Yesterday, I wrote the general outline of how to make a quest.

Today, we’ll get into the nitty gritty:

My QuestPackage has these objects in it:

1. The Quest Definition
2. The Quest Location
3. The Goodie Hut (Quest Destination)
4. Tile Design of the Location
5. Tile Design of the Destination (the goodie hut)

Items 4 and 5 are generated by the tile editor in the workshop, I just pasted them in.

The Quest Definition

I.                    Quest  Definition

a.       Display Name

b.      Repeatable (will it be spawned multiple times? 1 yes, 0 no)

c.       TriggerChance (% odds that it will be triggered when the trigger condition is met)

d.      Image (PNG of the image)

e.      QuestClass (Minor or Major. Completing a Major quest ends the game)

f.        TriggerType (What causes this quest to occur, we support the Location as well as other triggers such as population, turns, etc. This can be used to create random events which we’ll talk about in the future)

g.       TriggerOrigin (where does the event occur?)

h.      SpawnRating (how advances is the quest on a scale from 1 to 10)

i.         Description

j.        ShortTextAccept

k.       ShortTextDeny

l.         RewardText (dialog title for your reward)

m.    RewardImage (picture of what you’re getting)

n.      SuccessText (text that comes up when the quest is complete)

o.      GameModifier (message the game to do something)

                                                               i.      ModType  (with the corresponding Attribute options)

1.       GiveItem (attribute is name of item)

2.       Unit (StrVal provides the key and if necessary <Value> provides the amount)

a.       TransferUnitStat

b.      StealUnitStat

c.       Lifesteal

d.      IncreaseDecreaseUnitStats

e.      AdjustUnitStat

f.        AdjustCasterUnitStat

g.       UnlockUnitAbility

h.      CharmTarget

i.         CurHealth

j.        CurMana

k.       ManaBurn

l.         GiveExperience

m.    UnitJoinArmy

n.      TargetMovesBack

o.      SummonUnit (UnitClass provides class name, StrVal provides title)

3.       Player

a.       Treasury

b.      SpellPointBonus

c.       AbilityBonus

d.      EssenceBonusForAllChampions

e.      UnlockResource

f.        UnlockImprovement

g.       UnlockTech

h.      UnlockUnitAction

i.         UnlockCityAction

j.        UnlockSpellbook

k.       UnlockDiplomacyWndAbility

l.         RaiseResourceCap

m.    UpgradeCityWalls

n.      ExposeCity

o.      ExposeSovereign

p.      ExposeGoodieHut

q.      SpawnQuestLocations

r.        UpdateSpawnRating

                                                                                                                                       i.      NPC

                                                                                                                                     ii.      CREATURE

                                                                                                                                    iii.      QUEST

                                                                                                                                   iv.      GOODIEHUT

                                                                                                                                     v.      CRYSTAL

                                                                                                                                   vi.      FOOD

                                                                                                                                  vii.      METAL

                                                                                                                                viii.      SHARD

                                                                                                                                   ix.      GOLD

s.       UpdateRecruitables

                                                                                                                                       i.      SPIDERS

                                                                                                                                     ii.      SHRILLS

                                                                                                                                    iii.      DRATH

                                                                                                                                   iv.      DARKLINGS

                                                                                                                                     v.      UMBERDROTHS

                                                                                                                                   vi.      DROTA

                                                                                                                                  vii.      DRAGONS

                                                                                                                                viii.      DEMONS

t.        MarriageProposal

4.       Map

a.  TransportUnit

b.  PlaceEnvironment

c.  PlaceTerrain

d.  GreaterRaiseLand

e.  RaiseLand

f.  LowerLand

g.  SetEnvironment

h.      ReviveLand

i.         DestroyObjects

j.        RandomTerraform

k.       SummonUnit

l.         CreateGoodieHut

m.    CreateResourceHoard

n.      CreateWorldProp

o.      Reveal

p.      BlockTile

5.       City

a.       SummonRandomGuardian

b.      PlaceEnvironmentOnCity

p.      QuestObjectiveDef

                                                               i.      ObjectiveID (defining its numerical ID)

                                                             ii.      NextObjectiveID (telling it where to go next or -1 if this ends the quest)

                                                            iii.      Description

                                                           iv.      GameModifier

                                                             v.      QuestConditionDef (what determines whether this quest is complete?)

1.       Class (Success of Failure)

2.       Type (what type of condition is it)

a.       ClearGoodieHut (TextData then used to say which goodiehut)

b.      KillMonster (TextData used to identify which monster)

c.       UnitKilled

d.      BuildImprovement

e.      ReturnItemToCapital

f.        ReturnItemToQuestLocation

g.       CheckForItem

h.      ReturnItemToOriginCity

i.         UnitLevelUp

j.        UnitEntersOriginCity

3.       Faction (if applicable)

4.       Flag (AllConditionsMet forces all conditions to be met for it to be a successful quest, RevealTarget is useful for showing the player where the target is)

QuestLocationType

This is used to define the tile that will be used as the quest location. You can (and probably should) use existing quest location types.

GoodieHutType

This is used if you want your quest to spawn a goodie hut to send the player to. You could always just do the “bring me 5 wolf pelts back to me and I’ll give you gold” type quest instead and make sure you are spawning wolves that have the item WolfPelt as their treasure.

Download

To download the full quest here it is:

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/8051911/Quest_UrgentMessage.zip

You will need to unzip the XML file into your elemental\data\english\core quests directory

(in the future, I have put in the request that a packaged quest can just go into the user’s quest directory)

Other Notes

The hardest thing about making quests right now is the difficulty in testing them. One typo in a quest can make it just not work. This is why I’m lobbying internally (or externally) to get a quest editor made that eases this but will require more documentation. As you can see from above, the quest system is powerful but we’ve only scratched the surface so far.