28 KiB
[D][RT][RST] Let's talk about Quests
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Author: u/GaBeRockKing Horizon Breach: http://archiveofourown.org/works/6785857*
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URL: https://www.reddit.com/r/rational/comments/7lzhv2/drtrst_lets_talk_about_quests/
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Score: 28
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Created: 2017-12-25T04:18:35
Post:
Quests, for the uninitiated, are sort of halfway points between long-form roleplaying and traditional serialized fiction. Their general format is as follows:
- An author writes a "chapter" covering story events.
- The author allows readers to choose "what happens next", whether by voting on multiple-choice character actions, writing elaborate plans, or some combination thereof.
- The author incorporates those choices into their next update of the story.
Quests are an interesting form of writer-reader interaction, and quest-writers have plenty of options to keep things interesting.
I'd like to talk about rational/ist quests. The only explicit example that I know of is the collaboration between /u/eaglejarl and Velorien, Marked for Death (and it's currently inactive spinoff.) But other rational works have included quest-like elements. Notably, HPMOR had readers write-in plans for harry's final fight against voldemort, with the threat of a bad end if nobody could find a good one.
Quests have a lot of potential to be rational/ist. Readers have a tendency to act almost exclusively in what they perceive to be the character's best interest (although admittedly, it's difficult to nail down whether a character is acting according to their values when "values" are something defined by an uncomfortable consensus between dozens of people.) In turn, quest runners have every incentive to provide a world that functions in a consistent fashion to readers, many of whom go all the way to writing their own game systems, covering combat actions, character interactions, and what-have-you.
Meanwhile, from a participant's perspective, there's real buy-in regarding actions taken in-story because they often have a direct hand in causing them.
So with that, I'll open the discussion with a few questions, of which you can answer any or none of:
- What do you think of quests? Would you read one? Would you write one?
- How can quests be tuned to balance fluff with crunch? (That is, how can the game mechanics be tuned to give readers clear understandings of how the quest works, while still leaving space for the quest to develop as an organic story?)
- What good quests have you read/ are you reading? (I'll post my own recommendations list in the comments)
- Do you have any ideas for quests? What are they? Let us help you brainstorm!
- How can quests be designed to be both rational/ist and engaging? (/u/eaglejarl please chime in!)
- What genres are underserved by currently existing quests?
- What issues do many quests have?
- What successes should more quests incorporate?
- FREE SPACE (pretend I asked a question you want to answer!)
Comments:
u/xamueljones [+15] My arch-enemy is entropy (47 minutes later)
Here's my quest recommendations that involve the players being smart and dealing with a rational/well-thought out setting:
- Cultivation Quest where the players control a street rat with above average cultivation talent.
Dragon Ball: After the End - Dragon Ball Quest set centuries after the ending of the manga where a pacifistic descendant of Goku needs to learn how to rule a people who thinks she's weak for being a pacifist while enemies come to kill off the remaining Saiyans.
Puella Magi Adfligo Systema - Puella Magi Madoka Magica Quest where the players start out by wishing for their Kyuubey-granted power to be the ability to control grief. Yes the wish is as over-powered as it sounds to anyone who has seen the show and every last bit of Mary Sue-ness/intelligent planning/lucky dice-rolls is required to survive the quest.
Erogamer - Pornographic Gamer Quest where a girl spontaneously become a game character out of an eroge with unsettling implications.
"This is more depth than I was expecting with my porn quest." --- all of the readers
"This is way more depth than I was expecting with my porn quest, even taking that statement into account." --- Sirrocco
u/None [+4] (3 days later)
I'm disappointed. I was hoping forge of destiny was about a literal street rat who was good at farming.
u/None [+3] (an hour later)
[removed]
u/xamueljones [+11] My arch-enemy is entropy (an hour later)
very little actual plot progress
Snicker More like the opposite. While there is a good amount of porn, there is plenty of plot and an over-arching storyline. In fact, every single sex scene furthers the story in some way.
It is a pornographic story that is so much more and philosophically deeper than "just porn". The quotes I posted under the link for Erogamer perfectly sums up what the quest will deliver.
u/i6i [+8] (9 hours later)
Literally the next morning introduces time travel.
u/SpeculativeFiction [+3] (a day later)
Is erogamer more than just porn?
