*SPOILER WARNING* Village of the Lost (Colharbour) is really, really, really stupid quest writing.

Tabbycat

This thread makes me wish we did have the quest response of "lol wut?"

Jayman1000

Tabbycat wrote: »

This thread makes me wish we did have the quest response of "lol wut?"

yeah or something similar. Instead of always just the same cookie cutter choices.

Atlan_daGonozal

Tabbycat wrote: »

This thread makes me wish we did have the quest response of "lol wut?"

There are many quests I wish had another “lol — not doing that” option.

CMDR_Un1k0rn

Dusk_Coven

Tomg999 wrote: »

I agree. It is jarring to be walking around saving everyone you meet, and then meet a merchant and be offered the option "No - give me all of your gold now!"

They offer you an achievement if you do it enough times -- like that justifies its existence in the game...

Robo_Hobo

Someone's probably already mentioned it, but originally the quest had 3 or 4 different endings.

1. When they ask you to sacrifice yourself, you could say no, and they fight you to the death. If you kill them, then you get a different ending where they aren't saved, and someone else gives you the quest reward and says something about your decision, I think they were impressed (?) can't remember.

2. You say no, and then you fight to the death - but if you die during the fight, the quest completes with the same way it would with you having sacrificed yourself, but with different dialogue, I think they were apologetic or something when they give you the quest reward.

3. The current, only remaining quest completion option, where you willingly sacrifice yourself.

4. I think there might have been an intimidate or persuade option where you tell them no but they don't fight you because you manage to convince them to not go that path or sacrifice someone else, I can't remember.


ZOS said the reason they changed this quest (and others with similar situations) was because it broke up groups who were questing together because if you chose different options it would put you in different quest instances (because I guess it was a different instance if they became hostile or something like that? Can't remember if there was a different room) So instead their solution was to remove the choices from these quests so there is only one choice you can take, or at least only choices that lead to the same quest instance. I didn't like that change so much but I can understand their reasoning, although it felt like a lazy fix to me.

But as for dying and then respawning and it being canonically referenced, it actually would make sense since your character is the Vestige and can canonically respawn, it just feels weird since this is like 1 out of 4 quests in the entirety of ESO that actually reference your Vestige/Soulless status, and 1 out of 2 quests that I can think of, that actually know that that means you can resurrect under normal circumstances, but that said the way it's written when you do they don't make any note of saying they know you can resurrect when they ask you to sacrifice yourself, so when they aren't surprised afterward it does feel a bit weird...although it is Coldharbour and Soul Shriven are pretty normal there, so maybe it was just a normal thing, even if your character isn't a normal Soul Shriven.

And that's entirely ignoring the possibility of a character doing that quest without having done the Soul Shriven tutorial first, which further complicates that whole mess, but yeah.

Danikat

I know it's a really old thread so this is probably somewhat irrelevant at this point but I reallly liked this quest.

Suronii - the NPC you're working with - is a necromancer (or at least the spell she uses is necromancy), she needs someone to die in order to power the spell and you're the only one there who is still alive. She knows you're soul shriven - that death for you isn't permanent, that's why she's not surprised when she sees you again afterwards. And even if you'd somehow gotten through the entire game to that point without dying you should know that too because it's been discussed in various other quests. (There's a whole quest line in Bangkorai which centers around one of the Tharn's going to great lengths to kill you permanently.)

The quest impressed me because I didn't expect that but in retrospect it seemed obvious. I was suspicious of Suronii right from when she mentioned she was happy you're alive (to be honest I'm suspicious of any quest giver who seems excited or pleased with the situation) but I thought it would be a typical outcome where she tries to trick you and then you have to kill her, so I was suprised when she was so up-front about it, and kind of confused when you're just going along with it. At the point I jumped I knew my character would come back and my guess was that the spell just wouldn't work, because I thought she needed a soul. So it was kind of a cool surprised to see it did work, and then I realised what had happened.

Maybe it helps that going through Coldharbour I was finding and reading all the lore books and other info which deals with soul shriven and daedric vestiges and I was kind of fascinated with the whole concept, so to me it was interesting to see a novel use for it played out in a quest.

FierceSam

U

Dahveed wrote: »

People laugh about the "collect board tusks" quests in other MMOs, but honestly I think that is something that is missing in this game... not so much the literal collecting, but the "neutral" kinds of quests where you are just doing a task, checking something out, selling mats or relaying messages etc... Something that isn't just "hero please help us!" over and over again.

Might I direct your attention to the Murkmire prologue quests.

Not simply because the ‘Back to Murkmire’ event is almost upon us and it would be timely, but because you’ll be doing 150 of the arse-grindingly tedious dailies just to get the Murk Prepper achievement with its pungent swampy brown reward dye (which is, quite literally, s*** on a stick).

And, to make your board tusk collecting dreams come true, one of the 7 daily tasks is the single most badly designed steppenfetchit daily ever - the Mammoth Meat Hunt. Here you will struggle to gather a stupefyingly large amount of Mammoth meat from a population of mammoths clearly too small to provide the required amount. A population that spawns slowly enough to ensure far too much competition for their slaughter when they do, finally, make an appearance. A simple quest so badly designed it takes an inordinately long time to complete and leaves you loathing all other players, the NPC who tasked you to do it and the entire team lazy enough to let the bloody thing out into the game in equal measure.

After that, I’m sure you will look upon Village of the Lost as a shining example of a quest done right.

Elsonso

FierceSam wrote: »

And, to make your board tusk collecting dreams come true, one of the 7 daily tasks is the single most badly designed steppenfetchit daily ever - the Mammoth Meat Hunt. Here you will struggle to gather a stupefyingly large amount of Mammoth meat from a population of mammoths clearly too small to provide the required amount. A population that spawns slowly enough to ensure far too much competition for their slaughter when they do, finally, make an appearance. A simple quest so badly designed it takes an inordinately long time to complete and leaves you loathing all other players, the NPC who tasked you to do it and the entire team lazy enough to let the bloody thing out into the game in equal measure.

Interestingly, enough, people often fail to think outside of the circle. You do not need to stay in the circle. The circle is apparently just guidance. A hint. All of the mammoths in The Rift seem to drop the meat.

If you want to complain about one of the Murkmire quests, the Gloom Morel mushroom portion of the bug repellent quest is the one to complain about. I have not found any alternate source for that, and when that quest was popular, you had to be on your toes.

Linaleah

never mind, didn't realize it was a necro

Brandathorbel

I don't really bother with stories in video games. They mostly are subpar. I am sure most video game writers failed to succeed In their desired format