IDEA: Quest: The end of Ultima, the (possible) trilogy.

[R.A.V.S.O]

Alright so, word has come to me that Ultima needs some new quests to break the vicious cycle of repetitive tasks in-game

and therefore I'm commiting this post for my idea...

Questline "The end of Ultima"

exactly what it says on the title.... a (hopefully) trilogy of quests leading to a shockful turn of events that lead to the destruction

of the Pioneer 2, home of the hunters...

what I would hopefully like to do is have ALL of the community of Ultima involved in this... as NPC's what I mean is, take Ultima's most popular players and put them as guiding NPC's all having references to the ultima server itself (this is easy to do just alter some dialogue here and there...)

this post will cover plot and possibly management of these quests...

ok for the plot, in a nutshell, a series of events have ocurred over Ragol that have been triggering hotspots that in turn have made

cratures all over Ragol more vicious and intelligent, capable of leading an organized offensive against hunters themselves, the monsters are smart.... TOO smart, as if someone is leading them all with a dark intent in mind...

Now then, what I have in mind is a 3 part questline that involves both multiplayer and solo mode, having quests 1 and 2 be played in solo mode and having the 3rd and final segment done in multiplayer mode AFTER players have cleared parts 1 and 2 and unlock it,

what are these about?

Quest 1: "A surge in the deep" Mode: single-player Episode: I Consists of: player + popular EP1 npc's

DESCRIPTION: Hunters have gathered information concerning the violent behavior of ragol's creatures and have pinpointed

the source of the mind control... deep in the mines, a group of hunters (the player and 2 npc's) must brave through the forest and

into the mines to search and destroy the source,

quest spoilers: (btw I mark these as spoilers because, well if these actually catch the players attention, and actually start to be developed I might as well NOT ruin these... so read at your own regard)

During your exploration into the mines, you discover a tainted Vol Opt and eliminate it, back at the base after reading the info the corrupted Vol opt had, it appears it was a self operating program set to detonate at a certain time AND also gather information on how the Hunters fight, the next target lies in the control tower located in EP2,

HOW I WOULD PLAY THIS OUT: (Ok this section is in terms of GAMEPLAY how I would handle this quest, basically how the quest plays, what you can and cannot do, what to expect etc...)

This being a single player quest, has no absurd amount of enemies, they are easy to dispatch but the real charm of this quest is that I would like to take some areas from other quests (such as forest offensive) and tone them down a bit for single player gameplay

basically QUEST 1 is a nostalgia run,

(to avoid cluttering the page)

Quest 2: "The Pioneer 2's Ultimatum" Mode: single-player Episode: II Consists of: player + popular EP2 npc's

DESCRIPTION: During your search through the mines, the search team has discovered the next generator lies atop the control tower heavily secured, it is up to the player to reach the top floor along with the help of fellow EP2 npc's (or solo I'm still thinking about this one) dying during the quest is by all means failure as the Pioneer is unable to support you once the infiltration begins,

quest spoilers:

Ok this quest is a more different ballgame than the one before, it has 2 endings, should you die before reaching the top floor and taking down the mastermind, you'll get bad ending where the control tower assumes total control of the area and gives you a grim foresight of what is to come, (*cough* Quest 3 *cough*) on the other hand should you get to the top floor and take down all enemies you'll get a better ending where your team managed to disarm the control tower in time

DOUBLE SPOILER: They really don't stop it. the tower managed to send all it's data collected on the hunters to an unknown location without your team knowing, thus starting the story of quest 3.

HOW I WOULD PLAY THIS OUT:

Alright then here the thing, this quest depends on your ability to stay alive, if your NPC's die, it's no biggie but you dying instantly ends the quest with a sour ending, what I'm trying to figure out is, after death is it possible to keep track of a death count? my original idea was to allow the player dying up to 3 times max, while trying to reach the top, however this being a single player quest I also want to keep enemies to a minimum to basically test players out in survival tactics, there is no time limit, no rushes, just make it out in one piece,

as an incentive to getting the good ending I would like to ask Larva to permit this quest to hand you an item for your great effort, where the item quality depended on the difficulty you are playing at

Quest 3: "The end of Ultima" Mode: multi-player Episode: IV Consists of: 4 players (recommended high level)

DESCRIPTION: After some time on the incident at the control tower things have been quiet... but not anymore, it appears the control tower was indeed a decoy set to capture the info of the pioneer's best hunters and pioneer coordinates itself... the plan was successful and now an army of mutants at the mercy of the control program has it's eyes set on the pioneer 2 itself! their last line of defense? the best hunters ultima has to offer of course! can 4 elite hunter truly change the unavoidable fate of the end of the Pioneer 2 and Ultima itself?

quest spoilers: (I must say this is perhaps the MOST spoilerific quest of them all, what makes it unique is how the quest itself is handled.