Most writing from Questionable Content falls into that problem--It's a site explicitly made for XXX content, as Spacebattles and Sufficient Velocity don't allow them. Which means essentially all of the works on there have porn in them, usually in place of things like plot and character development.
The Erogamer is a big exception there, oddly enough. Gamer fics usually go downhill fast due to various inherent flaws, so it should be doubly cursed. However, the author managed to write a emotionally compelling story about a girl going from a hopeless castoff to a more functional member of society.
Some of the plot parts are actually pretty fantastic, which I won't spoil.
u/GaBeRockKing [+2] Horizon Breach: http://archiveofourown.org/works/6785857 (57 minutes later)
Thanks for the recs! I'll check (a subset of) them out.
u/SoylentRox [+2] (2 days later)
Heh. Just Erogamer, right?
u/GaBeRockKing [+1] Horizon Breach: http://archiveofourown.org/works/6785857 (2 days later)
I can neither confirm or deny that
u/RMcD94 [+1] (2 days later)
What's a cultivation quest?
Also are there pdfs or epubs or some way load an entire thread on one page so as to read it when offline?
u/xamueljones [+5] My arch-enemy is entropy (2 days later)
Cultivation quest is me making a reference to the Chinese genre of Xianxia which is about people 'cultivating' their strength, magic (qi), and martial arts to become immortal and/or to reach the pinnacle of strength (be able to beat up everyone else).
It's a very stagnant genre as once you've read one novel, you've read all of them due to how similar each of the novels are. I generally treat them as the junk food of literature. It's a very simple plot where I can feel good reading about protagonists who succeed at virtually everything (you could call them Mary-Sues). Here's a link to a very good critique of the genre. Wuxiaworld has the best collection of translated Xianxia novels if you want to read them anyway and I recommend I Shall Seal the Heavens and Desolate Era as the best of the lot which aren't deconstructions or subversions of the tropes.
However, Forge of Destiny is a quest where the players are controlling a disciple which has made this stagnant genre very interesting due to how there is a lot more well-thought out world-building and lack of a guaranteed success.
Sufficient Velocity has a button near the top of the page called "Reader Mode" which only shows you the posts by the author and none of the commenters. Or you can download Calibre and install the plugin FanFicFare where you can download any story from sites like Sufficient Velocity, Space Battles, fanfiction.net, Archive of Our Own, and more.
u/RMcD94 [+1] (3 days later)
The reader mode is perfect thank you, sadly no computer access to use calibre.
Thanks for the explanation, it sounds similar to isekai in terms of them mostly being the same and not that high quality am I right in that?
I am enjoying forge of destiny even without awareness of the genre through I'm a bit annoyed at how quest choosers seem to always choose someone who is uncharismatic. I prefer characters who dive headstrong with confidence into unfamiliar territory, or at least attempt to be better prepared (not talking to the carriage driver for a multiple hour journey for example).
I also leafed through some of the other ones and am most interested in the pmmm one, enjoying the civ one too, it's interesting to read, kind of reminds me of alternative history. So thanks for the recommendations
u/GaBeRockKing [+8] Horizon Breach: http://archiveofourown.org/works/6785857 (14 minutes later)
As promised, my list of quest recommendations: (please keep in mind that I am exclusively a lurker on quests, and do not rate quests based on reader interaction.)
Fanfiction:
Marked For Death Rational(ist), Naruto
Pokemon Quest PokemonFanfiction?:
PREQUEL Skyrim(?), Webcomic, Highly Recommended
Grand Strategy (Original Fiction):
Paths of Civilization Command-a-civilization
Blood And Money Command-a-Ruler
Are Isekai's Supposed to Involve Grand Strategy? Command-a-Ruler, Second Person
By the way, I've been looking all over for grand strategy quests. Recommend me literally any of them with >1k words written; they're rare enough that I'm not picky. I might drop them anyways, but I'll at least check out pretty much any of them.
u/Action_Bronzong [+3] (20 hours later)
Highly Recommended
I don't think it's remotely possible to recommend Prequel enough, such is my love for that story.
u/None [+2] (4 days later)
[deleted]
u/None [+1] (4 days later)
[deleted]
u/SpeculativeFiction [+2] (a day later)
Grand Strategy, Eh?
