Post by Gando on Aug 28, 2008 20:23:49 GMT -5
I know you said that you want people to have the option to break quests and otherwise act "in character" despite any ingame effects this might have but I think the Harrington quest breaks in an undesirable way if you don't do it exactly right. Having restarted so many characters I forgot the sequence and went straight to the greed imp lair (standing on the corner of the building and searching) because I had bunch of differing ideas on how to defeat that part as a pure int caster Zulgor. In the end I chose to spend the remaining points in my levelables to up my agi and charisma and made a summon tunneler spell (and upped my strength a bit) to get through the wall that wont die. This worked fine and I actually had enough charisma that I ended up not needing the licialhyd for the Nymph. BUT when I went to talk to Harrington (duh?) his maid wouldnt let me in...Ok thats understandable... I skipped parts of the quest so it broke. BUT it also breaks the rest of the stealthy viper quests and that doesnt make sense. At the very most s/he might get a reprimand for not complying with the ("storyline") commands of his superiors. But when the npcs act like s/he still is on the quest when in fact s/he isnt there is a problem.
Well I think its a problem anyway. Traditionally RPGS give the open ended approach more rigorous error testing in the sense that if the party does something the DM does not expect he has some contingencies set up and consequences roll on...and continuity is preserved. If the DM really wants the players to continue with a certain storyline he can rethread the hooks at a variety of prepared areas where they might have the appropriate encounters. If not they never get the feeling they missed anything unless they actively question this. I believe the same should apply to a computer game that simulates an rpg.
Well I think its a problem anyway. Traditionally RPGS give the open ended approach more rigorous error testing in the sense that if the party does something the DM does not expect he has some contingencies set up and consequences roll on...and continuity is preserved. If the DM really wants the players to continue with a certain storyline he can rethread the hooks at a variety of prepared areas where they might have the appropriate encounters. If not they never get the feeling they missed anything unless they actively question this. I believe the same should apply to a computer game that simulates an rpg.
