Originally posted by Lathial

 

I have played (and tried) pretty much every MMO from UO to Rift and one thing that has become more and more predominant in games is questing.   In most games these days you can quest from level one to cap.  In my opinion, game companies used the single player quest driven games (like Oblivion, Balders Gate etc) and just added a multiplayer option to them. 

Stopped reading there. Seriously, Baldur's Gate 'etc.' are not quest-based. In my opinion the more recent quest-based 'RPG's are a sorry excuse for an RPG.

In the olden days with the real RPGs such as Baldur's Gate or KOTOR I never had the feeling of just working off a list of 'quests' like a chore. You were just progressing through the story and helped some people along the way. Authentic people in an authentic world with authentic problems. Not "will you please take this letter and pass it to the guy 10 ft behind me please?" bullshit.

Also there were no stupid exclamation marks above people's heads.

I don't like 'modern' RPGs and don't get me started with MMOs. They all suck. Well, that is except the ones that are not quest-based. So yeah I (probably?) agree. Screw 'quests' or what they have become.

Originally posted by Boreil anyway mmorpg's dont need to do away with quests all together , but they need to do away with all the 1000 Bs quests you get in between the real quests with meaning . Quests should be about Lore , story and the world around it ,there can still be all those kill 10 of this or go fetch this quest , but present them in a diferent way , not as actual quest content , have traders who send you out for gathering things for them as "hunter/gather" tasks , even have a task board's  in citys to pick up hunt and kill tasks if you want , but make actual quests real and mean something . Take leveling up totaly out of questing , thats what grouping  is for.

This pretty much says it.

Questing is not grinding.

The way that newer games have implemented quests is. It's ridiculous to come up with "thousands of quests" that are essetnailly the same thing.

If it hasnt' been said in this thread already, questing as it is implemented doesn't even seem to be about the mobs you kill (assuming that they are mostly kill x quests) but are about the large chunk of xp and the reward you get. This is what players are honing in on.

If they were to eliminate the large chunk of xp at the end of the quest, fewer players would be doing them. At least as they are currently implemented.

I think this is all mute TBH.

If you remove quests, your still going to be out ina  field killing tons of boars, only now, your not really doing it for anything, other than to be the guy that kills all the boars, if you do it via a quest, then you kill some and get out the way so the next guy can come and do the same.

One of the biggest problems with those other games is that you end up with a field full of dead bores, and 50 people standing around all trying to ninja the next one as it spawns, iv seen this, hell iv done it, its annoying, in this respect question is a good thing.

What I would do is remove all the quest rewards, lets face it most of the time their crap that wouldnt have been good even if you got them 5 levels ago, so strip out all green , white, ie crap quest rewards, keep blue quest rewards for those harder longer quests.

in turn on those dull kill x boars type quests instead of hading the payer an item he will sell to a vendor, 99..999% of the time, just hand him more gold, or give him repoutition that counts for something later in the game, do something ELSE, other than giving out rewards the player wont even use, or want.

Better idea: Let's remove MMORPGs from questing.

I just cant agree with the OP. 

Questing provides context for action.  It provides a story or at least a goal.  Mindless carnage is not fun in my opinion.  This can be applied to any form of entertainment.  If Im watching an action movie, it better have some decent context.  If its just things blowing up and mindless action I get bored very quickly and no amount of watching guys get shot or people getting knocked out is going to matter. 

Games can be a bit different in that they are interactive.  But a good solid goal give context to what Im doing and why and thats a big plus in my opinion. 

Originally posted by Corehaven

I just cant agree with the OP. 

 

Questing provides context for action.  It provides a story or at least a goal.  Mindless carnage is not fun in my opinion.  This can be applied to any form of entertainment.  If Im watching an action movie, it better have some decent context.  If its just things blowing up and mindless action I get bored very quickly and no amount of watching guys get shot or people getting knocked out is going to matter. 

 

Games can be a bit different in that they are interactive.  But a good solid goal give context to what Im doing and why and thats a big plus in my opinion. 

I like mindless carnage.  I like it far better than being some insignificant NPC's rat killing lackey.  Mindless carnage has a soothing repetitiveness that is nterrupted when I have to scurry back to my NPC overlords to hand in quests and get new ones.

MMOs without quests worked in ye old days for same reason all other mechanics worked back then. It was niche hobby for a hardcore group, that not only had access to internet, which itself was not as common as it is now, but also enjoyed RPGs and computer games in general. 

