RuneScape Forum Archive | Reworking Camelot Series

Deltaslug

Posts: 32,671 Sapphire Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

So, we've known for a long time that the Jmods aren't too happy with the Camelot quests:
- Merlin's Crystal
- Holy Grail
- King's Ranson
- Murder Mystery (tie in quest)

Reworking the 3 quests would be a knightmare, even if it is just a transcript rewrite to make it more of a Runescape plot instead of a generic fantasy plot. And removing the quests would also be problematic.

There is one option:
Step 1: Remove all 4 quests from the quest list (like Witch's Potion and Sheep Shearer)
Step 2: Reclassify them as Miniquests
Step 3: Add an announcer in Seer's Village

The announcer would state that 3 local minor Kandarin Nobles (Arthur, the Sinclairs, and Le Faye) are very rich and very bored, and they are looking for a wandering hero to play the role of hero in their play acting.

Arthur and Morgan Le Faye are play acting the roles of 2 competing factions. The Sinclairs are doing a "Murder Mystery" act.
By the time things reach the fourth act (King's Ransom), all 3 families stories are intertwining and getting out of hand.

In all the stories, you play the exact same "part" (though there is fighting, the abilities of Excalibur are real, etc).

This would explain the absurdity of the stories and why it isn't Runescapish:
- most of the people are acting (improvising as it goes)
- 3 rich and bored noble families spending heaps of gp on props, some of which are enchanted to make it look real
- the knights are actually knights, but they are going along with it since they are paid, just as bored, and can spar with each other
- the Kinshra got involved because some idiot paid them and didn't realize how bad of an idea it was

The player still gets to do Knight's Waves (they are still real knights) and the Court House (your acting was so good, people thought you really were a lawyer).

18-Jan-2017 05:36:09

Aug

2022

Kemtros

Posts: 5,407 Rune Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

Another problem is what the quests are required for outside of the series.

- Merlin's Crystal is required for Heroes' Quest.
- Murder Mystery is required for Freeing the Lumbridge Sage.
- King's Ransom is required for While Guthix Sleeps, Nomad's Requiem, and One of a Kind.

For starters, I'd recommend removing some of the requirements. Heroes' Quest has other requirements, and I don't think Merlin's Crystal has anything to do with it. Freeing the Lumbridge Sage has several requirements, and Murder Mystery is only required because it might be referenced when trying to get one of the ingredients, so removing Murder Mystery as a requirement wouldn't change much beyond removing options from a completely random pool, and the amount of other options is wide enough as it is that the absence of Murder Mystery would be negligible.

That leaves us with King's Ransom. Honestly, I have no idea why it's supposed to be required for While Guthix Sleeps other than WGS being such a substantial quest at the time of its release, and other "big finales" were required for that. One of a Kind requires it because of our familiarity with the Animate Rock Spell, but that originated in One Small Favour, which is already a requirement for King's Ransom anyway. Maybe just have One Small Favour take King's Ransom's place as a requirement for One of a Kind?

Finally, there's Nomad's Requiem, but that's literally only because we have to use Piety. That's one I'm not sure about. One thing that comes to mind is just not require the Knight Waves at all, and Piety and its companion prayers can just be normal Prayers we automatically unlock at level 70 without any other requirements.

tl;dr: Isolate all Camelot content to its own little corner so it's not required for any other quests. Though Court Cases and Seer's Village Tasks are okay.

18-Jan-2017 05:56:35

CD_Paladin_C

Posts: 3,945 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

Just rename everything.

Fixed.

Also we just can axe the full metal alchemist quest while we're at it, just like they said they should in the q&a. "Your god's dead next time he's in a world event. "
-The Lore Community to our Saradominist Friends, Said During World Event 2, Proven During World Event 3.

#StopSaradomin

18-Jan-2017 06:06:46

Vardan

Posts: 1,237 Mithril Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

Removing the requirements would be a god first step, but given how tightly the Camelot series is woven into Fifth Age, I'm not sure it can be reworked. You wouldn't just have to rework it, you'd be reworking everything that makes reference to it. Like Excalibur.

We sleep soundly in our beds because rough men stand ready in the night to visit violence on those who would do us harm.

18-Jan-2017 06:35:44

Oct

2005

Wahisietel

Posts: 3,426 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

The problem is that Camelot is kind of King Lathas's main motivation in the Elf series. Camelot cannot be just removed or cut off from other content.

Honestly they could just remove the references to England/Britain and replace it with some fictional Saradominist world + change Galahad's dialogue and it'd be fine. You never were our brightest star, Khazard. 'Vermin slaughtered like lambs'? What does that even mean?

18-Jan-2017 12:54:34 - Last edited on 18-Jan-2017 12:54:57 by Wahisietel

Deltaslug

Posts: 32,671 Sapphire Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

Kemtros said :
Another problem is what the quests are required for outside of the series.

- Merlin's Crystal is required for Heroes' Quest.
- Murder Mystery is required for Freeing the Lumbridge Sage.
- King's Ransom is required for While Guthix Sleeps, Nomad's Requiem, and One of a Kind.

For starters, I'd recommend removing some of the requirements. Heroes' Quest has other requirements, and I don't think Merlin's Crystal has anything to do with it.

