Putting the 'role' back in role-playing games since 2002.
Donate to Codex
Good Old Games
  • Welcome to rpgcodex.net, a site dedicated to discussing computer based role-playing games in a free and open fashion. We're less strict than other forums, but please refer to the rules.

    "This message is awaiting moderator approval": All new users must pass through our moderation queue before they will be able to post normally. Until your account has "passed" your posts will only be visible to yourself (and moderators) until they are approved. Give us a week to get around to approving / deleting / ignoring your mundane opinion on crap before hassling us about it. Once you have passed the moderation period (think of it as a test), you will be able to post normally, just like all the other retards.

Elder Scrolls What makes for good quest design?

Vlajdermen

Arcane
Joined
Nov 19, 2017
Messages
2,192
Location
Catholic Serbia
Ever since the top 101 came out, this particular aspect of RPGs has been on my mind. It's usually the main point of praise for Oblivion, and I've said it myself that it's the best part of Underrail. I didn't elaborate much because I didn't know how to explain the difference between good and bad quest design, but after pondering on it, I've come up with some general guidelines.


  • Interact with the game world
If the world should feel like a cohesive whole, the quests should reflect that. They should be parts of it, not isolated, insular pieces of gameplay. A good example of this is the Rattay tourney in KCD: it starts off as more or less a distraction, but when you come to a certain town later in the game, you meet a man whose son was killed after winning, so the tourney becomes an actual event with emotional stakes, rather than just a way to grind combat stats. I'm just using this example because it's fresh in my mind, KCD, Arcanum and the Fallout games are generally great at this. They make you feel like you and these characters inhabit the same world.


  • Have different difficulty and outcomes for different builds
This one's pretty simple, and was pointed to by Sweeper a while ago. What's the point of having builds if everyone can do everything? Have quests that aren't doable unless you invest this many points into repair, or that many points into persuasion. Have crowds of tough enemies that can be circumvented by stealth, but not persuasion, and that are more vulnerable to chemical weapons than regular guns. Sometimes, have optional objectives that reward the player for going the "jack of all trades" route, other times, punish him for not investing enough in one skill.

Bottom line: when playing an RPG, you should frequently get a sense of missed opportunity that'll motivate you to try a different build on your next playthrough.


  • Escalate in complexity
While almost every good RPG does this, I wanna point to Shadowrun: Dragonfall as an example. I've said before that it has a "blockbuster feel" to it, and that's because all the main quests feel like they have their own 3-act structure. Not just in the story, but in the gameplay too. They start off small, setting up the mechanics and general feel of the quest, and gradually build up to a big showdown. They're all memorable, not just because they're mechanically fun but because they serve as a payoff for all the story elements and gameplay mechanics you've been familiarized with.
It's never just "go there and kill 20 kobolds".


  • Surprise the player
The specific thing I pointed out about Underrail's quest design is that it likes to shake things up mechanically. There's the doppleganger island, the bit where you're ecsaping a room that's flooding with mutagen, and so on, but something I find interesting in retrospect is the mech-piloting mission. Throughout the game, you come across burrowers, which are tough enemies that always appear in managable numbers, except in one quest where you have to fight off a massive infestation with a mech that's powerful, but can't be healed. It's interesting because that's a common trope in non-RPGs like Chronicles of Riddick. I'm not sure if taking cues from other genres is always a good idea and Underrail pulled it off.
This point isn't about Underrail specifically, it's about how quests should ocasionally put an interesting spin on the mechanics, UR is just the best example to my knowledge.

Anything I missed? How else would you define good quest design?
 

Roguey

Codex Staff
Staff Member
Sawyerite
Joined
May 29, 2010
Messages
36,741
A reasonable amount of supported options to go through it.

It's usually the main point of praise for Oblivion

:what: Oblivion's quests were boilerplate with the lone exception of the Dark Brotherhood questline which is Hitman in Cyrodiil.
 

Butter

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Oct 1, 2018
Messages
8,639
A reasonable amount of supported options to go through it.