The party starts in the southern crater path having to make way towards the north towards the crater itself, where the only hope for the pioneer is to head in and disable the final remote, the result? you fail, (no I'm serious about this one)

the team manages to reach the crater only to be mocked by the program on how futile is their defense, seeing as how it has seen them fight and knows all the player's moves calls upon and endless horde of mutants to kill you once and for all, then it proceeds to jam connections to the pioneer, your last order from the principal "Survive for as long as you can brave hunters!" the quest ends when all players are defeated and can no longer fight back (dying is permanent)

HOW I WOULD PLAY THIS OUT:

I know what you're all thinking... but RAVSO,how in the world are we to win if we're forced to die?

that's the thing everyone, this quest is designed as a last stand, a way to go out with a bang, the only correct way to clear this quest is to indeed well... die at it, no questions asked,

But if you did that, you might as well die from the very beginning you might say and take the easy way out, so where do rewards come from this? well here's my answer: since this is a last stand, I figured I would give you a reward after your death, quality depending on how many mobs might have died and difficulty, basically the more you lasted alive the better is your reward,

what makes this quest even more special is how the npc's would have dialogues before and after quest...

for example NPC 1 would say (before quest): "You guys are our only hope, if not all of the Pioneer is lost! give it your best!

then afterwards at the end same NPC 1 would greet you with "They... they died... it's all over... the pioneer 2 is lost..."

basically all npc's would treat you as heroes before going down to war, and THEN as spirits of the departed when returning

meaning all npc's would talk about you in 3rd person after the end of the quest and basically its you guys (as ghosts) hearing what they had to say as well as giving their last farewell at the pioneer,

returning to the lobby before the quest would be called "abandoning ship" (I'd have the principal say "You know [player name] it's not too late to back down... you could abandon ship... no one would blame you, all you need to do is head to the guild counter and resign... I wouldn't judge you..") afterwards... it would be called "going to the afterlife" since the lady at the counter gives you her last gift (the quest reward) before you "ascend"

now then as to how I plan to do this... I was thinking of merging the road to the crater with the "realms of war" arena, all the times I've played it I've never seen everyone clear it completely... this is the closest thing we got to unwinnable, and thus perfect for this quest,

basically dying would (same as RoW) expell you and give all NPC's the ghost commentary, as a plus, there's no telepipes and no drops to avoid lag,

I would like to classify it as a honrable final quest in the player's timeline

and that's about it... now then look... I KNOW this might probably be never done and so, but that's just it, it's an idea and I believe it MIGHT be possible to make with the right devs in our side (you know who you are ) it might not come out 100% as stated but I believe this to be somewhat possible, please give your constructive criticism, any ideas that we could improve.... which Ultima NPC's to add... after all I would love it if we could actually get ALL of the Ultima community to pitch in,

think of this as a magnun opus, it's not that hard to visualize and I believe with the right teamwork, possible to make, so what say you everyone?

[King Ra]

Good stuff

[fatboy]

nice work. I hope fatboy get put in as one of the npc but make him extra fat. . I love the idea.

[King Ra]

My bad wrong words. This is a fantastic idea.

[Josh Jordan]

Put Jorlak In there as a merchant who charges overpriced Mesetas for cheap items As a Troll Method

[funkytrousers28]

this is really good, these quests sound really fun and i hope they get made one day :3

[Drga]

I.. I.. I wanna play it now T_T But I can only do basic HTML so I can't.. one of you guys get on it! Good idea!

[chuk]

Spoilerception =P

But good job RAVSO, all we need now is someone who wants to dedicate him/herself to making quests.

[Drga]

I would if I knew how xD

[Elton Sadat]

i love it, thanks for share you idea

[Grimoire Greys]

Very interesting. I'd really like to see this happen.

[R.A.V.S.O]

Ok, the thing is... now we need someone with some knowledge on qedit,

I can provide plot support (as I already have), quest testing and accurate translations from english to spanish and viceversa.

qeditors that would like to help in, should know how to,

- edit mob spawns in the map.

-place events at said maps

-place functioning warps at map

-know how to alter text (I'll probably give this one a shot)

-know how to handle events via variables (such as a mission succeeding or failing tied by a timer)

these are just a few things that the questline would be using, as you can see it's nothing out of the world that qedit

could handle (such as a gigantic rainbow rappy final boss), but oh well I'll probably have to crack open some qedit tutorials

and see how I could handle quest 3 in particular.

[Touhou_FTW]

I may jump on this actually after finishing my own little thing. I am re-learning the program anyway. :3

[Lee]

except a quest should comprise more planning then the little bits of tbh useless story, see the story means nothing if it has no substance to back it up, if you are designing a quest think of it like a film director.

Every shot, every wave, every trigger and trap, every camera angle must be planned.

I'm not having a go, i'm just trying to explain coding aside how difficult it can be.

Edited September 2, 2013 by Lee

[R.A.V.S.O]

there's no possible way to avoid gameplay and story segregation at this point, yes the idea is rather incomplete as is but that's partially because

I was aiming to explain the whole thing in a nutshell, then once I had drawn some form of crowd that can manage qedit attempt to flesh it out properly

I'm not expecting to pull this off from one day to another like pulling a (magic) (bun)ny out of a hat, of course I would manage a more organized

step by step, that does include, mob spawn locations, camera shot angles, warp location and alocation etc...

similar to RPGXP I had a plot planned, then started to do some basic mapping, re-edited some plot then continued to flesh and event the map

it's many passes and trial and error to complete these sorts of things

of course I figured you'd reply with a great big "nope", I don't blame you really, it's not the first or the last time you'll see one of these posts with a

semi-thought idea on the works. that's kinda the reason why I was either looking to have Ultima help me out or find and review some tutorials myself.

either way, mods call the shots I'm just providing the ideas and such, hopefully I'll get a solid base to work on sometime.