Thing is, these days, where you have much less "hardcore" audience, companies need to cater to the more "casual" crowd, whenever You like it or not. Questing is one of those features that gives a player a visible progress. Sure you could kill 50 boars and get 1/10 of level up, but finishing a quest, with a guaranteed reward and a decent XP boost is much better way to close the day, to feel that you've actually done something in relatievely short time window. 

The problem with quests is that they haven't evolved much since the first implementation. They are pretty much the same quests for all those years, just mob names change. It will be interesting to see how GW2's event-quests will work out as i see it as a step in good direction. Rather than a stuck in ground NPC with ! above their heads telling Yyou to kill 10 boars, you will have more dynamic setting with progressing quest-events that have multiple paths to finish and can progress both ways. 

And no. It's not the same as Public Quests from WAR, it's mor eof a step above the Rift...rifts. 

Thing is, with video games, You are limited by technology. You will never get the same freedom like You would have in pen and paper RPG, there will never be real variety in how things can be approached. Games are entertainment, MMOs generally,w ith few exceptions, are action genre. I can't really see any valid way of re-designing the system drasticly at this point. 

I think there can be casual games for the audience that the above is mentioning. And there can be sandbox games and sandpark games for those who dont like quests. People will pay for what they like. Some might be considered niche, and others may be considered mainstream, thus is the market nowadays.

Originally posted by xDayx

I think there can be casual games for the audience that the above is mentioning. And there can be sandbox games and sandpark games for those who dont like quests. People will pay for what they like. Some might be considered niche, and others may be considered mainstream, thus is the market nowadays.

Of course there can. But then You have people complaining that said sandbox games don't have the same level of polish and quality as the big productions.... not realizing that at some point a load of money needs ot be involved, and money doesn't grow on trees. Games, like every other business is based off cautious calculations. People with money to invest into producing a game won't do it on large scale with something that will appeal just to few if they can get a better outcome from something else. 

There have been plenty of attempts at indie MMO with Darkfall and Mortal Online being the notable example of the recent and they don't really fare so well, they aren't able to establish a large playerbase while even so called "WoW Clones" are able to at least earn some cash from box sales/first 3 months even if it means shutting down a few months later. 

I would not say that it is the quest er say since things respwning is going to happen as a non quest or quest based mmo anyway. It is more that grinding mobs and grinding quests need to be streamline so that you gain the same rough exerince either way you do it. Your teling me that you killing ten boars or whatever that respawn in a non questing game is different then in a quest based one? The one that would help is things like retrieval of unique items in the world being able to be doen rarer then they are to make it that less get to do it.

Originally posted by udon

Sounds like Minecraft is the game for you.

I was about to say GW2 might be what the OP is looking for. They are taking the questing model and throwing it out and going more with objectives. Instead of goto x location and kill 10 rats you are given objectives that  tell you something is going on and you can choose to or not choose to act on that info.

Originally posted by Corehaven

I just cant agree with the OP. 

 

Questing provides context for action.  It provides a story or at least a goal. 

Don't turn on WOW, WOWhead and look up quest, don't cheat. 

Do you remember why you were killing Boars in that zone in WOW?  Do you remember the reason you were given the quest and in what context the quest was using?  Can't remember the reason?  Than context is meaningless, it's one big quest grinding blur.

Originally posted by Nerf09

Originally posted by Corehaven

I just cant agree with the OP. 

 

Questing provides context for action.  It provides a story or at least a goal. 

Don't turn on WOW, WOWhead and look up quest, don't cheat. 

Do you remember why you were killing Boars in that zone in WOW?  Do you remember the reason you were given the quest and in what context the quest was using?  Can't remember the reason?  Than context is meaningless, it's one big quest grinding blur.

I think this just means that quests need to be more engaging and have more meaning behind them.  I think what we actually need is MORE quests.  10-20 times more quests, so there's more variety, so that if you're in a group with 10 people, all of you may have taken different paths and completed different quests with different rewards. 

Originally posted by Madimorga

I like mindless carnage.  I like it far better than being some insignificant NPC's rat killing lackey.  Mindless carnage has a soothing repetitiveness that is nterrupted when I have to scurry back to my NPC overlords to hand in quests and get new ones.

Asian MMOs are looking for you.