It's usually the main point of praise for Oblivion

:what: Oblivion's quests were boilerplate with the lone exception of the Dark Brotherhood questline which is Hitman in Cyrodiil.
Oblivion has some fun and imaginative quest premises. There's the floating inn that gets hijacked and driven out to sea, rescuing the guy within the painting, the village where everyone was turned invisible, etc. The quest resolutions were usually a letdown, because by this point TES had all of its interesting mechanics shorn off.
 
Vatnik
Joined
Sep 28, 2014
Messages
12,198
Location
USSR
Ever since the top 101 came out, this particular aspect of RPGs has been on my mind. It's usually the main point of praise for Oblivion, and I've said it myself that it's the best part of Underrail. I didn't elaborate much because I didn't know how to explain the difference between good and bad quest design, but after pondering on it, I've come up with some general guidelines.


  • Interact with the game world
If the world should feel like a cohesive whole, the quests should reflect that. They should be parts of it, not isolated, insular pieces of gameplay. A good example of this is the Rattay tourney in KCD: it starts off as more or less a distraction, but when you come to a certain town later in the game, you meet a man whose son was killed after winning, so the tourney becomes an actual event with emotional stakes, rather than just a way to grind combat stats. I'm just using this example because it's fresh in my mind, KCD, Arcanum and the Fallout games are generally great at this. They make you feel like you and these characters inhabit the same world.


  • Have different difficulty and outcomes for different builds
This one's pretty simple, and was pointed to by Sweeper a while ago. What's the point of having builds if everyone can do everything? Have quests that aren't doable unless you invest this many points into repair, or that many points into persuasion. Have crowds of tough enemies that can be circumvented by stealth, but not persuasion, and that are more vulnerable to chemical weapons than regular guns. Sometimes, have optional objectives that reward the player for going the "jack of all trades" route, other times, punish him for not investing enough in one skill.

Bottom line: when playing an RPG, you should frequently get a sense of missed opportunity that'll motivate you to try a different build on your next playthrough.


  • Escalate in complexity
While almost every good RPG does this, I wanna point to Shadowrun: Dragonfall as an example. I've said before that it has a "blockbuster feel" to it, and that's because all the main quests feel like they have their own 3-act structure. Not just in the story, but in the gameplay too. They start off small, setting up the mechanics and general feel of the quest, and gradually build up to a big showdown. They're all memorable, not just because they're mechanically fun but because they serve as a payoff for all the story elements and gameplay mechanics you've been familiarized with.
It's never just "go there and kill 20 kobolds".


  • Surprise the player
The specific thing I pointed out about Underrail's quest design is that it likes to shake things up mechanically. There's the doppleganger island, the bit where you're ecsaping a room that's flooding with mutagen, and so on, but something I find interesting in retrospect is the mech-piloting mission. Throughout the game, you come across burrowers, which are tough enemies that always appear in managable numbers, except in one quest where you have to fight off a massive infestation with a mech that's powerful, but can't be healed. It's interesting because that's a common trope in non-RPGs like Chronicles of Riddick. I'm not sure if taking cues from other genres is always a good idea and Underrail pulled it off.
This point isn't about Underrail specifically, it's about how quests should ocasionally put an interesting spin on the mechanics, UR is just the best example to my knowledge.

Anything I missed? How else would you define good quest design?
I'm blasé about "what makes a good rpg" discussions, but this is such a shit list, wow...!

90% of what makes a game good is good writing and good combat.

"Surprise the player" is just one of many things that good writing does. While "have replayability" is not even a prerequisite, as proven by Disco Elysium.

Posted & unsubscribed.
 

V_K

Arcane
Joined
Nov 3, 2013
Messages
7,714
Location
at a Nowhere near you
The one most important thing for good quest design is good level design. Even the most basic fetch quest can be enjoyable if the mcguffin is at the bottom of an expertly designed dungeon full of secrets, puzzles and alternative routes. On the other hand, if your quests amount to running through linear corridors, killing trash mobs and watching cutscenes, no amount of window dressing and see-an-sees will make it good.
 

