Questmaker's Backpack

[Muratus del Mur]

--THESE ARE PRIVATE NOTES, I WILL BE CHANGING THEM AS DEVELOPMENT ADVANCES . i PUT THEM PUBLICK SO YOU CAN HAVE A PREVIEW :) --

 

I am working on a set of tools to allow quest makers to build realy well integrated quests. I will be posting here the list of PREDEFINED actions to be found in the Questmakers Backpack.

 

RAW POSSIBLE ACTIONS TO MIX, PENDING EDITS:

- create pickable clicky in a location

- assign existing item functionality to a clicky (LIST)

- require to have other named items to show a clicky

- require not having named items to show clicky

- trigger overlay image on clicky action (quest related visuals)

- trigger secondary actions on clicky action (like focus inventory)

- create progressive clickies (like the bushy)

 

POSSIBLE ITEM FUNCTIONALITY:

- all current existing items with all settings variable

- (need to check if illusions and spells work as expected on items)

 

 

I have terrible memory so having this here will help me plan things better.

 

As you can see there can be any combination of the above and that allows limitless possibilities...however, i will prepare PREDEFINED sets of actions/settings as quest building blocks to place in the Questmakers Backpack. This is not due to any limitations but to make things easier and more clear also to less experienced quest makers that might find real examples more inspireing than totall freedom.

 

----

 

Please feel free to suggest such functionality presets if you think you understood what is going on. Best if you would make recommandations based on quests you would like to implement yourself. If you are not totally sure you understand what is going on, please do not reply here. I will be posting updates as i will start to create such presets and things will become more clear.

 

---

 

Current work done:

- assisting tool to easy place clickables on the scene (see screenshot) [attachment=4447:clickyassistant.jpg]

 

 

 

below i will post the updates

 

 

====== 30 dec 2013 =====

 

First tools in the backpack:

1) create 1-20 pickable items with custom artworks placed in any scene, no item functionality

2) create one public item that becomes available only if you collected all required items

Edited December 30, 2013 by Muratus del Mur
1,2 added

[Ackshan Bemunah]

So the pickables will replace keys?

[Muratus del Mur]

pickable items are clickies that when you click you grab them from the scene and place them in your inventory (they vanish from scene and appear in inventory)

Keys are ways to filter things and to place rules on what is visible when and to who.

 

two completely separate things.

 

However, in a larger context, now you can use items (obtained regardless how, picking them up, transfer, etc) to filter out things similar you could use keys. Keys remain the most powerful way to give and restrict access ..but thats a longer story.

[Ary Endleg]

Questmaker will be able to create new things in the scene with power to esentially transform whole scene into something almost totally different? As well as create items out of the blue that are pickable? Seems like artists will be very busy with drawing requests.

[rikstar]

The first thing that I think about is: What do questioners need to do to get such a backpack? Do you need to but the feature in the WP shop, or you get it after you have proven that you can make proper quests. Or an unknown method?

[Muratus del Mur]

@ary..yeah the scene could be changed a lot. Preferably not totally, for such a purpose a new scene would be better. Adding new scenes by a quest creator is something i have in plan to do. Lazarus is the first to have the chance to participate in such an experimental thing, but thats an other story. To answer your question, a questmaker of this level should be able to modify both scene and player. The purpose will not be to "transform" but to complete/enhance

 

@rikstar .. a couple of people already deserve such abilities, one example, but not the only one, is Nimrodel. If you have proven over time to be able to build really awesome quests BUT ALSO that you understand how the values of md influence eachother and how some things are inconfortable for a purpose..then you might have a chance to get such a backpack. I will work to improve the things in this Questers backpack and will make it available to more quest makers over time, not just to the top ones. You have to understand that such quest creating abilities will have no safety features, so i need to trust the questmaker fully before giving him such abilities. This sort of quests will appear as official and will exceed the scope current quests have. Imagine a quest maker will be able to give medals or even award an entire scene to someone...hehe..big plans i know... but for now lets see them as some really cool ways of making quests :)

[Muratus del Mur]

===========

there are SO many options and i am so unorganized. ...so i will start with a very basic set of tools, that could be used for awesome things already, but they are just basic. Please ask questions about them if you have any, or suggest things related to them that might help you in your quest. PLEASE, ask just about things that could actually help you in a quest you are working on or plan to work on, avoid theoretical things, i am full of ideas , i don't need more, i just need to adapt the current features to actual cases while still keep them generally valid so that they could be used for other quests too. I hope i was clear enough (its late and i am tired)

 

 

First tools in the backpack:

1) create 1-20 pickable items with custom artworks placed in any scene, no item functionality

2) create one public item that becomes available only if you collected all required items

 

 

so, what could be next?

