I think the allure of accomplishment, the challenge, the lore and the immersion of a good quest can make or break a game like this one will be. I think having questing as a core to the gameplay is crucial. I believe that one of the reasons EQ1 was so good was because these things. So, what makes a quest great? Which ones did you absolutely love? And why?
My favorite quests were:
The Staff of Elemental Mastery (Mage epic 1.0) - This was huge, long, complicated and extremely challenging. The reward was also monumental and it had the coolest graphic particle effect in the game so it was just plain FUN to have and show off.
Plane of Time flagging - This was the hardest and largest community quest arc in EQ. This took us about 15-18 months with open raids. I loved that giant groups of 72 people were banding together to help each opther and accomplish this. The sense of challenge, sense of community and the sense of accomplishment from this were so huge. I also loved how complicated these quests were and they were not "dumbed down" at all. I had to keep a detailed checklist of steps - I loved that.
Tunare Warden - One of my favorite quests. This was deeply lore-centric and made me feel immersed as part of the virtual world and played into my character's RP. The quest was a little complex with several sub-arcs. It was just enough to almost do solo but I did need to recruit some help. And the item was not overpowered but was very useful. For non-epic quests, I think the scope and magnitude of this quest, along with the challenge and reward and the lore make this the best example of a *PERFECT* quest. It became trivial at higher levels but, in its heyday, this was the best designed quest I've ever seen. I also loved that this was rather obscure and I think I never saw another person do this quest so the reward and accomplishment felt even more "special".
Bayle's Heraldic Quest was fun and required a lot of do-able activities but the reward simply wasn't worth the time. Timeshear was also a tremendous waste of time and effort. I did like the SoD armor quests though.
I especially liked that htese things were complicated and part of the fun was figuring them out and keeping track of them all. Finally, some of the steps were steeped in urban legend and mystery - like how to spawn Quillmane, etcetera.
Coldain Prayer Shawl was one of the quests that I remember working on forever. Everything seemed to involve trade skills at some point back then. This had a lot of it. I don't particularly love trades but this was the reason I did them. The reward was also great for a long time if you needed mana regen. I guess I just like doing things that few people actually do.
Jamie said:Coldain Prayer Shawl was one of the quests that I remember working on forever. Everything seemed to involve trade skills at some point back then. This had a lot of it. I don't particularly love trades but this was the reason I did them. The reward was also great for a long time if you needed mana regen. I guess I just like doing things that few people actually do.
Great call... that was one of my favorites when playing my Druid I believe!
Any quests that required: Some crafting, some rare drops, some geographical challenges, some combining of your findings, etc... those are the ones I love. Especially if the item can benefit you legitmately for the next 10 levels or so above level to obtain.
I think my favorites quests were EQ's epic quests - any of them - because I loved the dynamic where a particular quest mob would spawn, and the person camping it gives a rallying call to his or her guild, and the majority of the guild comes to the rescue. Nowadays, when someone asks for help with a raid type mob, I see things like, "sorry, I've already killed it this week" or "he doesn't drop anything I need".
Speaking generally, any quest related items that allowed me to ask for help, and then be able to say " I am only here for this one thing. You guys, thank you for coming and you can do with the rest what you want and I promise to help you whenever you need, on something"
Alot of the quests mentioned here allowed that.
Gadgets the nice thing about BiC was that even if you were not able to get all the slots filled, it was still pretty good on the lower end and it gave a reason to be able to invite partial groups into semi-hard areas in the new place. and if you got one with 5 slots, you could start another with 4 slots and they would not be lore.
I was a mage and I remember a monk friend was on and the insects in the sewer were just a bit too hard alone and the monk was bored so I invited him. We were careful, but actually ended up having a good mini-grind and I was able to get the piece, we even were able to go in a bit, once we got a rythym, going.
Jamie said:Coldain Prayer Shawl was one of the quests that I remember working on forever. Everything seemed to involve trade skills at some point back then. This had a lot of it. I don't particularly love trades but this was the reason I did them. The reward was also great for a long time if you needed mana regen. I guess I just like doing things that few people actually do.
This is at the top of my list. Best quest there was in EQ1. Behind that would be the 10th Coldain Ring.
Diplo quests for Vanguard were nice. I liked the Soko-What? subquest from EQ2 where you hide kittens in a sack pirate asks what you did so you tell him you ate them..pause... Arrrr! you be a real pirate! is his answer..good times. Some of the job changes quests for FF11 back in the day were challenging.
As annoying and painful as they were, my favorite "quests" were the zone flagging that accompanied many of the expansions. Getting keys and zone flags to unlock areas was a great way to spur thinking and encourage teamwork and the race to be the first guild or individual to finish it was always a blast. Outside of that, I agree Coldain Prayer Shawl was my next favorite as I was a tradeskill junkie and enjoyed putting those skills to use.
Quests always seem to be hard at the start, then for some reason the devs start to lose focus on making them challenging again. Sometimes i think they are focused on getting them out quicker, since they lost most of their team to new projects.
The VR team could always hold monthly contests, and have people design quests within their current system, or add quests later on in later expansions. Ideas usually come by the public anyways, much like scripts are written after hosting software is released. Modding has become the new future.
Crafting is another thing people just love. Especially when you create stuff to use, and sell on the market. I found that EQ never went too heavy into tradeskills. I think that was a huge mistake. I think they could have attracted new people if only they could model more quests, and tradeskills. Explore those options and i bet more will be attracted to the game.
Just some food for thought.
My favorite quests where epic quests, and tradeskill quests. I enjoyed the ones that you have to kill boss mobs, or search for pieces of missing parts. You fashioned them to weild another piece to the quest. I hope to see many more of those quests in the future.
Pretty much all that has already been mentioned here.