The World Waits on evil: A man from earth is body-switched with a lich, and has to lead his (partly undead) kingdom without giving away the fact that he isn't the original ruler. Not a quest, but likely the most rational fic I've read on those two forums. Features a non base ten system of math, non standard english words and phrases (he isn't speaking english in the story, some things don't translate exactly. Fuck = "love like striking", for instance.), a necromancy based industrial revolution, and magical experimentation.
Warhammer Fantasy: A Dynasty of Dynamic Alcoholism Command the ruler of Ostland! Features a second imperial Gunnery school, many wars, and a great deal of infrastructure improvements.
Into the Amber Age: Control a god (and his civilization.)
Deus Ex Mechanicus: Control a Mechanicus Forge world. Technically controlling a ruler, but this quest is more broad strokes than most. Lots of tech development, societal changes, massive infrastructure projects, fleets sent out to fight, genetic enhancement projects...
A Geek’s Guide: Corporation of Occult Research and Extermination Control the head of a secret US-based organization made to defend against supernatural threats. Plenty of tech-development, and orchestrating world events from behind the scene. Actually finished, and despite it's Anime setting, has good writing and characters.
I think the sequel is just okay (too much power wanking), but it's set years later anyway, focusing on a completely different group.
Grandeur Rising, Eastern Fantasy Empire: Control an empire in a fantasy version of China. Loads of tech development, conquest, infrastructure building, etc. Completely OC, as far as I can tell. Start with the second post, which has the index.
To Rule: Dragon empire quest. Finished.
There is no GATE; we did not fight there: A very well written GATE province quest.
u/GaBeRockKing [+2] Horizon Breach: http://archiveofourown.org/works/6785857 (a day later)
Thanm you for the recs!
u/SpeculativeFiction [+2] (a day later)
PREQUEL Skyrim(?), Webcomic, Highly Recommended
I've read a little ways in (past the imps), and this story reminds me unpleasantly of The Wandering Inn, in that every action tried fails horribly, and nothing ever goes right for the protagonist. I personally call it Angst-farming, where the characters exist to be tortured.
Does it ever grow out of that? If so, how long does it take?
u/GaBeRockKing [+1] Horizon Breach: http://archiveofourown.org/works/6785857 (a day later)
What happens with prequel is that the differential of what katia loses on her misadventures and what she gains grows smaller, to the point where eventually, on some misadventures, she's makes a net positive. Shit still goes really poorly for her though. So it eventually does grow out of that, but I can't really give you a single point.
u/None [+1] (3 days later)
It gets a bit better once she goes onto the road to Kvatch for the second time, the low point of the story is when she wakes up after drinking after the imps, but things are never good for her.
u/Cariyaga [+1] Kyubey did nothing wrong (a day later)
If you wish to change your policies on participation, we'd be happy to have you in either Marked for Death or Settlers of (Yu)Catan. :D
u/GeeJo [+1] Custom Flair (13 hours later)
If you enjoyed Paths of Civilization, one of the Marked For Death writers started their own version set in Mesoamerica - Settlers of (Yu)Catan. It's still in the very very early stages, though. Otherwise, I'll second the Erogamer rec from elsewhere in the thread.
u/GaBeRockKing [+3] Horizon Breach: http://archiveofourown.org/works/6785857 (14 hours later)
If you enjoyed Paths of Civilization, one of the Marked For Death writers started their own version set in Mesoamerica - Settlers of (Yu)Catan.
I literally read through and bookmarked that one yesterday :P
u/Cariyaga [+3] Kyubey did nothing wrong (a day later)
Needs more BOAT.
u/alexanderwales [+7] Time flies like an arrow (an hour later)
I've read a few. I think that a lot of the enjoyment comes from the community rather than the qualities of the work itself. When read without that community, some of the pleasure from the story is lost, because it's a dead thing rather than a living one, and there are plenty of authors offering static stories.
