Heroica RPG - Quest Masters' Lounge

[Rumble Strike]

Quests have featured micro-scale buildings before, although not exclusively.

[Sandy]

Would it be alright if I made mini-scale models depicting the Quest locations and whatnot? I don't think I have the time nor pieces to make large-scale models for my quest. Has anyone done mini-scale quests before? How would a mini-scale quest be accepted?

The most important thing for me is that the pictures themselves are good quality. The scale or scope of the models used for illustration is really not important. Of course big models are prettier to look at, but if you can get the micro-models to serve their purpose, then it's all fine by me.

Granted, the characters can't really be in microscale, but that's fixed by using avatars. If your minifig collection is limited as well, then just ask for help from someone with a more extensive collection - like myself.

[Brickdoctor]

I'm actually getting the chance to break out my lego for the first time in months today and I figured it'd be the perfect chance to work on some quest sets.

However, my supply of lego is rather limited, so I've got a few questions.

Would it be alright if I made mini-scale models depicting the Quest locations and whatnot? I don't think I have the time nor pieces to make large-scale models for my quest. Has anyone done mini-scale quests before? How would a mini-scale quest be accepted?

I can't speak for Draggy as far as whether or not it would be allowed in the contest, but micro stuff has been used in Heroica before. I know I did some forced perpective with micro scale models in Quest 4.

[Zepher]

Alright, a few "questions for the interim" for the QMs and players, just to get those brains chugging:

1) QM's, a fun challenge to get you to think about your own work - rank your quests in order of which are your favorites, and then put little notes next to each as far as to WHY it ranks where it ranks. Hopefully you will notice a trend of what YOU like to put into YOUR quests.

2) Players and QMs, what are some of your favorite specials (passive or otherwise) that have appeared in the game? Which were fun challenges?

3) Players and QMs, which are some storylines/places/characters you'd like to see introduced/more fleshed out?

4) An idea for the future: QMs, what if we did a QM swap? Laid the basis for a quest, and then passed it off to another QM to flesh out/run. That QM would trade an idea off to you! Could be pretty interesting. It could also breath some life into some stories that are getting stale, told only by one person. It would be like Sandy's stories - we know more about the Guild, for example, because other people have picked up the threads. We cameo each other's stories, but what if we tried to let each other tell large portions of the story?

[Kadabra]

Idea 4 sounds amazing, actually. I'd love to see, say, how you would've run a Lion Knight storyline or how Brickdoctor would've done a Wren story.

[Rumble Strike]

I would give Endgame a fairly innocuous plot and some characters and see how he'd turn it ino a multi-stage boss fight with passive specials galore!

[Endgame]

I would give Endgame a fairly innocuous plot and some characters and see how he'd turn it ino a multi-stage boss fight with passive specials galore!

I would say challenge accepted, but... I'm already in the middle of Q79, you see.

I may prepare another batch of Boss Philosophy soon, if anyobdy would be interested.

[Brickdoctor]

Alright, a few "questions for the interim" for the QMs and players, just to get those brains chugging:

1) QM's, a fun challenge to get you to think about your own work - rank your quests in order of which are your favorites, and then put little notes next to each as far as to WHY it ranks where it ranks. Hopefully you will notice a trend of what YOU like to put into YOUR quests.

I can't really decide... 17 had my favorite mechanics. 31 seemed to have more railroading than I would've liked, but the story was a lot more complex with Zeph and JimB helping. 77 is a further improvement graphics wise over all the others, but I feel like I haven't been able to keep up with the Internet problems I've been having. 4 is the least favorite; I cringe at a lot of the stuff I did there. I think I would say that 77 has the best mix of open-world freedom, graphics, sets, variety of characters, and attention to detail in the setting. Plus I've been doing the thing with the different languages (Quenya, Adunaic, Old Gunganese, Shriiwook, Neo-Black Speech, and Klingon, so far.), and that's a lot of fun. So, from best to worst, 77, 17, 31, 4.

3) Players and QMs, which are some storylines/places/characters you'd like to see introduced/more fleshed out?

I plan to flesh out the Knights of Patuqun a lot more. Maybe not on the level of the Lion Knights, but certainly as much or more than the Brobric Elves. Hopefully I'll have time to do that.

4) An idea for the future: QMs, what if we did a QM swap? Laid the basis for a quest, and then passed it off to another QM to flesh out/run. That QM would trade an idea off to you! Could be pretty interesting. It could also breath some life into some stories that are getting stale, told only by one person. It would be like Sandy's stories - we know more about the Guild, for example, because other people have picked up the threads. We cameo each other's stories, but what if we tried to let each other tell large portions of the story?

I'm going to swap with Zeph and give him a quest where he has to do nothing but calculate tons of battles with dozens of heroes and even more enemies. I love hosting quests like that.

