Quote:

Original post by robert4818 Quote: Pattern: Hero go to LOCATIONX and recover the ITEMX from BADGUYSX for a reward of REWARDX. LOCATIONX = { AbandondeCastle, CaveOutsideTown, HermitsHut, DesertedGraveyard } ITEMX = { ImportantLetter, PreciousRing, MagicBean, KingsSword } BADGUYSX = { BigOrc & BunchOfOrcs, EvilWizard & KillerBats, BanditChief & BunchOfAssasins, EvilCyborg } REWARDX = { ClueToBigQuest, BunchOfGold, TreasureMap, HardyHandshake } 4x4x4 = 64 combinations from just one pattern... I tend to disagree here. I see at most with this simple set here. 4 quests, maybe 16 depending on how dramatically different the change of bad guys will be to your game. All of them are Item Retrieve quests. The only real difference is the map. After playing COH I can tell you that there really is no difference between trying to find a gun rack, a stack of dynamite, or even computers. Its just different window dressings for the same thing. The reward does not change the quest at all. Its like saying you have a larger variety of bad guys if one gives you 50xp and another gives 58xp with no other changes. However you are right, the simple menu system is infact what I have in the original post. However I went for a larger perspective than you did in your descritpion. In fact you're description above, could be easily incorporated in the main idea. Some things that I definately feel need to be incorporated into a random quest generator, are as follows. Unpredictability. The player should never feel 100% confident that the quest they get will work like they have planned. This is why I incorporated the surprise element of Step 2. If your player is sitting there and says "I've got another (insert quest type) here...this is what I need to do" then I believe as a developer you have failed. Thats not to say that the quests should be put together so hap-hazardly that they make no sense, but that the player should never be left to feel complacent. Connection. One of the biggest problems with Random quest generators tends to be that they are, well, so random. I know this is an oxymoron, however, the point is that depending on how you get your missions, there should be at least some tenuous connection between a few of your quests. Thats not to say that EVERY quest needs to connect, but some stuff needs to connect. It gives the game a taste of continuity. As for numbers... I listed 6 very general goals in the OP. If you combine any number of those goals together to form one quest you get a large number of quests...don't quot my number because statistics was never my strong point... 720 If you do at least two variations one where the goals are done in a chain of dungeons, and another where every one is done in the same dungeon, that's 1440 quests. If you toss in variations of how to do the quests, say about 5 different types. (stealth, kill all, mine-field, etc)that gives you 7200 quests. Now toss in the chance of tossing in a random surprise in the middle of a quest (i.e. replacing the quest with one of the others), and that bumps your number of quests up to 5,184,000. This is without talking about map options, rewards, or even specific targets.

I stated :
"Thats just 4 option lists and you could add several more 'options' to increase
the number of combinations."
just to keep it simple (8 substitution types each with 4 different options = 64K ...)

Compounding simple quests into more complex ones could be done ad nauseum to raise the combinations to huge numbers (as youve shown) BUT the more complex they are the less likely the player will complete them , too long (players dont like reading paragraphs of quest log to try to remember what they were doing), interfering with game's superplot, start interfering with themself (more logic checks to prevent this), might become illogical/incoherant - coordinating them along a plausible theme requires a magnitude more code logic, etc...


A simpler way (one way) of chaining is to have items or info presented in one quest be the activation for another quest (quests activated with NPCs questgivers detecting the trigger and offering a second tier quest (probably also randomized) when the player later walks by.

A pool of initial quest trigger items might be fed in randomly as loot for the generic (first tier) random quests (making it a matter of chance which ones players find) and chance that sometime later the player will meet up with the NPC in someother location to lead to the next chained quest.

The quest trigger item itself might have clue text (simple puzzle??/hints) leading the player to the NPC (effectively making it a triple linked quest).

The key to a good mission generator is always Variety. In order to keep the player going, you need to have a large variety of missions. The more things switched out, the better you are. However, not every change is as important in providing true variety as others.

IMO the order of precedence in variety is as follows:

Primary Objectives (What you need to accomplish)
-Rescue the princess
-steal the crown jewels
-Kill the Wizard
Secondary Objectives (How you need to accomplish it)
-Without being seen
-While killing everyone
Map
-Castle
-Sewers
-Warehouse
Special Circumstances
-Surprise Change of Objectives...
-Weather
-Timelimit
-On a flying Ship
-Meteor Shower
-Flooding
Enemies
-Orcs
-Goblins
-Zombies
-Thugs
Extra paint jobs...
-Added touches to the maps..
-Pictures
-Different Items to pick up / collect
Reward
-Money
-Xp
-Items

I don't like dynamic missions. Ultimately, you are generally doing the same things. In the oringal posters idea, these are the the basic things you can do:

Interacting with NPCs or objects
Deliver and return
Kill X
Protect X
Live through an attack

You can combine these, put them in steps, instance dynamic dungeons, and code for occassional surprises, but ultimately the player is doing the same tasks over and over. . . just in different order.