Writing a quest takes a lot of tools out of the writer's toolbox, and some that aren't outright removed get severely crippled. It's difficult to have a setup and payoff if there's an audience ready to step in the way of that payoff. Similarly, it's really tough to develop a theme, have a character go through a character arc, develop parallels or symmetries that reinforce the central point ... a lot of stuff gets much, much harder, and from what I've read, mostly just doesn't get done as a result. This is compounded by the fact that quests are, almost by definition, first drafts.
Now, some authors are skilled enough to be able to tie up loose ends while also working within the constraints of audience participation, and there are different levels of quest so far as that goes. Even for those authors that aren't skilled enough, some readers don't actually care if there are a bunch of loose ends left around, and in any case, this isn't a big problem if the author's solution is just "continue this thing forever or abandon it when I get bored", which also works for some audiences (minus the abandonment part).
I think in general it's an interesting concept, but not one that tends to produce results that are toward my personal tastes.
u/None [+8] (4 hours later)
In my limited experience, player characters often develop themes and arc anyway, mostly because the players themselves choose actions consistently enough.
In any other case, if you want to enforce characterization, you could give them traits that give bonus and cons.
In PoC, there is no permanent character cast(which until recently, last only 4 updates), but there is a sense of characterization of a civilization.
The player civilization, the Ymaryn, is the best friend you could ever have, but also your worst enemy, which plays into the strategic implication of their build, since losing lands is much more costly for them, but also make them ferocious opponents in defensive wars, which also make them shit at conquest.
Combined with other values, this of course has all sort of historical and narrative implications.
u/thrawnca [+4] Carbon-based biped (a day later)
I'd agree that it's difficult, if not impossible, to maintain the same story quality in a quest as in regular literature, and that the compensating advantage is the community.
I'd further add that at least in PoC and the new spinoff SoY (and probably in other quests too) there's an educational component to participating in that community. To meaningfully join in the discussion, you end up researching government forms, the historical development of different agricultural and metalworking and seafaring techniques, distribution of animals and vegetables and minerals, relevant geography, immunology...
u/ToaKraka [+5] https://i.imgur.com/OQGHleQ.png (2 hours later)
Platforms for quests include (but are not limited to):
- SufficientVelocity
- QuestionableQuesting (requires an account for the viewing of NSFW quests)
- SpaceBattles
- 4chan (and the suptg archive)
- Fiction.Live (formerly known as Anonkun)
What do you think of quests?
In general, I dislike stories that are composed of excessively-short chapters.
However, the content of a story matters just as much as its format and its English do. After spending the past two or three hours in looking for interesting quests (in the course of writing this comment), I can't say that I've found any.
What
goodquests have you read or are you reading?I read Problem Sleuth years ago, and currently am following Prequel. My interest in those stories is based primarily on their pixel art. (The story of Homestuck was totally insufficient to sustain me through an archive binge. Even Problem Sleuth took several attempts to complete.)
In the course of writing this comment, I found that Marked for Death, The Erogamer, and Twisted Pinwheel seemed somewhat interesting at first but fell flat after a few chapters, while nothing else was even worth mentioning.
Would you read a quest?
The content of a story matters just as much as its format and its English. Quests cannot be summarily written off on the basis of lackluster experiences. Would I have stuck with fanfiction if I hadn't stumbled across Time Braid at the tail end of the binge on vacuous NaruHina fluff that followed my initial discovery of FanFiction.net?
tl;dr: Yes.
u/eaglejarl [+2] (10 hours later)
I found that Marked for Death [...] seemed somewhat interesting at first but fell flat after a few chapters, Can you expand on that? Constructive criticism is useful.
u/ToaKraka [+1] https://i.imgur.com/OQGHleQ.png (11 hours later)
On the basis of the first thirty-three chapters (half-read, half-skimmed):
- Humor verging on crack-fic territory
- Protagonists (genin with no interesting techniques or abilities) about whom I don't care (and I'm not interested enough to wait for the fuuinjutsu investigations to get somewhere good)
- Aimlessness (It makes me realize how boring the "Orochimaru roams the elemental countries to buy/exchange/steal techniques rather than sequestering himself in hidden laboratories" idea that I had some years ago very likely would be.)
u/eaglejarl [+2] (a day later)
Humor verging on crack-fic territory
What does this mean?