[Endgame]

Question 1:

1. Death's Homecoming: My biggest quest to date. Featured some of my best builds, best battles, and best boss fight. The party and roleplaying was excellent, as well.

2. The Syndicate: Sported my overall favorite RP, and my builds weren't too bad either. Featured my favorite character design (humanoid, anyway: The Stealer of Senses) and some of my best editing. Masson had the most well thought out pyschology of any villain that I've shown thus far, and is among my favorite characters I've made.

-Three is a tie, and both are close to 2:

3. The Stealer of Senses: The players made this quest shine. I was mostly focusing on providing a medium for their roleplay, and it paid off tremendously.

3. Fading Spark: Let me just say I like where this one is going to go.

4. Voracious Vault: This one holds a big place in my heart, and had excellent players, but overall I don't think it was my best. I still see it as a good quest, but I also see plenty of things I have since improved upon tremendously.

5. Product Testing: My worst job hosting in all aspects (the players were as good as ever, but I? Not even close.). I still feel terrible about forcing my party through this one. Terrible, and not even close to the others in this list.

Question 2:

I quite liked the Chao/Cosmosaur's specials, as well as the passives The Stealer of Senses would've used. In general my favorite specials are the ones that alter the flow of the battle.

Question 3:

This is a tough one, really. I've already stated my favorite location in the game to be the Luminous Passage, but there is nothing really to develop... I'm going to have to go with either Etheria or Underground Eubric at this point.

Question 4:

Hmm... Dannylonglegs? I could try to out-intrigue him, and he could try to out-boss battle me.

[Kintobor]

Alright, I'm game.

Question 1:

1. Grim Grinning Ghosts- It had the best characters, best overall plot, and it was somewhat self contained. I do intend to do a follow up, but as it stands, its an excellent stand alone quest.

2. A Secret Under Eubric- I gave the party a lot of freedom here, and the introductions of Abbot and the Shadow Sisters were incredibly strong, as was the roleplaying. It was short, but I think it benefited from that.

3. As Thick As Thieves- I'll give me thoughts on this one in a bit, but as of right now, they're mixed.

Question 2:

Anything to do with Hexing, since it not only creates excellent party drama, it's just an awesome effect. I have a boss battle planned for the near future who I think has some of the coolest specials ever and is on Endgame proportions on how grueling the fight is, but other than that, battles aren't the most important thing to me in a quest (at least in my opinion).

Question 3:

The High Kingdoms, but since Zepher beat me to the punch, Vartland and the Abra Desert.

Question 4:

Tough question. I'd love to swap with Endgame and force him to do a quest with minimal battle mechanics and maximum character, and I suppose I'd go all out battles and put characters to the side. That and he has to through in a pony reference, since I believe all my quests have at this point.

[Palathadric]

I'd love to swap with Sandy and have Pretzel's order take over Eubric.

I'd love to do a swap with Etzel, but I don't think I'd give him too much to work with. But I'd get him to do all the builds for my quest...

[JimBee]

Can't really say for the rest, but for question 3, I'd definitely like to see:

- History of High/Low Kingdoms and Orc Rebellions

- Moon Elves and underground city

- War in the north, including Vartland viking raids and Bonaparte involvement

- Bluto

[Flipz]

31 seemed to have more railroading than I would've liked, but the story was a lot more complex with Zeph and JimB helping.

Oh, the irony. You do recall that that was the Quest where CJP and I ended up totally lost and confused and ended up randomly attacking Emeraldo's guards instead of following the plot, right?

Obviously, I haven't actually QM'd yet (though I'm still happy to run rounds for QMs who are dealing with issues ), so I can't answer 1.

2.) I LOVE LOVE LOVE Endgame's "Level ??" enemies that scale in damage relative to the Hero targeting them. In my opinion, it's a MUCH better way to deal with level mismatches than specials that ignore SP or row "for characters with a higher level than them".

3.) [shamelessplug]The Cathedral of Commerce, though I'm only about 3 sets and 2 puzzles away from having my Quest ready to go. [/shamelessplug] In terms of things we haven't seen, I'd actually like MORE "unknown" things. We've been filling in a lot of the edges of the map, I think it's time we added a few more back in.

4.) Well, I tried to do that with you and [REDACTED], but then the idea took on a life of its own. I'd love to do a swap with you sometime, though.

[Etzel]

4) An idea for the future: QMs, what if we did a QM swap? Laid the basis for a quest, and then passed it off to another QM to flesh out/run. That QM would trade an idea off to you! Could be pretty interesting. It could also breath some life into some stories that are getting stale, told only by one person. It would be like Sandy's stories - we know more about the Guild, for example, because other people have picked up the threads. We cameo each other's stories, but what if we tried to let each other tell large portions of the story?