CryptRat

Arcane
Developer
Joined
Sep 10, 2014
Messages
3,625
Intricate level design. I'm inside a dungeon to find a macguffin, let my party look for hidden places, locks ands buttons, freeze ice or use a jump spell, uncode hints and enter keywords. Hacking skill gives access to documents, and you need to look for hints yourself inside the documents. Persuasion allows to bribe the guard by actively giving him a baseball card because some hint told you he collects those. Directly use a rope, and dexterity determines how high you can go. Simply having to actively use skill and items means you may miss something and look for another way, which is great. Minigames suck, systemic gameplay does not. Typing dialogs is a plus.
 

Roguey

Codex Staff
Staff Member
Sawyerite
Joined
May 29, 2010
Messages
36,741
Oblivion has some fun and imaginative quest premises. There's the floating inn that gets hijacked and driven out to sea, rescuing the guy within the painting, the village where everyone was turned invisible, etc. The quest resolutions were usually a letdown, because by this point TES had all of its interesting mechanics shorn off.
Morrowind having levitation didn't make its quests any more interesting. :M
 

Vlajdermen

Arcane
Joined
Nov 19, 2017
Messages
2,192
Location
Catholic Serbia
I'm blasé about "what makes a good rpg" discussions, but this is such a shit list, wow...!

90% of what makes a game good is good writing and good combat.
"What makes a good RPG"? We're not discussing that, we're specifically discussing quest design. I couldn't have been more clear about that. Keep your chromosomes in check.

Posted & unsubscribed
:(
 
Self-Ejected

RNGsus

Self-Ejected
Joined
Apr 29, 2011
Messages
8,106
Have dungeons and quests that are doable with every build, just multiple paths, some that end in failure, and failure may open other options toward your desired end.
 

Harthwain

Magister
Joined
Dec 13, 2019
Messages
5,426
One thing you missed is not having strict criteria for finishing a quest. Or, to be more specific, having criteria flexible enough that you can accomplish the quest in a variety of ways (including doing something quest designer didn't think of).

This could be as simple as bringing an object to the quest giver. All you really have to do is obtain said object, thus giving you a free hand as to the manner with which you set out to accomplish your task. It's important to note that while the object in question can't be too common, it should be too obscure either. Otherwise you are pretty much limiting the player (unless the object "circulates" in the game's environment, meaning giving you means of extracting the object at various points in time).
 

octavius

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Aug 4, 2007
Messages
19,702
Location
Bjørgvin
The most memorable TES quest for me was in Morrowind when I followed up on a comment by an NPC, started investigating and ended up finding the Lord's Mail, just by paying attention, noticing visual clues and exploring. No quest compass, and not even a quest log.
I wish more quests were like that.
 

Vlajdermen

Arcane
Joined
Nov 19, 2017
Messages
2,192
Location
Catholic Serbia
The most memorable TES quest for me was in Morrowind when I followed up on a comment by an NPC, started investigating and ended up finding the Lord's Mail, just by paying attention, noticing visual clues and exploring. No quest compass, and not even a quest log.
I wish more quests were like that.
You mean quests that use the visual and audio aspect of the RPG as a part of the gameplay, not just set dressing? I'm down for that.
 

markec

Twitterbot
Patron
Joined
Jan 15, 2010
Messages
51,057
Location
Croatia
Codex 2012 Strap Yourselves In Codex Year of the Donut Codex+ Now Streaming! Dead State Project: Eternity Codex USB, 2014 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag. Pathfinder: Wrath
Provide interesting story to peek the interest of the player and give him a reason to start and finish the quest.

Make a good level/encounter design to keep the player constantly engaged.

The quest cant feel out of place of the gameworld and needs to build upon the bigger picture of story/lore.

Give opportunities for player to use his build and allow multiple ways to solve it.

End result of the quest should provide reaction and consequences in the gameworld, not only in end slides but during the game.

Rewards should be proportional to the challenge.
 

