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More fun with quests

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More fun with quests

from JoeUser Forums

So I’m having a blast making quests. I had forgotten how powerful the system had gotten over the past couple of years of development.

I am going to make a claim here that I hope modders will back me up on: You could, with the current beta, make a Baldur’s Gate style RPG with the quest system.

You’d be insane to try though. Until there’s a real editor, working with XML is a kind of torture once the quests start to get complicated. A typo here or there can really wreck things. It’s very very tedious. Plus, you’d want to have more controls over your “campaign” to disable units and things to make it an RPG and not an empire builder. 

I just want to emphasize that what I’m doing is all being done with Notepad.  If I had some .NET developers handy, I’d ask them to make a proper editor (and in fact, if anyone wants to make some money on the side, I’d be glad to arrange something to someone interested in making a proper quest editor).

Here’s a simple one I made today:

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I bring the little man to me.

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I answer…a duck.

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So in this case, I give units items, name those items, and their descriptions right from the same XML.

…

Ok, let’s try that again..

Guy comes to visit…yada yada yada.  Picking a different answer…

Got the location for the Gauntlets of power. But Mimbly also gave me…dancing shoes.

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Those are some pretty…boots.

Reason #503 as to why you don’t let software developers make art requirements:

Every single unit in the game can be dressed and have it show up on the map. This requirement was added by me after Demigod (a great game btw).  In that game, the armor and weapons you equipped didn’t show up on your unit in the map. They said it would be extremely expensive and difficult to do that. The “bang for the buck” wasn’t there.

But I insisted that the Kumquat engine support it for WOM/FE. 

GPG was right and I was wrong. It was tremendously difficult to do this.  Especially when there are thousands of units running around.

But now that it’s done, it is nice to see it in action.

Anyway…Getting on with our quest…

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The quest can supply a tactical battle map too.  Unfortunately, I don’t have any right now that look like a tomb yet. I could make one with the built in map editor but I’m a dangerously lazy guy and Paul says he’ll make me one next week.

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So here I got to put the units in and name them whatever I’d like.

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And again, I took a piece of equipment someone else made, renamed it and gave it its own description.

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The description is inherited by the object (the gauntlets). It’s not just some pop up description. That initiated game object has the description tied to it now forever.

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And there they are.

Learn more on Elemental: Fallen Enchantress at www.fallenenchantress.com.

157,836 views 66 replies
Reply #51 from Elemental Forums Top

Thanks seanw3.

That opens up potential for many interesting quests.

Example: Encounter Hut with a old mystic, much respected by all the Kingdoms. Slay the mystic and all the kingdoms declare war on you.

Part 1:

At a quest hut, the Player encounters a merchant tells of a legendary mystic; honored by the people of all the Kingdoms/Empires, that guards, a powerful magic sword.

1. I will seek out this mystic. (leads to Part 2)
2. Thank the merchant for his story.

Part 2:

The lady with the magical sword stands before you and says; The sword is more powerful that you know. I hold it for the one that brings me the head of the Demon in the caverns of Yor.

1. Attack the mystic to take the sword - (tactical battle victory: gain an enchanted two-handed sword and lose lots of influence, this is where the sword's power comes from - it unites the kingdoms against any who would take it by force). 

2. Accept the quest to slay the demon prince. (gain an enchanted two-handed sword after returning to the hut of the mystic with the demon's head)

3. Leave this mystic in peace.

Part 3: Return to the hut of the Mystic

Returning to the mystic hut you note a suit of glowing armor on the wall alongside a shimmering shield.

1. Here is the demon's head (gain a two-handed sword)

2. I will take the sword you promised and the armor that I see. (attack the mystic and lose lots of influence, but gain the two handed sword along with a suit of very heavy armor and a very heavy kite shield if you win the battle)

Reply #52 from Elemental Forums Top


...  If I had some .NET developers handy, I’d ask them to make a proper editor (and in fact, if anyone wants to make some money on the side, I’d be glad to arrange something to someone interested in making a proper quest editor).
End of quote

I'll be honest that I haven't loaded up the beta yet but I've been watching the journals pretty religiously since War of Magic released... some of the things that I would have liked seen differently are being addressed in FE and I'm hoping to have a true spiritual successor to Master of Magic.

But, to get to the point -- this quest system has me excited.  I'm the kind of gamer that wants a campaign in the games I play because I want it to engage my mind with a story.  I'm not the guy that plays multiplayer and I can only play a "random scenario" so many times before I'm completely 100% bored of it.

I also happen to be a .NET developer and have been working with it since .NET 1.0 but have kept sharp with all the new technology and toys with each release of .NET (TPL, LINQ, WPF, WCF, etc).  Rather than put my resume here, I'll just put it out there that I'd be interested in entertaining this possibility and feel free to contact me directly with the details.

I'd be pleased to be able to contribute towards the sort of game I've longed for playing since MoM (which, admittedly, didn't have a campaign, but I was also a lot younger so my time spent gaming was more abundant and more easily spent). 

I'll echo what a couple other devs here mentioned and that is the question of whether or not there is any documentation (XML Schema or otherwise) about the quest system.  Clearly somebody can reverse engineer it but if you had documentation it'd certainly make their job a lot easier.

Elemental: Reforged
Reply #53 from Elemental Forums Top

There's no released XML schema for anything, but everything is incredibly easy to understand. It's all "plain text" so there's no need to reverse engineer anything. Basically, if you play a few quests in the game you'll quickly develop a sense of what you can do and what you can't do. Then you can look at the XML and it will be clear as day how the game reads it.