[BFH]

 

First tools in the backpack:

1) create 1-20 pickable items with custom artworks placed in any scene, no item functionality

2) create one public item that becomes available only if you collected all required items

 

so, what could be next?

 

Yes, I'm a bummer guy or whatever, but I'm concerned about some aspects... However, one I believe you should really take into consideration is the fact that if the backpack will somehow allow anybody to add "artworks" to any scene, you will need to desing it in a way that it prevents a scene getting flooded with many "clickies", "items", whatever.

 

That said luck with your experiment :P

[Master]

But if the quest has a filter of player names who started the quest, the pickable clickies would only be visible to the ones that started the quest and not the others.

[Ary Endleg]

Turning some object that is in original scene artwork into clicky/pickable item which isn't clicky already. Lets say there is some rock in the scene that isn't clickable yet. Turning objects that are already in scene into clickable would lower the need for so many new artworks questmaker might need.

[Chewett]

Turning some object that is in original scene artwork into clicky/pickable item which isn't clicky already. Lets say there is some rock in the scene that isn't clickable yet. Turning objects that are already in scene into clickable would lower the need for so many new artworks questmaker might need.

If the object isnt clickable, you need at least one piece of artwork to turn it golden and make it clickable.

[rikstar]

Also what is going to happen with clickables who do not work at the moment. There are a lot of them in the east. Will they ever become available?

[Muratus del Mur]

clickable items that are currently in the scene and are not used, won't be part of this system. This system can only work with new clickables added from now on. The "old clickies can be programmed only in the old way, either by md coder or made into a public clicky and allow md script on it.

 

There won't be a problem to flood a scene with too many clickies because i am counting on the good intentions and common sense of the people that will have access to such tools. When we are talking about such tools we are talking about people that really want to achive something nice, not to destroy or abuse things. This is a very rare breed of players other "games" don't know about :P

 

Turning an existing part of the scene into a clickable is possible by adding an identical drawing over the exact same spot..its a bit of a hack, but works just fine.

 

The way i see this work is that a group of people will do artworks, an other group will do the clicky coding and placement, and these two groups will work together with quest makers to build really cool quests. I might sound utopic..but i think this will actually work. Of course it is possible just for one person to do all of these , like both drawing the clickies, placing them in the scene, and designing a nice quest..but there are very few that could do that.

 

Also, these clickies can be limited to show just for the people that start a certain quest, so they could be set so that they won't all show up by default. This is how i made autumn2050 clickies, they only show up for those that work on that quest and later will only show up for those that participate in it.

[Maebius]

can I just say I read this and started drooling.  Not for the artwork "spam" in a scene, but the general idea of items/clickies and temporary quests that this would allow for...   hmm,   may intice my monthly madness back....   

Thanks Mur, for opening yet another box in my mind.   ;)  At least it still has Hope inside it, not just the demons that escape first!

[JadenDew]

I have went through quite a few quests where the questmaker had scripted various interesting riddles or puzzles that we had to solve before proceeding to the next stage of the quest.

I am wondering if it is possible, upon completion of such riddles/puzzles, to able to automatically "unlock" pickable clickies that was originally inaccessible or invisible?

[DarkRaptor]

I admit that after doing some quests one of the my current problems is where of the available clickies should i put code so that makes some sense and looks integrated.

So the possibility of having quest specific clickies is just... Incredible!

Some very usable "in scene"/"in inventory" items would be:
    Pickable items (or quest inventory items)
        could be found on scene and upon click passed into player inventory with quantity=x
        could be directly passed into a player inventory by script action
    Openeable items
        could be found on scene and would be basically a 2 (or more) state clickie
        usages: Chest's that need to be opened, Doors, traps (wich should be disabled),etc.
    Triggerable items
        could be found around a scene and upon click would do a quest global trigger (visible in the triggers)
        usages: Would enable cooperative play clickies like protect the flag, treasure attacked..etc.
    Dialogopener items
        could be found around a scene or used in inventory and act like the current clickies, openning a dialog with puzzles, riddles, etc
    xxable..
        ...
        
..actually i imagine these actions like "pre-made" functionality templates.. not sure if you see it that way..(more on this later..)

Also a set of some new script functions would be very handy for quest creation:
    -> a way to Set and Check if a Trigger is currently ON. Ex: Check/SetTrigger(<questid>,<triggername>)
    -> a way to Check the outcome of a recent battle. Ex: CheckBattle(<player1id>,<player2id>)
    -> a way to Call a existing functionality (spellcast,resource gather,travelsandals,etc..). For security reasons such usage should be granted per quest and logged.
    -> a way to Refresh a panel on the client side (Scene,Inventory). Ex. Refresh(<SCENE|INVENTORY)
    -> a way to (re) trigger a "in scene"/"in inventory" clickie. Ex. ClickOn(<clickie>)

 

    .. better stop.. because i'm sure i'm asking for alot of work!
 