Zed Duke of Banville

Dungeon Master
Patron
Joined
Oct 3, 2015
Messages
13,137
A reasonable amount of supported options to go through it.

It's usually the main point of praise for Oblivion

:what: Oblivion's quests were boilerplate with the lone exception of the Dark Brotherhood questline which is Hitman in Cyrodiil.
As much as I'm loath to defend any game I loathe as much as Oblivion, even leaving aside the Dark Brotherhood questline, the Thieves Guild also had a decent series of quests (though not up to the level of the Dark Brotherhood), and there were a number of more notable miscellaneous quests scattered throughout the game, such as A Brush with Death quest in which your investigation of a disappearance leads you inside a magical painting (with appropriate graphical changes), Vaermina's Daedric quest involves a tower twisted into a series of nightmares, the Horror of Dive Rock quest in which you defeat an Uderfrykte in a callback to Morrowind's Bloodmoon expansion, A Shadow over Hackdirt quest involves rescuing a sacrificial victim from a Lovecraftian village worshipping Deep Ones, etc.

Of course, the Fighters Guild and Mages Guild questlines were poorly done as were most of the components of the Main Quest, closing Oblivion Gates was dull and repetitive, and many of the miscellaneous quests were little better.
 

Tyranicon

A Memory of Eternity
Developer
Joined
Oct 7, 2019
Messages
7,836
Not being boring as fuck is the only requirement for me, but unfortunately I don't take my own advice and my quests are sometimes boring as fuck.

From a gamedev point, what do quests accomplish?

1. Allow the player to further impact the game world and achieve their own goals.
2. Advance a story narrative.
3. Provide the player with an excuse to test out new mechanics or play with existing ones.
4. Act as filler because you ran out of ideas.
5. Because it's a RPG and needs quests hurr durr.

I won't lie, sometimes I do get really lazy and opt for some combination of 4 or 5. But good RPG devs will design quests for a least one of points 1-3 in mind, and usually all of them at once.
 

Darkzone

Arcane
Joined
Sep 4, 2013
Messages
2,323
Ever since the top 101 came out, this particular aspect of RPGs has been on my mind. It's usually the main point of praise for Oblivion, and I've said it myself that it's the best part of Underrail. I didn't elaborate much because I didn't know how to explain the difference between good and bad quest design, but after pondering on it, I've come up with some general guidelines.
  • Interact with the game world
Everything is an interaction with the game world. The interaction has to be reflected in the game world in the past as lore, present as ability to change the world and future as the result of the changes that the player made based on his decisions that are now in the past.

  • Have different difficulty and outcomes for different builds
Have different possibilities for each build to solve a quest in a specific way. The quest outcome can be the same for all builds, but the outcome should be defined by the player choices that he makes.

  • Escalate in complexity
KISS, but keep the quests and story engaging due to good progression and cohesion.
Edit: Keep it grounded in realism and do not hurt the established rules of the world (coherency).

  • Surprise the player
Overrated, like mystery boxes. The only necessary surprise should be the good quality of the work (here the quest design). Also see the Edit above.
Anything I missed? How else would you define good quest design?
Fun. Engagement. Character. Etc....
 
Last edited:

Mikeal

Arcane
Joined
Dec 19, 2016
Messages
3,575
Location
Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth
Not being stuck somewhere because you didn't do everything exactly how quest designer inteneded. Freedom of finishing quest as I want without bullshit teleports to fight etc.
 

Takamori

Learned
Joined
Apr 17, 2020
Messages
908
Not much of a fancy words guy but a quest to be good
-Don't treat me like a retard with the good ol' marker go here, provide interesting fluff and clear instructions through text or conversation with npcs
-Allow me to solve it in multiple ways
-Not every quest needs a plot twist, plot twists were so overused that I expect the thing to not go the way is meant to go
-Use the quest as a opportunity to introduce bits of your world ( Don't text dump me like Pillars of Eternity though)
 

As an Amazon Associate, rpgcodex.net earns from qualifying purchases.
Back
Top Bottom