If you don't script things then you have to use scripted presets for the mission descriptions. While you can pull from different strings and mix this up a bit, the mixing up makes it hard to create characterization, and other posters have already indicated many of the continuity issues and othe problems with dynamic mission generators.

Also, I think the way you make better content is to increase the types of missions and mission goals. For instance, instead of just Deliver X, Kill X, and the Protect X with a chance of getting a surprise Interact with an NPC objective, there should be NEW objectives that are not currently done.

Here are some ideas for using in instanced missions:

1. Find the exit and escape in time while avoiding falling debris and beating opponents quickly to get past them.

2. Frequent boss fights with single-player boss fight elements. Find their weakness and exploit it.

3. Puzzle content - both logic puzzles that can be beaten by cheaters that use the net and dynamic puzzles that require skill like in Puzzle Pirates.

4. Other race against the clock objectives.

5. Special mode missions that change up gameplay. Examples:

In CoH:

a. A mission where there are super-power dampening fields that must be sniped with the "special power" rocket-launcher you get from a contact at the front of the mission.

b. A mission that removes all travel powers and adds exploration elements by forcing players to learn the correct route of teleportation devices in the mission to get to the boss.

In World of Warcraft:

a. A dungeon that prevents healing except through the use of special items given to every player.

b. A dungeon in which all players are turned "undead" and must use their new temporary powers to fight out.

Use dynamic stuff in your level designer's tools, but don't omit the human element by making everything dynamic. Level designers should be able to do everything you have suggested by making choices to make a mission do any of those things, but I think you ned a human element to make the content associated with them intriguing.

Finally, I hate dynamic mission generators because they are more difficult to debug. Instead of going to Mission X, you have to fiddle with your generator. You might have to do this anyway if your missions contain dynamic elements, but this gives the devs more fine control as you can adjust two sytems instead of just the one really big one.

Based on my experiences on AO, and asheron's call, here's my too cents what:

I wish there was more options for selections of missions, such as how far away. I liked the ability to make keys for other players, if I wanted or needed help in a mission. I didn't like multiple stage quests because then you have to find out the place. If there is multiple stage quests then have them in one place such as a play area.

I don't think quests should be the whole game. Although I really liked going on single player quests (it's hard to find people to adventure with), I don't think they should be the whole game. Crafting, guild activities, exploring, etc,. should be included because sometimes doing missions gets repetitive. I personally liked going off and exploring the winderness. One thing I didn't like is not being able to enter certain lands. I liked being able to buy maps.

Players should have a influence on the world. If there is no effect on the world because of there actions, then the player feels what's the purpose of this? Anarchy online's, conflict between the clans and Omnitech, should be mission based versus territory based. Personally, I would like too see a thing where players could input there own quests, such as post a message on a bulletin board or give underlings orders.

Auto-generated quests cannot replace the primary missions of a games plot.

Its is just too hard to create randomized quests that fit together and match the games theme for this method to be the sole plot driving mechanism.

I only see them as filler. In MMORPG many players cant always get together with their groups and need things to do solo. In single player games, such small quests can serve a way to build up the char and obtain resources to further the
'big' (hand crafted) quests. Short quests allow a flexibility for players who only have limited time online or new players who might not be ready for more complex/difficult missions.

Even simple auto-quests would be a major improvement for most of the existing MMORPG games which rely on static spawns.


It might not be impossible to create a good game fully driven by auto-generated quests, but it requires too much work for the game companies to invest.

Quote:

Original post by Anonymous Poster It might not be impossible to create a good game fully driven by auto-generated quests, but it requires too much work for the game companies to invest.

Agreed. Which is why it is up to us, the hobbyists and independent developers, in order to see if it can be done!

Quote:

Original post by Anonymous Poster Quote: Original post by Anonymous Poster It might not be impossible to create a good game fully driven by auto-generated quests, but it requires too much work for the game companies to invest. Agreed. Which is why it is up to us, the hobbyists and independent developers, in order to see if it can be done!

Ack, that last Anonymous Poster was me. There's too many Anonymous Posters in this thread to make it more confusing without assigning a name to my posts!

By the way, I strongly think that this approach can be done and done well, although I don't think the commercial companies will touch it for quite some time because there is too much risk, not too much work. Unless there's the precedent that shows it is possible, they won't see that it's worth their time. And frankly, if people are buying the stuff they put out now in record numbers, from a commercial perspective why do they need bother?