u/ToaKraka [+1] https://i.imgur.com/OQGHleQ.png (a day later)
In my opinion, the story contained too much humor. This obviously is a very subjective determination—but I generally tire very quickly of reading Lee-/Guy-style diatribes (however intentionally staged in-story, IIRC) and interpersonal comedies of errors (however intentionally instigated in-story).
u/Flashbunny [+4] (3 days later)
I see a lot of people saying that Quests have shortcomings that regular stories don't, and that's true. But a point that I think many of you are missing is that a Quest isn't just a reader-driven narrative, it's a game. It has advantages in reader/player enjoyment/engagement that a story does not. The strengths of the two mediums coming together are admittedly balanced by weaknesses from both, but it's wrong to view them purely as a strictly-inferior version of a story, because you're missing a large part of the point.
u/abcd_z [+3] (22 hours later)
Readers have a tendency to act almost exclusively in what they perceive to be the character's best interest
Usually, yeah, but occasionally you get things like the youthsuit incident, which pissed off a lot of people.
QM Note: This update was originally canon. 2 hours and 45 minutes before voting closed, a group of regulars decided it would be funny to vote for "Action Plan: buy a YOUTHSUIT" as a replacement for the then-leading plan. Thanks to a combination of low voter turnout for the original plan and the narrow time window for other players to realise what was about to happen, the new plan won. @eaglejarl and I decided that, as the plan could only be the result of a brief burst of insanity (the RADIOACTIVE GREEN, BOLD BLOCK CAPITALS were a clue), so Hazō could only act on it as the result of a brief burst of insanity. Thus, the update you are about to read. All hell broke loose in the thread after it was posted, but amidst the ragequitters and people who simply focused on expressing their anger and hurt, there were also a few who made calm, constructive and well-reasoned arguments for why the update should be retconned. It is they who finally managed to convince us that the case for doing so was (very slightly) stronger than the case for keeping it. This update is now an omake, but it was a very, very close run thing. We hope that this cautionary tale will inspire you, in this quest or any other, to vote early, often and sensibly so that this kind of clusterfuck misunderstanding can never happen again.
u/Cariyaga [+1] Kyubey did nothing wrong (a day later)
Also, we have at least a few players that explicitly don't want what's in Hazou's best interest.
(please join if you'll add to the sane portion :D)
u/None [+1] (a day later)
[removed]
u/Veedrac [+1] (6 days later)
u/Mellow_Fellow_ [+5] (2 days later)
Polyhistor Academy is a rationalist quest I highly recommend, and it just started back up again for Year 2. The quest takes place an academy of magic, with the main character specializing most heavily in Illusion and Mental magic. The twist is the top 10% of each class are awarded practically unlimited funding for their future projects. The bottom 90%... well, death is preferable. This paradigm set was forth by the school's (re)founder, Yoseph Kroll, who uses the school as a method for mass-producing extremely powerful mages. The competition between the students and the quality of the facilities creates pressure to push students far beyond what they would be capable of elsewhere.
Kroll is not an ethical man, and the horrifying aspects of the setting are played out logically.
Despite being hosted on QQ, Polyhistor Academy is definitely not a porn quest. Instead, it is there because the author wanted creative freedom. Sexuality is part of the human condition, after all.
u/None [+2] (2 days later)
Haven't actually read it, heard good decisions aren't made, but it's fairly notable in that it was run/written by the author of Worm himself.
u/deltashad [+1] (a day later)
What do you think of quests?
They severly limit author potential to produce great story.
How can quests be tuned to balance fluff with crunch?
The best kind of game mechanic is implicit one, because it allows to bloom most spectacular and convincing ideas not the most numerically superior by some inane metric.
How can quests be designed to be both rational/ist and engaging?
I don't think that it can be done. Mob are unlike individuals it consists of is dumb, emotional and incapable of implementing any long term plans. So protagonist in quests often forced to do idiotic things without any half-decent explanation, which is really painful to watch in rational/ist world.
What issues do many quests have?
Author gives players too long leash, with which they proceed to hang themself. Big groups of people tend to be dull, so author should use every trick in the book to squeeze some forethought from the mob. Even if said tricks restrict players freedom.