Interesting idea, but I'm not sure if I think it's the best way to encourage QM cooperation and idea exchange. I think I would prefer shared hosting or interlocking quest to QM swapping, mostly because I like to fulfill my own ideas and I see the actual quest run as a reward for all the planning and I rather not give up that. I also think it's more fun to cooperate and discuss with a fellow QM instead of giving him/her an idea and free hands with it.

[CMP]

1) QM's, a fun challenge to get you to think about your own work - rank your quests in order of which are your favorites, and then put little notes next to each as far as to WHY it ranks where it ranks. Hopefully you will notice a trend of what YOU like to put into YOUR quests.

69, 51. 69 has a wide variety of locations and NPCs, but 51's character interaction with NPCs was more in-depth.

2) Players and QMs, what are some of your favorite specials (passive or otherwise) that have appeared in the game? Which were fun challenges?

Tough one....a lot of the ones we're facing off now in Quest 75 are pretty awesome.

3) Players and QMs, which are some storylines/places/characters you'd like to see introduced/more fleshed out?

Dwarves. So neglected. I also really, really want to see what the Masked Man is all about.

4) An idea for the future: QMs, what if we did a QM swap? Laid the basis for a quest, and then passed it off to another QM to flesh out/run. That QM would trade an idea off to you! Could be pretty interesting. It could also breath some life into some stories that are getting stale, told only by one person. It would be like Sandy's stories - we know more about the Guild, for example, because other people have picked up the threads. We cameo each other's stories, but what if we tried to let each other tell large portions of the story?

I think a simpler idea would be to have one QM do one Quest of a storyline, then another do the next, etc. Could be interesting.

[Brickdoctor]

Oh, the irony. You do recall that that was the Quest where CJP and I ended up totally lost and confused and ended up randomly attacking Emeraldo's guards instead of following the plot, right?

Yes, that was where I got too far ahead of Zeph and JimB so I let you try to do whatever you want because I wanted to get a bit of freedom in there. The rest of the quest was a lot of railroading.

[Endgame]

Also, decided to whip this up:

(Yeah, I chose to represent myself with the Master of Regret. Not sure why. )

You may notice that there is a small to signifigant hike in quality between the beginning and end of my quests, usually. This is why.

Also, questions for other QMs/Players:

What are your thoughts on Grand Finale quests? As in, a quest in which the QM ties up any ends that he feels that need to, incorporates all of his arcs in some way, and then simply signs off the air. Mine is getting... dangerously close, honestly, and I'm not sure if I should host afterwards. I may end up transisitioning to those "personal quests" if those ever end up getting implemented.

Edited August 21, 2013 by Endgame

[Sandy]

Nobody touches my quest ideas!

I honestly don't see the value of swapping quests, either, but more collaboration would of course be nice to see (and do it myself as well).

I also really, really want to see what the Masked Man is all about.

f you read it, the party in Quest#74 had an option to go visit the Masked Man, but they chose not to. I've been meaning to do a short epilogue featuring him and Dr. Cula, but I haven't had time to build anything whole week.

[Palathadric]

I actually have a lot of ideas for quests, but the problem is that I spend too much time reading other quests that I don't spend time MOCing, and I think part of the joy of QMing is being able to build MOCs to tell your story, which is why most of my creations have been needlessly big and therefore take an unnecessary amount of time to build, because they're not just built for the final picture.

Edited August 21, 2013 by Palathadric

[Pyrovisionary]

I was wondering whether a quest with 0 casualties would be at all appreciated. A stealth quest.

[Scubacarrot]

I think the idea of giving someone else a pitch/idea and have them make a quest out of it is interesting, but I think for most people they have enough ideas for quests, and less time to sort those out. Am I wrong?

In other news. Quest 40: The Strivvian Job: Part 2 (Electric Boogaloo?) It's a thing. Sandy, should I repitch?

I was wondering whether a quest with 0 casualties would be at all appreciated. A stealth quest.

Isn't that the idea of Quest 72? (Just joking, Zepher)

[Brickdoctor]

Isn't that the idea of Quest 72? (Just joking, Zepher)

I was just thinking that!

(It's still a pretty great quest and the action has picked up now.)

[Sandy]

In other news. Quest 40: The Strivvian Job: Part 2 (Electric Boogaloo?) It's a thing. Sandy, should I repitch?

I'm not sure if you're asking that in jest, but if you really are going to continue the Strivvian Job, contact me and we'll work out the kinks of continuing with an unfinished quest.

[Pyrovisionary]

Isn't that the idea of Quest 72? (Just joking, Zepher)

The quest I am planning is rather like quest 72. But The majority of what I am planning to host is getting the items needed for going to said party. And then escaping.

[Scubacarrot]

I'm not sure if you're asking that in jest, but if you really are going to continue the Strivvian Job, contact me and we'll work out the kinks of continuing with an unfinished quest.

I am serious.

Edited August 21, 2013 by Scubacarrot