I like the idea of having villains come back for more if they some how survive the end of a quest. It can also work the otherway - make some villians much more powerful then they should be, so when (if) the player(s) loose, they wake up the next day battered and bruised, but it seems the villian left them for dead. Then the villian might want to track the players down because they are witnesses (if he finds out they're alive), or the players could use the situation to their advantage.

There should be an option so that the player can activate a quest (or a quest chain) to try and hunt down any villians that they've encountered before.

Some players might get more then 1 villian - in which case they could team up :)
Players in the same clan/guild/party could find themselves facing a group of other player's villians who are working together to take down the guild.

Quote:

Original post by dink I don't like dynamic missions. Ultimately, you are generally doing the same things. In the oringal posters idea, these are the the basic things you can do: Interacting with NPCs or objects Deliver and return Kill X Protect X Live through an attack You can combine these, put them in steps, instance dynamic dungeons, and code for occassional surprises, but ultimately the player is doing the same tasks over and over. . . just in different order. If you don't script things then you have to use scripted presets for the mission descriptions. While you can pull from different strings and mix this up a bit, the mixing up makes it hard to create characterization, and other posters have already indicated many of the continuity issues and othe problems with dynamic mission generators. Also, I think the way you make better content is to increase the types of missions and mission goals. For instance, instead of just Deliver X, Kill X, and the Protect X with a chance of getting a surprise Interact with an NPC objective, there should be NEW objectives that are not currently done. Here are some ideas for using in instanced missions: 1. Find the exit and escape in time while avoiding falling debris and beating opponents quickly to get past them. 2. Frequent boss fights with single-player boss fight elements. Find their weakness and exploit it. 3. Puzzle content - both logic puzzles that can be beaten by cheaters that use the net and dynamic puzzles that require skill like in Puzzle Pirates. 4. Other race against the clock objectives. 5. Special mode missions that change up gameplay. Examples: In CoH: a. A mission where there are super-power dampening fields that must be sniped with the "special power" rocket-launcher you get from a contact at the front of the mission. b. A mission that removes all travel powers and adds exploration elements by forcing players to learn the correct route of teleportation devices in the mission to get to the boss. In World of Warcraft: a. A dungeon that prevents healing except through the use of special items given to every player. b. A dungeon in which all players are turned "undead" and must use their new temporary powers to fight out. Use dynamic stuff in your level designer's tools, but don't omit the human element by making everything dynamic. Level designers should be able to do everything you have suggested by making choices to make a mission do any of those things, but I think you ned a human element to make the content associated with them intriguing. Finally, I hate dynamic mission generators because they are more difficult to debug. Instead of going to Mission X, you have to fiddle with your generator. You might have to do this anyway if your missions contain dynamic elements, but this gives the devs more fine control as you can adjust two sytems instead of just the one really big one.

Wow...you've completely missed the point of my posts.

First, I've never said that a dynamic mission generator is to be the core of the game. In fact, if you read down later I've said that it is not intended to be a replacement for real content. However, for quick modular play, a dynamic generator is a plus. I don't think any game was ever hurt by having one...if they also had real scripted games as well.

The basic things you can do that I listed in the OP are the basics of ALL quests, not just the pre-scrpited ones. You name a quest, and its main objectives will fall into one of those categories.

Lord of the Rings is a deliver ring to mount doom and return quest, with a protect the ring tossed in.
Wizard of Oz, that was a multi-step quest. Go interact with Wizard, Go Kill Witch, Find Broom stick, Return.

Everything else you just mentioned fall under the same set of rules...but if you notice in my last post, I said special circumstances are important for a mission generator. Everything you mentioned from WOW and COH are special circumstances.

robert4818 - I think I did speak to your original post, and went into great detail about some of the reasons why pre-scripted quests are inferior to custom content, even for short play sessions.

Ideally, players should be able to get online and beat a custom quest within an hour or at least make progression on one of the steps within the quest.

For the many reasons I gave (repetitive objectives, random scripting is bad, less fine control given for debugging, etc.), I'd scrap the entire random mission generator and concentrate on making high quality tools for my level designers that allow them to choose from a larger variety of quest types than those you originally mentioned. Give them the tools to create a ton of variety and to write custom script for every mission. If you are going to be so old fashioned as to use text boxes to tell your story then at least make it a good one. :)

If my post seemed so dismissive that you assumed I missed the point, then I apologize.

You think a custom mission generator would be helpful for giving people with short gameplay sessions something to do. I think this leads them towards doing comparitively boring and less interesting content in your game and would hurt retention. You will get player complaints that a) they used the mission generator and out-leveled good custom content and that b) the dev team uses the custom mission generator as a cure-all for holes in the content (places where there is not enough content to level while doing fun things).

Feel free to ignore my "DOOOOM!!!" post. Others have given you good ideas on how to make it work.

Good luck.