skane, I once more encountered two conversation options where one led to a dead end that stopped me from proceeding. (Protip: Do not include two options unless they both do something different.) I grumbled about railroad DMs and spoke to Skane again, choosing the "correct" option. Suddenly, a waypoint appears to show me the way to a room... where I put out a fire and returned to the kobold(again?!) then he told me to put out 8 fires with 8 waters so I had to do a bit of jogging to collect 8 waters and click on 8 fires and fight 8 burning skeletons.
Whew, finally done with ALL of that. Time to confront a Duergar. Aaaand both conversations end in a battle. OF COURSE THEY DO. And shockingly, I have to return to the kobold again. Back to the beginning once more!
Okay, finally a new area and something different to do! But... all these duergar and devils weren't here before? In fact, a lot of things seem to magically materialize out of thin air in this quest when I need them. Magic, perhaps? And after defeating them, I have to go back to that same old GODS BE DA-Oh wait, a new NPC!? FINALLY.
Okay, I see a religion check here. That's awesome even though I can't use it! Okay, now things are changing for the better, I must admit. I can banish the succubus or attack her or choose to go back and kill the kobold. I choose the third option because I hate that guy! (He's not even a REAL paladin or Dragonborn anyway!) And I was delighted to see that I could actually kill him when I got to him. I returned to the Succubus and gave her his soul for which I was rewarded with a red crystal. Hmm, I wonder what it's for!
Now I have to collect skull keys, but a treasure chest materialized out of nowhere with the first one. Once again, I'm going to have to bumble into these rather than use my player skill and REMEMBER where I saw them. "Fortunately", due to the door that won't work, I can only go one direction. Ahh, and now that I have the second skull key, I can actually interact with the door that was previously unusable. Met the Drow lady and was able to slay her to get her key and crystal. Glad to see options, once more! While still REALLY linear(I can only seem to obtain one key at a time due to locked doors thus pushing me one direction all the time) I'm still enjoying the dungeon a lot more now that I'm not doing fetch quests for the kobold.
Aaand, it's over. I won't get to review it in-game because I've discovered a bug.
Basically, I got the third key from the Drow lady and instead of going through the first door on my way back, I passed it by and used the second door which led to a bunch of mindflayers and getting the blue crystal. Now I have no key to use on the door that I ignored(which I'd be willing to bet money has the fourth key and maybe the royal key in it)
Anyway, 2/5 stars. You write well and you know the Foundry really well, but you either don't know how to make things interesting or you don't honestly care. Removing waypoints is only interesting if the quest is non-linear in nature. Multiple dialogue options serves no purpose if it doesn't lead to multiple outcomes. You could excise the entire Dragonborn fetch quest stuff off the quest and just start with the succubus decision and collecting the four skull keys and you'd have a MUCH better quest on your hands. Fix the bug, or don't, I doubt I'll try this one again. Sorry!
Short code: NW-DJGYNI7NH
In this old school-style adventure, the hero(es) explore an old ruined castle while searching for a fabled magic item at the behest of a wizard.
The Mind Flayers do not give a key. They give an object which you need to "activate" another NPC which you might have seen laying on the floor in a certain room. How you get that NPC's key depends on what you did with Venecia. Sorry you got frustrated, that object blends in to the environment pretty well, and can be difficult to find, especially since you're not even really told to be looking for it.
In fact, your response to me is actually strikingly similar to the Greg Costikyan example they reference that I will quote here:
Short code: NW-DJGYNI7NH
In this old school-style adventure, the hero(es) explore an old ruined castle while searching for a fabled magic item at the behest of a wizard.
Thanks for the compliment. I will make my next quest less exploration based, without so many hidden items/objectives. The needle in the haystack design was a throwback to some older games like what you mentioned. Perhaps you would like Regular Quest, it's very short, and not too difficult, in fact you can scale the difficulty any way you like if you learn the cheat from Bigby.
The quick and dirty version of it is this:
EDIT: Also, I 1-starred Regular Quest, so that should answer that question. It's just a grinding map!
Short code: NW-DJGYNI7NH
In this old school-style adventure, the hero(es) explore an old ruined castle while searching for a fabled magic item at the behest of a wizard.