A Modest Proposal: Quests

    First, a little introduction. Modest Proposal is intended to bounce ideas to improve/change certain parts of the CRPG game experience in reference to DA4. I call it 'modest' because the ideas ideally should target less radical changes to the base of DA:I that would be reasonable for Bioware to execute as opposed to say, rewriting the dialogue system or doing the game in 2D graphics or using the Inquisitor as protagonist. There's nothing necessarily wrong with big ideas or talking about them but there's already plenty of that around. The focus here is on smaller changes that could have big payoffs. I'll kick one off and hopefully you will see what I mean.


     One of the common complaints for DA:I (and really, in my experience, any CRPG back to BG2) is on the quality and engagement of various 'side quests'. They've always been something of a necessary evil in CRPGs. game designers need some tasks to build-up your characters, set tone and setting, and to frame the larger quests that will define the larger story. On the other hand, by their very nature, there's really not a lot of time or other resources to give them or else they wouldn't be side quests. For my first modest proposal (actually proposals), I thought I would tackle this ongoing issue. As always, questions, criticisms , and especially better ideas I didn't think about are encouraged. No one from Bioware may see this or do anything with it, but maybe some other person who becomes a writer or producer of a CRPG will. Even if it is just "whistling in the dark" it feels so much superior to talk with people who care deeply about this strange little art. So on with it!


    1: Chained Side Quests. One of the great weaknesses of the typical side quest is how isolated it is from the rest of the narrative.  It's also why so many of these quests have unlikely sized bribes/rewards attached to them. You need something to get the Player to engage and it can be risky counting simply on the do-gooder impulse to get a Player involved. The concept of chained side quests is to take several of your smaller side quests and build links between them possibly even linking them into a an actual story quest. This isn't a new concept, of course but it seems to be only applied haphazardly instead of as an overall strategy. As an example, let's look at the early part of the Hinterlands. The early main theme of this area is the mudfight between barely templars and sorta mages. One of the minor quests you get are to track down some templar-lites that killed an old man for being a 'mage sympathizer'. You can pickup a paper off the targets that gets you a free pass to Templarland. What if you could find a little lore that the old man was a mage or helped them out? What if that letter was only part of a ticket to Templarland and instead you got some kind of pointer to another side quest helping out the mage side? Just a couple of tweaks and this little, simple side quest becomes part of the bigger story with real consequences for the Player instead of a checkbox to fill. There could even be chains of quests that don't link to a major theme but allow access to some special lore not otherwise marked or accessible. To all indications, we're going to be seeing a lot of the North of Thedas in DA4.  It would be nice to reward exploration of the physical environment with exploration of the loreic environment.


    2: Varying Conditions. We're all familiar with the well-worn fetch quests. Get 10 ram's meats. Get 4 elfroot and 2 spindleweed. Take these flowers to this shrine. They are the cheapest of the cheap and most reviled of the reviled. Some invention and actual gaming could improve the situation greatly. Again, it's not like Bioware didn't do this (very) rarely in DA:I. Think about Tricky Ritts, you have to find her and get to her aid before a couple of rogue templars kill her. Or the Golden Halla on the Exalted Plains that you 'fetch' by herding into the right place. What if instead of having to track down and kill say 7 rams, you instead have to cover for a hunting party against some rogue templars, crazy mages, bandits or bears? What if doing a better job means mroe meat and less need to cover a second (or third hunt)? What if the elfroot isn't regular elfroot or special ones that grow in the back of the cave that is the mage's HQ? What if you are siding with those mages and can just bluff/talk your way in to collect it? What if you're working with the templars and now you just have another excuse to storm the place? What if the shrine isn't there because it only appears at certain times but you have to track the clues that reveal that little fact? Behind every fetch quest, there needs to be a gooid reason why an adventuring party is the right choice and the party actually needs to do some kind of adventuring to complete it. Cut down the number and make them fuller.


    3: Side Quest Impacts. I don't mean just the ping of added XPs and a thank you of some sort from the quest giver. Look at the Corporal Vale quests where you need to get meat, clothing, kill bandits, stop mages, and stop templars. You've got a real village at the Crossroads with as many if not more people around than in Val Royeux. Plenty of ambient dialogue fires around there. Let the people be overheard about being hungry, being cold, concerned about one group or the other. As the party knocks one out, change the dialogue for that piece to how much better fed, clothed, safer, they are. Very small change that would motivate a fair bit of the player base. Not all but no strategy is perfect. Plus, you know I will always go for more of the world responding to the Player's choices and actions and this should be a no-brainer.


      thanks for reading if you got this far. Fire away and add your own ideas and thoughts, if you please.