[DarkRaptor]

I'm not sure how you designed the system and probably this is just utopic but..

i imagine a system where each clickie ObjectItem have:
 design-time modifiable:
     SCRIPTBlock       (similar to current scripts)
     HTMLContentBlock  (similar to current scripts)
     objectname
 non-modifiable properties: (assigned at creation)
    creator
    questid
    uniqueid
 runtime-script modifiable properties: (also design-time modifiable by interface)
     x,y,width,height,owner,name,description,visible,location,qtd,imgnormal,imghoover,imginventory


A quest creator would have at disposal functions like:
    CreateObjectItem(<questid>,<objectname>,<forPlayerID>) returns the created object
    GetObjectItem(<questid>,<objectname>,<forPlayerID>) returns a array of owned objects for a player
    DestroyObjectItem(<questid>,<uniqueid>) removes the object from the game

Some Conditions:
->Players would only see objects created for them. ( owner==uv('id') && visible==true)
    This is to prevent scene bloating with objects that are not meaningfull for those not participating in the quest.

->Objects created for PlayerID=0 would be visible (if visible==true) to all players that don't have such object.
    This would enable a visible starting point like a paper lost in the floor. Once the Paperobject was clicked the script would create a PaperObject for the player and set the visibility option accordingly.
    
->Global Interface where a Player could resign from a quest (or coders should always offer such functionality)
    This would remove all his quest specific objects and as so clear his scenes

Most object properties seem quite self descriptive, except the location property that would be:
    object['location'] == -1  ( if object is on inventory )
    object['location'] == '1_0x0_1' ( or other scene location )
    moving the object from scene to inventory (pick) would be a matter of:
        object['location'] = -1;
        object['qtd'] = 1;
        Refresh(SCENE|INVENTORY);

[Muratus del Mur]

further progress done today.

Now you can edit the location settings...it was possible before but now will be part of the questmaker tools

and, most important, item upload works now.

 

just a bit more and A25 can move on with adding quest specific items to the scenes.

With these tools, what once took ages to integrate, now will take seconds!

[Rophs]

stuff I had in a folder:

[log !!Wall of Text!! clay contest]

List of items that would need to be implemented:

 

Clay Package - misc - event

-Can be picked from some location before the event takes place, one must obtain one of these before the event starts, when the event starts all Clay Packages will transform into the items each participant starts with.

"A package of clay that will transform itself once the Clay Competiton begins."

 

 

Soft Clay Coin - valuble - event

-Event specific currency

"A coin made of soft clay, useful for trading during the Clay Contest."

 

 

Hard Clay Coin - Valuble - event

-Even specific currency

"A coin made of hard clay, useful for trading during the Clay Contest."

 

Large Clay Heat Jar - usable - event

-Functions as a normal heat jar, but for the Clay Contest. Holds 10k

"A large heat jar made out of clay."

 

Small Clay Heat Jar - usable - event

-Same as above but holds 5k

"A smal heat jar made out of clay."

 

Clay Ticket - usable - event

-can be used at any location with item collecting tag to be exchanged for a clay tool

"A ticket that can be traded for a useful tool at anywhere you may collect items."

 

Half Clay Dagger - usable - event

-can be used to kill a player who holds a Clay Cube who is at the same location as the user, breaks after one use

"A fragile dagger made of clay that will break if used."

 

Clay Dagger - usable - event

-can be used to kill a player who holds a Clay Cube who is at the same location as the user, breaks into two Half Clay Daggers upon use

"A fragile dagger made of clay that will split in two if used."

 

Quarter Clay Sigil - usable - event

-if user is not dead does nothing, if user is dead will revive user after 64 minutes, unlimited uses

"A sturdy sigil made of clay, it is said to protect whoever holds it. There appear to be missing parts."

 

Half Clay Sigil - usable - event

-same as QCS but revives after 32 minutes, unlimites uses

"A sturday sigil made of clay, it is said to protect whoever holds it. It seems incomplete."

 

Clay Sigil - usable - event

-revivles after 16 minutes, unlimited uses

"A sturday sigil made of clay, it is said to protect whoever holds it."

 

Clay Bucket - usable - tool - event

-can be used anywhere there is water to gain one unit of Water Murky with Clay, 64 second cooldown, harvest when depleted like a Common Herb Basket

"A bucket made of clay that can be used to harvest water, although it will murk the water when harvesting."

