forums.rs

Forums

‡ The best quest ever? Vote! ‡

Quick find code: 341-342-196-65106546

of 74
Autumn Elite

Autumn Elite

Posts: 3,487 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile
[#0MGFV81HT] said :
Didnt you put that review somewhere else?

Also is nobody going to make a review on Gower Quest, haven't seen one yet.

I put in in Recent Game Updates on release to discuss what more casual players think and if a mod decides to reply, it is on my thread instead of derailing Drakan’s into pages of my thoughts on one quest. Then later I post it here to archive and generate discussion with other lore players.

30-Aug-2016 11:56:06

Beerkiller
Aug Member 2023

Beerkiller

Posts: 127 Iron Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile
I am not casting a vote but would like to mention my most memorable quest.

Legend's Quest

It might not seem so memorable to anyone players in the years since it's release however if you were a member at the time this was the quest to complete. You would get access to the Legends Guild and the Cape of Legends. The cape at the time was one of the best in the game.

What made this quest memorable was people training their agility to meet the requirement for the quest. Back then agility was less than a year old hard to train / level. I cannot remember the place but do remember people being in one spot hours on end just clicking the same obstacle. It was pretty funny.

30-Aug-2016 15:27:12

Rondstat

Rondstat

Posts: 2,770 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile
I done did some tales and quests. Boy howdy. (This'll prolly be especially rambling this go-around).

I liked Gower Quest. Twas fun, though I think my own approach to this sort of humour may be a little closer to Crunchy's. That said, I did enjoy a lit of the references - Sphenischev made me smile, and I liked the entitled cabbages and their wonderfully bizarre syntax. It was also great to see some long-standing favourites addressed - Lloigh-Enn, Black Knight Titan, Life Altar (though I'm slightly sad it permanently quashes one of the more interesting fan theories).

I was actually quite surprised by how big this quest was - new models, environments, music, mechanics, etc. Behind the Scenes really stood out - even the grandest environments in Runescape feel tiny and scaled down. Most of the bosses hanging out at the bar normally dwarf the walls of their arena. Yet here, for the first time, we see grand pillars, cyclopean edifices, distant chandeliers disappearing into the murk of a giant hall's far reaches. I REALLY hope that the designers shake their fear of "big" environments, and introduce more stuff on a massive scale in future. The beauty of a virtual world is that there are no limits.

I wonder if the beta room really does use their editor's placeholders. I've gotta say - I wouldn't mind training sailing. Even as a joke skill, it's far more engaging than firemaking, fletching, cooking, or divination training. I've never felt strongly one way or the other about a sailing skill, but if they introduced something with this as a template - navigate ships around a vast map, firing on enemies, fishing up treasure, occasionally happening across procedurally-generated islands - oh man, I would be back on my monthly membership. Imagine if they used the Arc's procedural generation, but with multiple kits, like from Heist.

07-Oct-2016 15:35:43

Rondstat

Rondstat

Posts: 2,770 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile
Or introduced minigame mechanics, like say Heist with npc guards you have to evade to loot that island's riches. Or some central, penance-like boss you need to defeat with a weapon assembled from loot around the island. Imagine a more complete naval battle system, balancing speed, defensive, and offensive builds, attempt to aim at an enemy not knowing whether they're fast enough to evade it or strong enough to withstand it.

Anyways, I'm getting carried away. Side effect of quest: sailing excitement.

Tales of the Arc. Really, altogether these make a perfectly serviceable quest, and I saw it more as a oneshot than a series of miniquests. It was fun, though occasionally mechanically frustrating (500 monks and dragons in, RNG was really kicking my ass on Ling's quest). That said, the whole Arc feels like there was some missed potential. It's mainly a lot of grind mechanisms against a very impressive backdrop, which is disappointing when Ports alluded to so much untapped lore in the Wushankos - secret societies, a slave economy, human sacrifice, unknown rituals, complex webs of alliances and rivalries in a tense network of competing clans and khans. Prejudice and changing societies. Advancement vs those stuck in cruel barbarism.

I suppose the team wanted to subvert expectations. But, at a time when a lot of the game has begun to acknowledge the changing demographics and maturity of its playerbase, this feels like very child-oriented content. Dayglow colours, exaggerated, friendly npcs, exceedingly simple gameplay. Not the barest hint of seediness. And certainly no gameplay elements that we would have expected to fit the lore -perhaps raising reputations with rivals, choosing to dismantle or participate in the thriving slave trade, practicing forgotten mysticism.

It's just hard for me to reconcile the Arc with a game that also includes Nomad's Elegy. Is Runescape going to start competing with Lightseekers?

07-Oct-2016 15:51:00

Rondstat

Rondstat

Posts: 2,770 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile
Runescape is by no means a 'mature' or 'hardcore' MMO, and I wouldn't want it to be. I'm just confused whether this means it'll be pulling back from the story directions it's already established, try to make itself lighter.