You're quite right on Hero's.
Remember, at the time Hero's was one of the end all quests, just like Dragon Slayer, Legends, RFD, WGS, etc. It's not that it had a plot point, it was just that there weren't really any other quests at the time for the QP requirement, and it would be some time before more quests came along to ease that.
I mean, besides Dragon Slayer (to get into the Champion's Guild) and Shield of Arrav (becoming a member of 1 of the gangs), there really aren't any other quests storywise you need specifically to complete Hero's.

Regarding Murder Mystery, if the story stayed the same, there's no reason to take it out. There are other quests that require a miniquest to complete (Devious Minds requires access to the Abyss, Scorpion Catcher requires completing the Barcrawl, CoM/SE requires completing the Koscie/Kharshai's Memories).

18-Jan-2017 14:07:06

Deltaslug

Posts: 32,671 Sapphire Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

Wahisietel said :
The problem is that Camelot is kind of King Lathas's main motivation in the Elf series. Camelot cannot be just removed or cut off from other content.

Honestly they could just remove the references to England/Britain and replace it with some fictional Saradominist world + change Galahad's dialogue and it'd be fine.

I thought it was just a motivation?
He was more after his brother and getting strong armed by the Iowerth Clan to do things to help them. The Camelot fiasco was just a sideshow, in part because he was getting annoyed by the Sinclair family (minus the dad who loved Arthur).

18-Jan-2017 14:09:05

Jan

2021

AesirWarrior

Posts: 1,060 Mithril Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

There's a few references to the series around the game, like in the museum and One of a Kind, which kind of puts a dent in the whole idea, but they'd be pretty easy to fix.

Honestly I think the easiest solution would be to change all the names so it's still blatantly obvious it's a reference to IRL legends, but not a complete rip-off. More of a parody I suppose.

King Arthorios

Sir Lancel

Myrlen

etc -

I have noticed your kind does tend to blindly stumble forward towards danger simply because it exists. What is your word for that?

- We call it being a hero.

18-Jan-2017 15:36:10 - Last edited on 18-Jan-2017 15:36:37 by AesirWarrior

Deltaslug

Posts: 32,671 Sapphire Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

AesirWarrior said :
There's a few references to the series around the game, like in the museum and One of a Kind, which kind of puts a dent in the whole idea, but they'd be pretty easy to fix.

Honestly I think the easiest solution would be to change all the names so it's still blatantly obvious it's a reference to IRL legends, but not a complete rip-off. More of a parody I suppose.

King Arthorios

Sir Lancel

Myrlen

etc

tbh, I'm not sure if there is an "easy" way.

renaming characters, you'd still need to find ALL places in game where the names are called out.
if you wanted to keep the quest mechanics, but rewrite the transcript/story, good luck. It would be a heck of a lot of upfront work to make the story fit runescape. then have it sent for translation (German, French, etc). And you have to do that for 3 quests.

They could do a single quest (could be RFD/DoD style or like some of the Tales of the Godwars) but man that would require not only the work of taking a lot of content (and characters) out, would need to be at least intermediate to master (for the same total XP rewards), but it would still be a lot of work just to keep Excalibur and the Black Knight Titan in game. and the QP ... that one quest would be worth A LOT of QP.

18-Jan-2017 16:29:30

Aug

2022

Kemtros

Posts: 5,407 Rune Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

Wahisietel said :
The problem is that Camelot is kind of King Lathas's main motivation in the Elf series. Camelot cannot be just removed or cut off from other content.

Honestly they could just remove the references to England/Britain and replace it with some fictional Saradominist world + change Galahad's dialogue and it'd be fine.

Plague's End requires absolutely none of the Camelot series, so cutting Camelot off from other content wouldn't affect it. Removing it, sure, that would have an impact, but there's no overlap in any of the requirements for Plague's End and King's Ransom.

Deltaslug said :
You're quite right on Hero's.
Remember, at the time Hero's was one of the end all quests, just like Dragon Slayer, Legends, RFD, WGS, etc. It's not that it had a plot point, it was just that there weren't really any other quests at the time for the QP requirement, and it would be some time before more quests came along to ease that.
I mean, besides Dragon Slayer (to get into the Champion's Guild) and Shield of Arrav (becoming a member of 1 of the gangs), there really aren't any other quests storywise you need specifically to complete Hero's.

Regarding Murder Mystery, if the story stayed the same, there's no reason to take it out. There are other quests that require a miniquest to complete (Devious Minds requires access to the Abyss, Scorpion Catcher requires completing the Barcrawl, CoM/SE requires completing the Koscie/Kharshai's Memories).

Oh, I don't think Murder Mystery needs to be taken out. I'd rather just see it removed as a requirement for Freeing the Lumbridge Sage, and that subquest being changed accordingly. There might need to be a long-term plan for dealing with Camelot, but I'm only focusing on the short term.

My preference is more for isolating Camelot rather than removing it. King's Ransom could still be required for the Quest Cape, and that's fine.

18-Jan-2017 17:30:10 - Last edited on 18-Jan-2017 17:43:43 by Kemtros

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Reworking Camelot Series