[MUD-Dev] DESIGN: WoW quests and content

[Travis Nixon]

Mike Rozak wrote:

> What am I missing? (Perhaps I'm missing some quest/content-design
> subtlety.)

I don't think you're missing anything at all.  There are kill quests
(kill X mobs), collection quests (kill X mobs, where X is some
random number based on the drop rate), world item collection quests
(kill X mobs, where X is some number based on how difficult they
wanted the quest to be), and escort quests (kill X mobs, where X is
some random number based on the path length, mob density, and how
well you cleared the path before starting the escort).

You're doing the same stuff that's been done in past MMORPGs.  You
kill lots of stuff.

And to be completely honest, I don't know why it feels so much
better than the others I've played.  But there's no question that it
does, because as a player, I'm enjoying it a lot more than I have
past games, even though as a developer, I KNOW that I'm doing the
exact same thing I've done in past games.

I suspect the effect is purely psychological, and primarily due to
the sheer number of quests out there.  The "experience grind" is
something that most MMORPG players are very familiar with, but it's
something that's always turned me off.  When you're grinding
experience, you're doing it with a goal in mind: the next level.
The result of reaching that goal is that you get to grind exp in a
new area, set a new goal (reach the next level), so on and so forth.
After a while, many people start to realize the futility, and burn
out.

Actually, now that I'm writing about it, I think really what's going
on is a sort of "goal laziness".  WoW provides all my goals for me.
I'm not killing X mobs to get my next level.  I'm killing X mobs
because Ruggleflutz needs his gears back.  And, again, although I
know intellectually that they're both really the same thing, I'm
starting to realize that emotionally they're not.  Had you asked me
beforehand, without seeing the effects myself, I'd have called you a
crackpot for even suggesting that adding such a silly, meaningless
goal, could make such a difference.  Especially in a context that
breaks the immersion quite horribly, as you're always reminded of
the fact that 20 other people just gathered the same number of
gears, and that Ruggleflutz is on a never-ending quest to gather
gears that will never, ever, ever be complete.

But it does.  And honestly, I'm flabbergasted that such a simple,
stupid little thing could have such a big impact.

Obviously, there are some people that are going to dislike being led
around by the hand as much as they are in WoW.  But I have to say
that so far, it seems the majority really likes being led around.  A
lot.

It's not that the quests are very well-written (they're not), or
that the stories are incredibly engaging (they're not).  We're
talking middle-of-the-road traditional fantasy quest fare, here.
Maybe slightly better than most MMORPG fare, but not significantly.
So it's not that.

It's that there are 20 or 30 that you could do RIGHT NOW.  And in a
collective 120 or so levels across 4 or 5 characters, including a
nearly level-capped character in beta, I think I've only felt like I
had to grind exp to get that next level once.  And that was only
because I wanted to do it solo, because although I LOVE grouping
with friends and guild mates, I simply don't have the patience for
random morons who don't have any idea how to play the game in a way
that involves staying alive for more than 10 minutes at a time.

Overall, although there are some things on the horizon that could
be, there is nothing in WoW right now that I would consider
revolutionary.  It's more of the same, with a prettier face.  All of
the things that I think make WoW better than the other games I've
tried are really very small things.  Like the fact that combats are
faster, and generally involve more mobs at once.  Like the fact that
there's *almost* no such thing as a 15 minute down time.  (some of
the gryphon flights are still really intolerably long, IMO) Of
course, the fact that it's not revolutionary is not particularly
surprising.  Blizzard simply does not do revolutionary, at least not
in the traditional sense.  Also, WoW obviously is not a perfect
game, it has its flaws too.

But I think the thing that's most shocking to me is that the part of
my brain that's saying "wtf are you doing?  this is just the
same-old-same-old" is being totally ignored by the part that's still
having fun after a year of playing, which is about 3 or 4 times as
long as it took me to totally burn out on the last couple I played.

And I really can't explain why.  And that bothers me.  A lot.

:)
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