Tales of Nomad - by far the most successful experiment with Tales yet, and, I suspect, the most cost-effective. I thought the whole treasure hunt and examine-based tableau was very clever, and surprisingly satisfying. I greatly appreciated its efforts to give new meaning to existing lore - including Lucien's first assault on Varrock and the initially-nonsensical White Knight reveal. And, even in such a limited storytelling medium, Raven managed to introduce the unsettling, with an introspective, first-person account suddenly turning on us by the end, suggesting greater control and awareness than we'd suspected, and the dark suspicion we may have been duped throughout.

Once again, proofreading proves Raven's greatest foe. Visible unicode, unfortunate homonyms, and an apparent lack of understanding of commas. Y'all need to have multiple people read the dialogue before it goes in game. Also, a slower transition in Nomad's appearance may have been nice. More significantly, while I enjoyed the Tale, it didn't feel necessary to me. Nomad's story was concluded, and it didn't leave any loose ends that I felt needed to be answered. Now, it may be the main purpose of this Tale was to hype us up for the Magisters, and that's fine. But I still couldn't help but feel, if we only get X miniquests in a year, why use one up on a story that's already been satisfactorily concluded?

Say, why not a Morytania Tale? With Vanstrom/Ascertes only vaguely alluded to in a wildly oblique hint, I think a Vanstrom tale could feasibly tie up many of the loose ends. Mauritys' disappearance and efforts to slake vampyre blood addiction (including the mutated bloodvelds).

07-Oct-2016 16:05:52

Rondstat

Rondstat

Posts: 2,770 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile
The ultimate fate of the conspirators, and the aftermath of their plans in the wake of the 6th Age. Resolving the whole voluntary bloodletting issue. The fate of Sialathin and Lantania. The role of the mercenaries and ramblers (especially in the wake of a peaceful Morytania). The presence of the Burgh de Rott tomb. The plague-inducing sludge. Some acknowledgement of Draynor's death or Harlow's legacy. In an ideal world, I'd see the conspirators revealed as a force behind many of the series' conflicts, and a final battle with Raispher (something simple, say, give him Invasion of Falador knight mechanics, and triple the hp).

Or, why not tales to hold us over with all those forgotten questlines? How are the gnomes holding up? How's life for the druids in the wake of Guthix's death? Simple things that can be done mostly with dialogue, mechanically filled in with some skilling or treasure hunting. Or even recycled quest puzzles (so many mechanics are only used once).


EDIT: Meant to bring this up, I was also quite surprised by how many of the memes/references in Gower Quest came out of the lore community. How much you wanna bet Apropos was originally named Balustan?

Also, my Arc criticisms came out far more "Wah, I don't wanna play a game for babies!" than I intended. Sure, it seems to cater to a younger demographic. But I think the larger problem is that lore overall is just so shallow (so far) in the Arc, when the world indicated by the Ports storylines is so deep.

07-Oct-2016 16:13:34 - Last edited on 07-Oct-2016 17:07:56 by Rondstat

Wahisietel
Oct Member 2005

Wahisietel

Posts: 3,426 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile
Mod Jack already pretty much confirmed that Apropos is a reference to Balustan :P . And Jagex have said that they're going for a more serious approach with Arc 2, since the slightly comedic one they used for Arc 1 didn't work very well.

I agree that we need some Morytania tales/miniquests, if nothing else it would be an excuse to give us access to the rest of Castle Drakan post-quest. And it's not like they have any shortage of things to explore; in addition to the stuff you suggested, there's also stuff like the fate of Flaygian, Sarius's role in the new rulership of Morytania, what the trueborn Vampyres will do now that they can freely cross the salve, and the fate of Ivan Strom's parents.

Maybe we could get it in a month between expansions in 2017, Tales of Nomad was apparently done in a few weeks. You never were our brightest star, Khazard. 'Vermin slaughtered like lambs'? What does that even mean?

07-Oct-2016 18:59:17

Rondstat

Rondstat

Posts: 2,770 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile
Did anyone notice that, in the 'Making of a Monster' section of Tales of Nomad, the moment that catalyzes his decision to turn to darkness is getting kicked in the nards? One of the greatest threats to Gielinor could have become one of its greatest heroes if only he'd never taken a boot to the plums.

It makes you wonder - how many of the great monsters of history were made that way by genital trauma? Nero? Genghis Khan? Hitler?

18-Oct-2016 16:08:13

Rondstat

Rondstat

Posts: 2,770 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile
Oh yeah, that's a tough one. If you don't mind an oblique and utterly non-specific hint~
The clues are both far more literal and far more mundane than you'd probably expect. Think of the most boring way those two things could be true.


Now, the REALLY hard clue comes later (I think #6), and that's the one that took me hours to figure out. The location is also slightly stupid. But for another oblique hint (when you get there)~
Trust your first instinct, but exhaust it THOROUGHLY.

19-Oct-2016 16:35:19

Quick find code: 341-342-196-65106546 Back to Top