I think it is funny that people bag on WoW for being themepark, yet they fail to realize you can go through the entire game only doing PvP or explore the world on your own and never do a single quest. Hardly on rails other than maybe that you can't choose where you start. 

Thanks for all the comments and suggestions.  

It appears that "most" of us would be interested in some sort of overhaul of the questing system. Games like SWTOR, GW2 and The Secret World are all trying to change or enhance questing in some fashion so its clear that the current system is not working- or at the very least- getting old.

The current questing systems are set up to lead you from one hub to the next.  (generalization) Where the items or mobs are located just a few feet from the quest giver.  And, after you have completed all of his/her quests you are sent directly to the next quest giver just over the hill.  

Although my original post was titled - Remove questing from MMORPG's- I really dont think we should remove them entirerly.  I think we need to remove the current system.  

I think a combination of them all should be what developers should put into games.  Dynamic events can be exciting but can quickly become dull (RIFTS) so a wide variety of dynamic events should be the norm.   Also some sort of tutorial quests for beginners that lead them thru the first stages of the game- in this portion quests can be fetch and or kill types.  But once you leave the newbie area quests should be more involved.  Quests that involve many steps and interesting lore- (with no arrows) where you must search for the items (all while exploring the world gaining items and exp) and use the clues you are given to find or solve the quest.  (The Secret World is doing something like this now) 

I am unsure of whether quests should give exp or rewards-  If the rewards "new sword and or currency" where removed maybe something along the lines of status or titles and access to lore and "hidden" areas might work.  

Maybe just lore and status is enough (?)  I think it might be-What if, the reward for doing the quest was the actual journey.  The gear, status, exp and lore are all earned / learned while doing the quest.  Not when you complete it.  In a lot of RPG's the quests are just a means to get gear and exp - not the other way around.

Lath

Originally posted by czekoskwigel

Originally posted by Nerf09

Originally posted by Corehaven

I just cant agree with the OP. 

 

Questing provides context for action.  It provides a story or at least a goal. 

Don't turn on WOW, WOWhead and look up quest, don't cheat. 

Do you remember why you were killing Boars in that zone in WOW?  Do you remember the reason you were given the quest and in what context the quest was using?  Can't remember the reason?  Than context is meaningless, it's one big quest grinding blur.

I think this just means that quests need to be more engaging and have more meaning behind them.  I think what we actually need is MORE quests.  10-20 times more quests, so there's more variety, so that if you're in a group with 10 people, all of you may have taken different paths and completed different quests with different rewards. 

Ugh, the problem with mmorpg's are quests, more would be more bad.  I long for the day when I camped out respawn points in Everquest 1.

Originally posted by Loktofeit

Originally posted by lizardbones

MMORPG started without quests. Companies added quests and they made more money.

Very true. MUDs and the early MMOs has little or no questing. Most players back then were looking for a virtual world, whereas most players now are looking for online entertainment. Quests are a quick and easy way to meet the demands of today's audience.

Or you could look at a lot of those old muds as one big quest.  Kill the evil wizard and such.

Quests are more like from pnp dnd.

Bottom line is this for me at least. Quests make Devs Lazy. Why create an abudance of different activities for players when you can just throw quests in there to cover up grinding. 

In UO my daily activities varied widely. In themeparks you pretty much have the option of questing or PvP and thats if they have PvP. Crafting is a joke in todays MMO's so not worth including. 

It makes every day in an MMO feel like the last which gets boring as hell fast. I wouldn't care about the quests if I had other options. 

Give me a variety of things I can do in game. Then you can keep your quests without having to listen to me complain. 

I agree with most here. The questing systems that are currently used are ancient, but the reason why they "worked well" in the past was because there weren't an impressive amount of them and they were not made to progress you, but to tell a story or to supply you with an alternate way of acquiring gear. They weren't the only thing you did. The problem is that players are so engrossed on quests that never stop appearing that they don't have time for anything else, but following the next shiny "!". The thing that "mindless killing" (when questing is just as mindless with all of the indicators and auto travel) did was allow people to take a break whenever someone else needed help or they felt like taking a break. If you're in the middle of a quest nowadays, you're probably not going to take the time out to "visit" the world or take in everything else that's in the game.

The problem is that there are two main types of players.... players that want to be immersed into a world....and players that want to just pick up the "controls" and "play" the game.

If you want to discuss this from a more developmental/implemental standpoint... feel free to visit my forum... it could be fun.

makemymmo.forumotion.com

:)