 

Clay Shovel - usable - tool - event

-can be used anywhere fenths can be harvested to gain one unit of Raw Clay, 64 second cooldown, harvest when depleted like a Common Herb Basket

"A shovel made of clay that can be used to harvest fenths, although it will damage the fenths when harvesting."

 

Clay Coin Mould - usable - tool - event

-can be used to turn a Soft Clay Lump into a Soft Clay Coin, unlimited uses

"A mould made of clay able to mimic the shape of a Soft Clay Coin."

 

Clay Chisel - usable - tool - event

-can be used to split apart Half Clay Sigils, Clay Sigils, and Clay Daggers

"A chisel made of clay able to break apart fused clay objects."

 

Clay Combiner - usable - tool - event

-can be used to put together partial clay objects, two Half Clay Daggers produce one Clay Dagger, two Half Clay Sigls produce one Clay Sigil, two Quarter Clay Sigils produce one Half Clay Sigil, consumes one Water Murkey with Clay upon use

"A machine made of clay able to put together broken clay artefacts."

 

 

Clay Cube - misc - rare - event (untradeable)

-a "failsafe" to make it more difficult for people to cheat

"A small clay cube indicating its holder is participating in a Clay Contest."

 

Water Murky with Clay - resource - event

-a resource used in the event, its reactions are detailed elsewhere

"Water collected with a Clay Bucket, becuase of how it was harvested it has been contaminated."

 

Raw Clay - resource - event

-a resource used in the event, its reactions are detailed elsewhere

"Fenths collected with a Clay Shovel, because of how it was harvested it has been turned into Clay."

 

Soft Clay - resource - event

-a resource used in the event, its reactions are detailed elsewhere

"A piece of Raw Clay that has been combines with Water Murkey with Clay at the Clay Reactor."

 

end list of items...

 

The Clay Reactor:

Some clickable at Wind's Gate that can combine Raw Clay and Water Murky with Clay into Soft Clay, can also turn Soft Clay Coins into Hard Clay Coins

 

 

Clay item values...

(number of the most common item/amount of item)

The bulletin board at Fortune's well will list the value of every clay item from least to greatest, updated hourly.

 

Scoring

(total value of player's items/total value of all items)*3000

 

Prize pool

Clay Dagger

Clay Sigil (takes 300x as long as ones from event)

Half Clay Dagger

Half Clay Sigil (takes 300x as long as ones from event)

[/log]

 

[log much shorter, needs to be heavily edited/more stuff added...]

Repeatable quest:

Heat Machine

 

Stage 1:

A beacon with spots to attach more parts appears at Wind's Gate in the middle of the circle. It can dispense twenty heat jars each capable of holding 10k heat. Once filled, the jars can be put back in the beacon. When the beacon has been given 100k heat it will use the heat to activate stage 2 of the quest. When stage 2 is activated the beacon's heat jars are removed from the player's inventory,

 

Stage 2:

The beacon uses the heat to reveal parts that can attach to it which were scattered across the realm. There would be a total of 10 parts. Each part has three locations where it might possibly appear and appears at one of the three locations randomly each iteration of the quest. Parts can be then added to the machine. Once all the parts are added to the beacon stage three will activate. To lessen hoarding the parts will return to one of their random locations every 24 hours.

 

Stage 3:

Now that the parts have been added to the beacon it can serve yet another purpose, consumption of creature totems to fuel it further. The machine's hunger for heat requires that the totem contains heat equal to at least 75% of the totem owner's maximum vitality. Due to the nature of heat the machine will also only accept totems containing creatures with 10 age or less, otherwise the heat will go bad. After the machine has eaten five creatures it will 

[/log]

 

[b][log older version of the wind's gate thing][/b]

Repeatable quest:

Heat Machine

 

Stage 1:

A machine shaped like a beacon appaears at Wind's Gate. Players give it heat and when it reaches 100k heat stage 2 will happen

 

Stage 2:

10 parts for the machine appear around the realm scattered (different every time). Parts are added to machine, then stage 3

 

Stage 3:

The machine demands MORE HEAT five creatures with an age under 10 and over 100k heat must be sacced into the machine for no stat gain, they must be young so that the heat doesn't "go bad" in a sense. Rewards are given once machine is "fed".

 

REWARDS:

Players are scored the following way:

1point for every 1k heat in stage 1

10 points for adding a aprt in stage 2

20 points for adding a creat stage 3

300 points total, 100 per stage.

 

Award top contributors at the end.

[/log]

Edited November 19, 2014 by Rophs