Fix the mission log already!
Posted: Sat Oct 26, 2013 6:09 pm
It's been known for a long time that the mission log is broken and an active hindrance to new users. New players naturally gravitate to doing the missions in order, which results in missing out on a ton of useful experience and items and arriving at Dreadfell (if they make it that long) way too early. None of this is new information, but it's probably the single noob-unfriendliest feature of the game right now, and as Tome seeks to join platforms like Steam, it seriously needs to be fixed.
My suggestion, which should be very easy to implement, is:
1. Get rid of the level feelings! They're a useless hangover from Angband. Players are trained to ignore them right from the get-go, as they are wildly inaccurate for things like the World Map (which is one of the most dangerous places in the game, thanks to the presence of adventurer parties, but which gives a trivial-difficulty level message as soon as you've done a couple of dungeons). Instead, do what the game does for everything else and make the underlying data totally transparent. Mousing over a dungeon, or perhaps even over the stairs down to a new level, should give a level range.
2. Add a warning, in red, to the beginning of each quest description: "If you like, you can gain experience in other dungeons before tackling this quest," or words to that effect. Let them know right away that Tome is an open-world game that encourages exploration. An alternative option would be a pop-up after completing the first mission that explains that Tome has no time-sensitive quests (see below).
3. Currently, there are two quests that are time-sensitive (cannot be done after certain character levels are reached): Agent of the Arena and Trapped! Every other quest in the game can be delayed indefinitely, even the ones whose fluff is very explicit that they are urgent (like Race through Fire or the alchemist quests). To solve this problem, the Arena guy should be in a building (hence not affected by the gwelgoroth attack), and both that quest and Trapped! should be doable at any level, like every other quest in the game.
My suggestion, which should be very easy to implement, is:
1. Get rid of the level feelings! They're a useless hangover from Angband. Players are trained to ignore them right from the get-go, as they are wildly inaccurate for things like the World Map (which is one of the most dangerous places in the game, thanks to the presence of adventurer parties, but which gives a trivial-difficulty level message as soon as you've done a couple of dungeons). Instead, do what the game does for everything else and make the underlying data totally transparent. Mousing over a dungeon, or perhaps even over the stairs down to a new level, should give a level range.
2. Add a warning, in red, to the beginning of each quest description: "If you like, you can gain experience in other dungeons before tackling this quest," or words to that effect. Let them know right away that Tome is an open-world game that encourages exploration. An alternative option would be a pop-up after completing the first mission that explains that Tome has no time-sensitive quests (see below).
3. Currently, there are two quests that are time-sensitive (cannot be done after certain character levels are reached): Agent of the Arena and Trapped! Every other quest in the game can be delayed indefinitely, even the ones whose fluff is very explicit that they are urgent (like Race through Fire or the alchemist quests). To solve this problem, the Arena guy should be in a building (hence not affected by the gwelgoroth attack), and both that quest and Trapped! should be doable at any level, like every other quest in the game.
