Re: Preventing players from repeating quests (Was: Re: CF: Alternate proposal: MARK the power crystals)

[quinet@gamers.org (Raphael Quinet)]

On Thu, 26 Aug 1999, Hwei Sheng TEOH <hsteoh@cs.toronto.edu> wrote:
> How far should we push this in the maps, though? I'm referring to
> single-map quests, like the houses in Scorn. Should we make it so
> that after you've completed the map you'll never be able to go in
> there again?

I don't think that we should worry about small quests.  Usually, these
are low- to medium-level maps that do not contain any great reward.
So going through these maps several times does not give an unfair
advantage.

> How about multi-player situations, where some in a party has been
> through the map, but others haven't? How would we enforce this rule
> for them (and should we bother to enforce it in this case)?

Indeed, there could be some problems with multi-player situations,
because only the player(s) entering the treasure room would be
prevented from re-doing the quest later.  In this case, some members
of the party would have to stay near the entrance and wait for the
others to finish the quest.  If the number of players that are allowed
to enter is decreased by one every time, then the potential for abuses
is rather limited.

Hmmm...  It would still be possible to cheat...  For example, you
could complete the quest with one or several players, without entering
the treasure room.  Then create a new character, go quickly through
all (empty) maps, pick up the treasure, give it to the other player(s)
and then destroy the temporary character that got the mark.  This
would be a way to avoid the mark on your main character(s).

Fortunately, there are several ways to prevent that:

- By making powerful artifacts incompatible with each other, so that
  even if you manage to get more than one, you would not be able to
  use all of them.

- By linking quests to each other.  Solving one quest would allow you
  to enter another one, and at the same time would prevent you from
  repeating the one that you just solved.  The quests would be
  increasingly difficult, with increasingly great rewards.  In order
  to enter the most interesting quests, it would be necessary to prove
  that you are worthy by having solved some simpler quests.  This
  would effectively prevent a freshly created character from entering
  a high-level quest just after it has been cleared by the high-level
  player(s), because the new character would not have the mark of the
  previous quests (and chances are that most maps in the previous
  quests would have been reset in the meantime).

- By making the poweful artifacts instantly attuned to the player who
  picks them up first.  This could be done by changing the pickup code
  and adding some tests for the powerful archetypes (maybe they should
  have a flag for this) or by adding a new kind of marker archetype
  for the treasure rooms.  That invisible object would mark all
  objects that are on the same square as soon as a player steps on it.
  All objects that have been attuned to a player would refuse to be
  applied by any other player.  Adding a test in the pickup code would
  probably be the best solution, because the solution involving a
  marker could be circumvented by using pets that pick up the objects.
  Note that the objects must be attuned to the first player who
  touches them, not to the first player who applies them, because
  otherwise this would not solve the problem of temporary characters
  entering the treasure room and giving the stuff to the others
  without applying the object.

> Personally, I like the idea that once you finish a quest, you won't
> be able to go back and re-play the quest. However, I also think that
> it should OK for my character to visit a place where monsters will
> always be replenished (like a Troll island or something), just for
> the fun of bashing some monsters. Such maps, of course, shouldn't
> have any significant rewards (just the regular randomly-generated
> stuff). Any map with significant rewards should probably be playable
> only once.

Yes, I share the same opinion.  This is something that should be
mentioned somewhere in the Crossfire docs, so that the mapmakers can
keep this in mind.

-Raphael

-
[you can put yourself on the announcement list only or unsubscribe altogether
by sending an email stating your wishes to crossfire-request@ifi.uio.no]