Check out my Foundry Quest: A Kidnapping in Blacklake

[Winin]

If you happen to be in the beta this weekend, check out my quest: nw-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?121811-Foundry-Quest-A-Kidnapping-in-Blacklake

It is up for a contest, so the more reviews I get the better. If you can't make it this weekend, it will still be around when the game goes live, so you'll get to try it eventually! The thread I linked above has some screenshots if you want to see it.

[Jay]

Sadly I only just saw this or I would have taken Braq Badgerclaw around it at the weekend. I did run Braq through quite a few, and enjoyed them.

As someone who is looking forward to playing around in the Foundry, how have you found it? I appreciate you're probably still under NDA, so I'm not looking for specifics - just a general opinion.

If you get chance, and the NDA permits you to, I have some more questions:

1. Are maps designed from scratch, or do they give you templates that you tinker with?

2. Is there a limit on how big your map can be? For example - time permitting - could you create an entire town?

3. Do you have any control on the monster's levels? Now I know they scale depending on who is playing them, but I was wondering if you could state that the mobs were... I don't know, average party level +1? I say this because I found most of the solo quests pretty easy, especially with a healer companion. I think this is true of the game in general, and not just Foundry stuff.

4. Similarly to 3, can you decide on how many "elite/lt." and "boss" mobs there are?

5. Can you tie your quest to any NPC in-game?

6. Are you able to have traps span an entire passageway? I only ask because the one thing I love about DDO is that traps have meaning. The traps in NWO are very disappointing in comparison, as they can pretty much all be seen and circumvented - which kind of makes them pointless imho. By having a line of traps encourages the group to have a TR, or accept the damage a trap brings.

7. Is there any scope to add puzzles? I did one quest that had a "puzzle" in, but you were told the sequence and weren't actually able to pull the chains out of order.

8. I did one quest where I needed a key to unlock a door. That key was in a flower pot I had already looked in, but because I hadn't been to that door yet to discover it was locked - that flower pot didn't have the key in? When I went back to the pot, it was there! Actually this "content activation" was true throughout... where I'd explore the map out of sequence, go back and trigger something, return to a previous location I'd already explored to discover a bunch of mobs there suddenly. The sudden appearance of mobs didn't bother me, although feels a little disjointed - but the flower pot item, that was just shoddy! I had to reread through this section to see if I had asked a question or not lol, I hadn't. I guess I'm asking if it is possible to have quest items and mobs in play, without storyline triggers being activated?

I knew I had another question, but it has slipped my memory... I'm sure that is plenty to be going on with

[Zeli]

I did not get a chance to check this out myself, but I was online for a moment Sunday and saw that you were rating rather well. How did it go?

and I'd like to know all the things that Jay said too.

[Winin]

Here are my stats from the weekend:
Beta Weekend 4

60 Plays
32 Ratings
15 Reviews
3.3 Stars
35 min play time

Pretty good overall, and all the comments were very encouraging. The best part is that I don't know any of those reviewers, so they are all real. Of course it means none of my buddies left reviews. See the pic below.

NDA is over, so I can gab as much as you'd like. I'll post the answers in another thread...

[Winin]

---

1. Are maps designed from scratch, or do they give you templates that you tinker with?

Yes and yes. There are a list of prefab maps (both interior and exterior) which are taken from Cryptic-made quests that you can use as starting points. Or you can create your own from scratch. You can't adjust the terrain, but you can pick from a list of outdoor terrains, then place objects, move them around, etc. For indoor, you place rooms and hallways in any layout you want.

2. Is there a limit on how big your map can be? For example - time permitting - could you create an entire town?

Yes. Each thing you place has a resource cost, and when you reach your limit, you can't place anymore. So you can do small and very detailed or huge and not so detailed. People have made villages. The limit is due to performance. If you make maps that exceed the limit, they become unplayable on lower end systems, and Cryptic wants to make sure all maps meet a minimum standard for performance. However, they are actively working on ways to up the limit.

3. Do you have any control on the monster's levels? Now I know they scale depending on who is playing them, but I was wondering if you could state that the mobs were... I don't know, average party level +1? I say this because I found most of the solo quests pretty easy, especially with a healer companion. I think this is true of the game in general, and not just Foundry stuff.

You can place "easy", "standard", or "hard" encounters. They will match the characters levels. Easy will be minions, standard will be a bunch of minions or a few minions and one super minion (bigger health bar, etc.), and hard will have some lieutenant level mobs. But there are a lot of possibilities, so you can have some tough encounters. The trouble I found is that the same map played at level 10 is trivially easy, but at level 60 is unplayably hard. The same mob at higher level will have more skills available, not just more HP/damage. My quest is tuned for soloing in your teens. At 60, you need 2 people at least. Companions become less useful at high level too.

4. Similarly to 3, can you decide on how many "elite/lt." and "boss" mobs there are?

Yes, you hand place each encounter. One buddy is making an epicly tough dungeon with lots of stacked hard encounters and boss encounters. At 60, we got wiped with a group of 3. 4 was rough, 5 was just right. But you can't (yet) place "boss" encounters. You have to hand craft them by timing when new minions spawn, monster dies and respawns tougher, etc. The Boss fights that cryptic makes are hard coded for the specific mob and room, so we can't use those yet.

5. Can you tie your quest to any NPC in-game?

There is a list of NPCs in each zone that you can link to. So lots, but not all.

6. Are you able to have traps span an entire passageway? I only ask because the one thing I love about DDO is that traps have meaning. The traps in NWO are very disappointing in comparison, as they can pretty much all be seen and circumvented - which kind of makes them pointless imho. By having a line of traps encourages the group to have a TR, or accept the damage a trap brings.

Yes, you can place several traps to cover a hall. There is an active discussion going on about this very thing. Also you can make traps via triggers rather than the placed traps, e.g. place an item with a warning (or not). If someone clicks on it, monsters spawn, etc.

7. Is there any scope to add puzzles? I did one quest that had a "puzzle" in, but you were told the sequence and weren't actually able to pull the chains out of order.

Again, you have to do them by hand. Check out the quest Blacklake Luskan by @skytzyc (NW-XHSHV67EA). He does some good puzzles via the dialog interface. But there are other ways. You have to get tricky. I have jumping puzzles in mine.

8. I did one quest where I needed a key to unlock a door. That key was in a flower pot I had already looked in, but because I hadn't been to that door yet to discover it was locked - that flower pot didn't have the key in? When I went back to the pot, it was there! Actually this "content activation" was true throughout... where I'd explore the map out of sequence, go back and trigger something, return to a previous location I'd already explored to discover a bunch of mobs there suddenly. The sudden appearance of mobs didn't bother me, although feels a little disjointed - but the flower pot item, that was just shoddy! I had to reread through this section to see if I had asked a question or not lol, I hadn't. I guess I'm asking if it is possible to have quest items and mobs in play, without storyline triggers being activated?

Yes, the author decided to have that stuff appear after a quest trigger was reached. But you don't have to. It is hard to get other people to playtest your quests, so they probably never had anyone try it out of sequence and give them feedback.

I knew I had another question, but it has slipped my memory... I'm sure that is plenty to be going on with

NDA is down, so ask away!

[Jay]

Thanks for the info Todd - top stuff!

I look forward to giving your quests a whirl on the 25th.

[Winin]

My pleasure! When you try the foundry, many things will become clear, and many more questions will arise. The Foundry Beta section of the forum has been a great place to learn and share ideas. Hopefully the helpful folks will chime in on the appropriate live Foundry section.