Hands down the epic quests in Everquest. Simply because they where the only quests in the past 17 years that where memorable enough AND rewarding at the same time, all while not being a pushover.
Time flagging and coldain shawl also come to mind.
I really hate questing tho and that may be a main reason modern MMOs are bad for me. Quests for leveling... oh dear god... i just wanna get to know new people and explore dungeons and not fetch another 10 sacks of rice for some random dude. If i do quest i want it to be worthwhile, just like epic quests. I do not expect a great reward right away and don't mind taking months for them. But make them fun, rewarding and memorable.
Vex Thall Key is near the top of my favorite quests as well. To initiate the quest was mysterious and open ended (if you were at the helm). It had a variable pace and time sink, forced you to explore multiple zones, camps, and environments. It had a social dynamic and a solid raid dependency.
As a paladin, my favorite quests were class related. I was the first dwarven paladin on my server to get the Soulfire (dwarves started out apprehensive to temple of life, making the faction grind harder), and I remember spending quite a bit of time getting my Dwarven Paladin underfoot weapon - damn those orc camps. Paladin Brellium armor quests were fun as well.
Finally getting my Fiery Avenger was the highlight of this character in EQ. For months I camped all the rumored spots for it, as no one had known where the quest started, if it was even live, no one knew. It wasn't until Plane of Sky was released that we could finally get it.
Brad, I have never been able to find out for sure, but was the quest for the Fiery Avenger actually in game before Plane of Sky?
When I completed the Fiery Avenger and finally camped Plane of Fear for a complete set of Valorium, I had decided this character was complete. I retired him and rolled a shadowknight. Years later I would log my dwarf paladin on, in full valorium with his Fiery Avenger, and players would inspect me and gasp in disbelief.
Meaningful quests for me based on race and class. I don't need to be "The Chosen One", so much as let me flesh out my character.
The Testament of Vanear quest was easily one of my favorites because it represented so many little things the EQ team did right.
What makes the Testament quest so cool is the thought that went in to how to allow evil races to do it. If a quest like that were to happen in a game like World of Warcraft, they would either not have it involve a city, and just put it in a neutral area, or they would create different quests for every race.
In everquest, however, they were faced with a problem: The item is good for many evil race players, but a significant part of the quest takes place in a good city where those players were KOS. So what did they do? They put a sewer system in the city, built an entire zone underneath the city that many players probably never realized was there(i know it wasn't built just for this quest, but it enabled the quest to work), and put a secret entrance outside the gates of Qeynos. After you sneak in through the sewers, you can emerge in a big pond right outside the bar where the quest NPC likes to drink. Unfortunately, you'd still be KOS in that bar, so how did they solve that problem? The NPC, after some drinking, occasionally goes out for some fresh air and likes to go sit by the pond where the sewers pop out. Doing this quest on an evil race always felt so cool, sneaking into the city like a spy and meeting with the quest NPC to play his game of chance. The quest itself was quite simple but the detail that went in to making this turn in work just seems like something that game developers don't do anymore, due to most mmos being segmented off by a 2 faction split.
I love that every race had their own city, and that any race could freely enter any city(assuming they did proper faction work). I think the cities and starting areas for every race really helped make the world of Norrath feel alive and gave a sense of wonder and exploration as you branched out from your starting area to find so many other unique places scattered around. I was so happy to hear the devs talk about every race getting their own starting zone and city, because I think it is one of the things that truly set everquest apart from newer mmos in a post WoW world.
Ranger Epic 1.0 Quest. I still remember that feeling when a Shattered Emerald Of Corruption finally dropped in Plane of Hate. My level of excitement was off the charts.
Original Plane Of Time flag (same as OP). On EQMac with a limited number of players, and a lot of bugs and original unpatched encounters that made progressing through Planes of Power extremely hard, when we finally ran through plane of innovation to finish the quest, it was just a magical moment. I am still so saddened that EQMac shutdown before we could defeat Quarm :(.
AgentGenX said:I think my favorites quests were EQ's epic quests - any of them - because I loved the dynamic where a particular quest mob would spawn, and the person camping it gives a rallying call to his or her guild, and the majority of the guild comes to the rescue. Nowadays, when someone asks for help with a raid type mob, I see things like, "sorry, I've already killed it this week" or "he doesn't drop anything I need".
So true on both accounts.
Saw someone mentioned the Vex Thal key above which reminded me of another quest for the Ring of the Shissar. I remember my guild coming together in force to camp Ssra for the components and taking down the mini bosses in the temple. Some really good memories of everyone just being there to help everyone else. Great times!
The penance quest in EQ. It's a love/hate relationship. I love the quest because it allows a player to pay a "penance" for losing something important. I think it really added some flair for the race/class. At the time I thought it took an amazingly long time to complete; but, complet it I did!
Coldain ring quest for sure. The giant war for the 10th ring was so epic, and the buff from the ring was unique enough that even after better gear replaced the ring, I still kept it around for that buff.
Soulfire. Even in end game PoP, long after most people would have considered soulfire useless, I would farm a new one when the old one ran out of charges of complete heal. Five charges of instant complete heal was just so incredibly useful and could turn the tide when a group or even a smaller raid hit an "oh s**t" moment. The quest itself wasn't grindy at all and only required you to find a few unique NPCs across the world, if memory serves me right. I would just visit them in my down time at my leisure and store the items until I needed a new one.
Gadgets said:Vex Thall Key is near the top of my favorite quests as well. To initiate the quest was mysterious and open ended (if you were at the helm). It had a variable pace and time sink, forced you to explore multiple zones, camps, and environments. It had a social dynamic and a solid raid dependency.
Oh, man thats a ways back, but i totally agree! I loved VT and I met tons of on line friends while camping all the different camps for it. ++