The quests are probably the most difficult part of the XML, but I only say that because they are slightly more difficult than "very easy" for the common person. If you have programming experience, you'll dance through it.

Reply #55 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Frogboy, reply 27
Here's a craptastic screenshot of the tile editor. You use this to make goodie huts and quest locations and other special things that you want on the map.

End of Frogboy's quote

Has the editor undergone any changes? I spend quite some time with it, and although it is generally nice to work with, it did have some annoying issues.

  • Location, orientation, and scale of objects were controlled by sliders. Which are easy enough to use, but quite often I wanted to make a small change and found that the smallest step on these sliders was still to big. Location was doubly annoying, because when you initially place an object with your mouse you have far more precise control over it. So quite often I had to delete an object, select a new one, scale and orient it properly, and then very precisely place it.
    This could easily be fixed by adding a numeral edit box besides the slider, and perhaps another box to set the step size when using the slider.
  • When loading a tile, the first object you selected would revert to it's default scale (and orientation? I'm not sure). A bug obviously, but a very annoying one. Whenever I edited a tile I had previously created I would have to place a new object, de-select it, select it, and delete it, just to make sure it didn't mess up my design.
  • Minor annoyance, but once you start rotating the screen, there is no way to see which way is 'north', so can determine what the tile will look like when placed in the default orientation.
  • Major annoyance: the load interface. Not only was the list very small (you could only see a few file names at a time), scrolling through it was a nightmare (I'm not sure, but I think there was no position indicator, so you couldn't see where you were in the list). Worst was the order in which the files were displayed though, I'm still not sure how they were sorted, by creation date? Could easily be fixed by just using a default windows 'load' interface. I don't care if it looks pretty, it's an editor.

I hope someone took the time to improve the editor, it would make FE a lot more modder friendly..

Reply #56 from Elemental Forums Top

I would like to see a quest that affects both the questor and the questee.

Example:

  1. The witch asks the PC to defeat nest of spiders and bring her spider silk in exchange for gold - this gives the witch spider silk armor and she gains +2 levels
  2. She then asks the PC to bring her the venom sack of a giant spider in exchange for gold - this allows the witch to cast Spider Venom and she gains +2 levels
  3. Then the witch asks the PC to bring her the egg sack of a giant spider in exchange for gold - this allows her to cast Summon Demon Spider (and gives her a spell book of this spell) and she gains +2 levels

The completion of each quests enriches the player while strengthening the Witch. If the PCs wait to attack her after completing all three quests they will face a strong opponent. If the attack her early, they will not receive the gold she gives for completing her quests.

I would like to see a quest that can strengthen other Kingdoms

Example:

Aron the Swordmaster asks the PCs for a loan of 100GP to pay a ransom to rescue his daughter from bandits.

  1. IF PC accepts, Aron is greatful
  2. IF PC refuses the Champion Aron joins the services of another Kingdom that is most hostile to the PC Sovereign. The PC is advised of this via a text box.
  3. IF PC offers to rescue his daughter and is successful Aron offers to join them.
  4. IF PC offers to rescue his daughter and fails Aron joins the services of the Kingdom most hostile to the PC sovereign. The PC is advised of this via a text box.
Reply #57 from Elemental Forums Top

I'm a professional developer too, sign me up as a backup for the editor. I don't have much time these days, but if there's need of particular testing or an extra push to development, send me an email!

Reply #58 from Elemental Forums Top

Ive noticed in a few file folders, stuff for marriage, like in event music folder.  Does that mean we can make marriage type quests and then be able to have a dynasty?  I was one who really liked the dynasty and thought it was pretty neat to have your kids fighting with you...or against!!

Reply #59 from Elemental Forums Top


You could always turn dynasties back on in the ElementalDefs.xml file. In beta 5 we will get a new game modifier that will let us turn them on from anything, including quests. So, you could get married and have offspring from a quest.

Reply #60 from Elemental Forums Top

I am neutral about the idea of dynasties, but if we get that, can we at least make sure that the kids do not pop out less that 50-60 turns after the wedding? Let them be at least teenagers before I introduce them to the elephant.

Reply #61 from Elemental Forums Top


You can set the gestation period to your preference.

Reply #62 from Elemental Forums Top

I hope the gestation period is not 50 - 60 seasons. :)

I get what you are saying but I couldn't resist. Yeah, 50-60 seasons till the babe is born, and comes of age :)

Reply #63 from Elemental Forums Top

Ahh nice about the dynasties.  Ill have to try and track down where the gestation period is as well and for the record...thats a strange way of putting "having children or offspring".  Makes me think of alien or something!

Reply #64 from Elemental Forums Top

Well I certainly don't think of humanity as alien. You are much more than tiny insignificants only here for the pleasure of being stamped out. If that's what you were implying, it's totally untrue. I love HU-MANS. You are all my equal. :cylon:

Reply #65 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting seanw3, reply 60

You could always turn dynasties back on in the ElementalDefs.xml file. In beta 5 we will get a new game modifier that will let us turn them on from anything, including quests. So, you could get married and have offspring from a quest.
End of seanw3's quote

That would be awesone, but for the moment quests are bugged in beta 4 - I tried a custom faction, purchased some quest maps and I was able to finish 4 of them before the game went into non-interactive mode.

 

Reply #66 from Elemental Forums Top

LOL love the cylon image haha.  NO im not implying anything other then gestation is a strange word and always reminds me of aliens.  I re enabled the dynasty, but so far nothing has happened.  Do you still marry someone like you did in original game or does it happen randomly?