Lord of the Rings Online

Originally posted by Bursche

 

Originally posted by DonnieBrasco

 

 

Originally posted by Bursche

 

Yes, once again you are mistaken and miss interpreting what is not meant in a text.

 

Your assumptions miss the point made by miles. What was said is that having 3-5 NPC's giving out the exact same quest mob is lazy cheap boring design, that speeds up the game uncalled.

 

Even if you have to kill the same mobs for more than 1 quest, than these quests are always parts of different quest chains, and *of course* they are NOT given by the same NPC.

 

Actually, there are only 2 places where it is truly common: around the Forsaken Inn, and in Nan Amlug. After that, I can hardly point at any questing place where the mobs overlap in more than 2 chains.

DB

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I wrote: "What was said, that having 3-5 NPC's giving out the same quest mob..."

I remember i had 3 or 4 warg quests at some point too and probably missed a few.

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The part in which I was trying to shift your tight focus from your pet subject a little was: even if you have to kill the same mobs in an area, those quests are from different NPC's *AND* they are part of different quest chains. Thus - it perfectly makes sense. Only allows "joint" questing when someone knows every single quest in an area - like, raising an alt maybe ? - you can look at it as a "reward" for veterans, to be able to level alts more efficiently.

DB

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Originally posted by Yeebo

 

Originally posted by Bursche

 

Originally posted by Yeebo

 

Originally posted by Bursche

 

Originally posted by Yeebo

 

 

Originally posted by Bursche

 

Originally posted by jarish

Originally posted by Yeebo

Originally posted by erandur

Level 28, and I already HAD to take a break from it. Really pathetic way of filling the game up, just I noticed I have 3 identical quests at the moment.. just from a different npc, all kill 12 wargs....

You do realize that means you can get triple the XP you normally would by doing three quests at once?  I'm usually pretty happy when my quests line up that nicely. 

I totally agree I love it when I can kill mutliple birds with one stone.

Making a fast game even faster doesnt really line up nicely ;)

 

Why not just have exp for all alts at the same time too or even better: why not let players type in their wish level and DING. Welcome to Level 50.

It's the lack of innovative content he describes, giving a perfect example of lazy devs.

If you line them up you get 3 times the exp you should for this ammount of running and if you do them one after the next its just stupidly boring. No matter how you put it - its lazy by the devs.

 

Yes, having three random quests (out of hundreds) line up for the same targets if you happen to manage the chains they are embedded in correctly is exactly the same as handing everyone a 50. 

 

I also fail to see how LoTRO would suddenly be a better game if it took ten times as long to level, or they removed all the quests.  I played a game like that, it was launch EQ.  No thanks.

nowhere did i say to remove content or make leveling 10 times slower.

I said it lacks QUALITY and INNOVATIVE content but rather is stuffed full with boring grind shit quests like we had them in dozens of other games before.

YOU where the one loving it to get 3 times the exp you should get for a certain mobhunt.

so why dont you love it to get 500 times that exp just at once? (here is your 50 - you won, congrats)

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Being happy when random quest chains line up nicely if you manage them well is not the same thing as wanting to be handed a 50 on a silver plate.

Not only did you miss the point utterly, but you made the same point that I responded to again.

 

As for this:

nowhere did i say .... to make leveling . . slower

Your original response was:

Making a fast game even faster doesnt really line up nicely

The clear implication of this statement is that (1) you consider the pace of the game to be too fast and (2) having one set of low level quests line up for the same targets makes it even worse. 

So what did you mean?  Is the game way to fast or only a little too fast?  Or did you mean that the speed of the game would be just fine except for the three random warg quests?

No you never said make the levelling "ten times" slower.  But you did imply that it's too fast.

No-where did you ask for quests to be removed.  However you state repeatedly how "crappy" and "unoriginal" the quests are (from above "boring grind shit quests like we had them in dozens of other games before").  From the tone of your posts I assumed that you are someone that despises quest based solo friendly MMOs.  Was I mistaken?

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Yes, once again you are mistaken and miss interpreting what is not meant in a text.

 

Your assumptions miss the point made by miles. What was said is that having 3-5 NPC's giving out the exact same quest mob is lazy cheap boring design, that speeds up the game uncalled.

The last thing lotro needs is shortcuts and speed-ups. Putting content in that was so obviously lazy and poorly thought of is just an insult to the players.

Innovative and dynamic quests that change their route depending on luck, current (dynamic) circumstances and player decission would spice things up much better than tripple exp.

Of course such quest concepts can not be copy pasted from other quests and take twice or three times the dev time. With an undemanding player base like you represent it thats of course a useless investment for a dev team.

Bursche

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The only point you really addressed was whether you hate quests or not, and what you came up with there doesn't make the first bit of sense.  Let me see if I have this straight.....

 

"Three NPCs in the lonelands send you to kill the same wargs, if you know their quest chains well enough to cue up all three of those quests at once.  Therefore the quest design of LoTRO sucks."

Would it have been less "lazy and poorly thought out" (your words) if one guy sent you to kill rabbits, and another to kill wolves?    The point you are harping on is so nitpicky it verges on irrational.

Would it be nice if LoTRO had more dynamic quests with branch points leading to different outcomes?  Sure.  I'd like to see that in any MMO.  But LoTRO is no worse than any number of quest based MMOs in this respect.  In fact it does have a number of quests with innovative mechanics.  The "avoid eyballs" quests and some of the loremaster class quests come to mind.  The book quests are also far more cinematic and compelling than epic quests I've seen in other MMOs.    

However,  for the most part I 'm just happy to have quest text to read that's better than what an average  high school kid could come up with.  Sadly, that alone is a rarity in MMOs (and a subtlety I am guessing is lost on you).  I also really enjoy the stories that emerge from a lot of the quest arcs.  I don't mind being sent to kill ten foozles or deliver a package if there's a decent story connected to it.  

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Well i could not avoid more points because you made none.

As you completely fail to imagine the concept of dynamic quests and a dynamic world i will try (for one last time) to explain it to you.

NO i dont want to be sent killing rabbits, wolves, boars, lions, elefants, santa clausses I AM SICK DOING SO.

I want a world where:

1 NPC sends a player to kill lions.

and he sends another 25 players. Then he has enough lion fur for the rest of the week. (Oh i hear the crying of all those other adventurers not getting the same quest!! WTF my alt had that quest too!) but hang on... all those dead lions cause the rabbit population to explode and eat aunt sophie's salat. She gives out a quest to kill rabbits. Once enough rabbits are dead something else is triggered and so on and so on.

This is called a dynamic environment that interacts with the general behaviour of players.

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Originally posted by jarish

They can't make every quest too involved or complicated otherwise these updates that they give us every couple of months would take alot longer thane that to make. So you get some that they were able to put more time in and make them ones that people enjoy more and others are just filler. It takes alot of work to make these quests besides writing the dialog. I would rather have these filler quests than only 1 update a year or something like that. I think it is pretty amazing that they have been pretty faithful to give us the updates they have in only a couple of months each time. I mean other games you don't see anything for a couple of years and we already have had 5 updates + one more in a couple of months and the 1st expansion within a year and 6 mo.

Again, I refer to Tal Bruinen. It was a large area they added to the existing TrollShaws. It didn't get a lot of attention. There are several filler kill quests, but they aren't all for the same mob. You kill lots of different things, not lots of the same thing. I understand the need for filler, most of the time people don't read the quest story anyway.

What they do see is the objective and when it's the same objective over and over, it's a grind. There is enough grinding with titles, traits, pages, reputation, and crafting mats.

Originally posted by Bursche

 

Well i could not avoid more points because you made none.

 

As you completely fail to imagine the concept of dynamic quests and a dynamic world i will try (for one last time) to explain it to you.

NO i dont want to be sent killing rabbits, wolves, boars, lions, elefants, santa clausses I AM SICK DOING SO.

I want a world where:

1 NPC sends a player to kill lions.

and he sends another 25 players. Then he has enough lion fur for the rest of the week. (Oh i hear the crying of all those other adventurers not getting the same quest!! WTF my alt had that quest too!) but hang on... all those dead lions cause the rabbit population to explode and eat aunt sophie's salat. She gives out a quest to kill rabbits. Once enough rabbits are dead something else is triggered and so on and so on.

This is called a dynamic environment that interacts with the general behaviour of players.

 

 

Completely impossible. It would only work in an "MMO" where the number of players on a server would be limited to a very small amount, like 100 person at a time.

OR in a completely instanced world.

In an open MMO with (tens of) thousands of players, you can NOT balance dynamic quests. You don't need to be a scientist in computer gaming to understand that. If you want a 100 thousands players play your MMO, you will need to add static quests. Lots of them. No developer can affort hundreds and hundreds of content writers working 24/7 on new content, and another couple hundred programmers/testers to work on dynamic balance also 24/7.

Such a game might never exist...

DB

Originally posted by DonnieBrasco

 

Originally posted by Bursche

 

Well i could not avoid more points because you made none.

 

As you completely fail to imagine the concept of dynamic quests and a dynamic world i will try (for one last time) to explain it to you.

NO i dont want to be sent killing rabbits, wolves, boars, lions, elefants, santa clausses I AM SICK DOING SO.

I want a world where:

1 NPC sends a player to kill lions.

and he sends another 25 players. Then he has enough lion fur for the rest of the week. (Oh i hear the crying of all those other adventurers not getting the same quest!! WTF my alt had that quest too!) but hang on... all those dead lions cause the rabbit population to explode and eat aunt sophie's salat. She gives out a quest to kill rabbits. Once enough rabbits are dead something else is triggered and so on and so on.

This is called a dynamic environment that interacts with the general behaviour of players.

 

 

Completely impossible. It would only work in an "MMO" where the number of players on a server would be limited to a very small amount, like 100 person at a time.

 

OR in a completely instanced world.

In an open MMO with (tens of) thousands of players, you can NOT balance dynamic quests. You don't need to be a scientist in computer gaming to understand that. If you want a 100 thousands players play your MMO, you will need to add static quests. Lots of them. No developer can affort hundreds and hundreds of content writers working 24/7 on new content, and another couple hundred programmers/testers to work on dynamic balance also 24/7.

Such a game might never exist...

DB

lol yeah, the same was said about MMO's in game magazines 20 years ago. And about almost every invention humans ever made.

All it takes is to create closed trigger circles that interact with each other. Not really a big deal and partially done in other games already. DAoC for example had elements of this and also Ryzorm (R.I.P.)

But sure, impossible - LOTRO is the highest evolution of MMO gaming. Newsflash, its not, its a backstep in many aspects.

Originally posted by Bursche

 

But sure, impossible - LOTRO is the highest evolution of MMO gaming. Newsflash, its not, its a backstep in many aspects.

 

 

When did anybody say that?????

LOTRO is a top quality, quite successfull game that has brought only a few innovations to the genre, and nothing really revolutionary at all.

But if you keep on insisting that multiple parallell questing using the same mobs is the worst thing that can happen to this (and, almost every other) game, then just don't play those games.

DB

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