Event Quest

[Tantalyr]

In addition to Merri's comments, there are quite a few that have the 3 pieces that have dropped so far. Some have even been able to get as many a 4 copies of the same scrap after a kill. Much like the dryad event, these pieces seem to just be a bugged aspect of a portion of the final "quest". I still have a ebony wand from that event. It was useful to complete the ritual, but useless otherwise, and MANY have multiple copies of that item. So, I think that these scraps are just quest "related" items, nothing more.

I keep trying to remember the dryad event, and IIRC, it was not as vague in nature or NPC dialog. I keep hoping for more clues, but after over half a month, I am losing hope.

You recall correctly, Aamer. With the Free the Dryads event we were told in various ways (usually existing NPC's) to seek out new NPC's and solve their riddles for more clues to advance the event. So, to me at least, it was pure joy to log in and scour the Land for NPC's that I'd never seen before and speak to them. Indeed, that event got me more motivated to roam all of vast Istaria far more than Darkstaff ever did.

But with this "event," well . . . dozens of folks on every shard have checked and rechecked every dialog of the event NPC searching for hidden meanings, clues and puzzles. We've scouted and rescouted every possibly related venue in Istaria searching for new NPC's, new structures. And no joy at all.

It seems more and more conclusively that we must simply slay Daknor over and over and over and over until some lucky player or two fetches the next hide (or two, or three, or . . .) to advance this event.

It's simply Camp-and-Whack-a-Daknor I fear . . . .

[LaughingOtter]

I feel for you, Tzael, and I hope you can bear with the event as it unfolds. Especially if the idea I'm pondering is correct.

The community has been chafing for a major event for ages. Not an event that lasts a month, but one that takes weeks and weeks of active participation to progress. One with significant rewards and changes to the world. Comments in IRC have described this event as being massive, comparable to the satyr liberation or dryad events.

If it is that big, and will be impacting the game to that extent, then this information quest is a pretty trivial thing to base progression on. So, what if it's a teaser, and nothing more?

Five scraps of hide, each portending different sections of the WA advance - that's classic foreshadowing. Sinister plans, scanty information, progressive advancement and encrochment on the territories of the living, a totally clueless commander nobody has ever heard of before- that's a prelude, not an actual event. It's setting up the Lord-Commander to be Istaria's answer to George Armstrong Custer. [;)]

If this is correct - and I have no specific knowledge that it is - then the hide scraps are pretty much irrelevant. If you get them, you get them, and you get whatever reward goes with it. Speaking strictly as a storyteller here, a commanding officer so blinded with self-importance WILL disregard any warning, any dire portent, any clue that, to the audience, is obviously critically important. I think it very likely that the first person to present Jatell with all five hide pieces will be told something on the order of the following: that they are meaningless, and that either a) Jatell should have donethe scoutinghimself, or b) Jatell's keen military mind has already discerned the WA plan and formulated a counter for it.

I still don't agree with the setup requiring single-mob camping, especially if the hides are in fact a teaser that does not impact the main event in any way.

I may very well be wrong here, but the things that make no sense from a gameplay perspective make perfect sense from a storyteller's perspective.

[Tantalyr]

Laughing Otter, in a followup to your excellent post, let me pose a query to you, and all those who have labored long and hard (and suffered many a death point):

Assume the following (all, methinks, educated guesses based upon the "event" as it has progressed thus far, together with comments in IRC and other posts in other threads):

1) The only way the event quest progresses is by collection of all five (six? seven? etc.) hides that Daknor potentially drops.

2) The hide drops are random, and the final hide (or two, or three, etc. hides) is an "extremely rare" drop on the order of a specific Reklar or Valkor weapon/armor piece, or a specific SoG weapon.

3) Accordingly, only a few (say 4 or 5) players per server will be lucky enough, before the event ends,to loot all hides necessary to complete the quest in their logs and, thus, gain whatever title/rewards given for completing the quest.

QUERY: How will you feel, how will you react, after spending dozens of hours in a LOT of groups slaying Daknor, incurring Lord knows how many death points, to see a VERY lucky few get the title/rewards while you get nada (except maybe a small pat on the back from players who know you worked your heart's worth)?

[Tzael]

One advantage of the dryad quest was that the quest could be done (even if you failed) by simply trying to hand the respective wands and scrolls over to the NPCs, and if you failed, quest went too.

In the same manner, there's Howls in the Dark. If you took part in it, you were quite likely to get hold of one of the etched fang pendants and could do the quest.

A big difference with the current event is that the second hide piece seems to no longer be available with no obvious reason why. All other events where securing parts was a requirement ensured the availability of those items. I think this is ultimately what is frustrating myself, moreso than the randomness of the drops. If the piece was removed deliberately then I would like to appreciate why it has been removed because at present the lore we have for the event does not allow us to deduce what might be going on. other than the onset of an invasion.

[HAG]

To follow in Tzael's post ...

I'm pretty sure i hunted Daknor right after his first appearance and soon got the first - the "Singed" hidepiece. Right after that it seems the loottable (driven by a patch on maintenance-day ?) jumped over to the "Scorched" piece where i now learned it's the third in a row.

So on unity i only know 1 player for sure that has 3 different hide-pieces - maybe there's 1 or 2 more. That's just not it! Can't be the second hide only dropped for one Evening? [:@]

[shadow_wyrm]

well for me its like this........

yo have a quest that says return to the lord commander when you have additional pieces. seems simple enough right.

1) how many pieces

2) are they all different?

3) if this event wasn't supposed to be a camp and smack of daknor thrn what is it we are missing?

4) if all the orders for daknor are in and everything we need to do to get them is in then what are we missing?

5) if there is supposed to be a total number then why is there no counter stating 3/5 on it in the quest window.


my problem is. i rack up about 4 dp's per daknor hunt. we have tried absolutely everything to figure this quest out. we waited patiently in hopes that a new piece would be patched in. in my last 10 hunts i have gotten absolutely nothing. did the whole run out the screen and come back and loot. i have gotten nothing.

now why on earth do i want to continue to hunt a guy i get no xp from.......nothing to further my quest on....... and ok silver. i would rather hunt something that at least gives me something in return.

i spend i dont know how much hoard everytime i hunt him, but yet i never get anything to replenish it. there is only about 5 people on order that will fight him now. no one else cares and has better things to do. so i think we need answers right now. you design a quest for your higher level based players to keep them entertained so they wont leave.......then you leave us in the wind on what's going on.

can we get a little more than everything is in. well obviously it isn't

[Aamer Khan]

Yep, we are all getting to that point, dazed and confused by the lack of clues or input from the Dev's.

[PJ]

Given that all indications point to this quest being the tip of the event I council patience. While I have a few misgivings regarding the structure of the 2nd event quest, I will give TG the benefit of the doubt and willcontinue to smite Daknoruntilthe event progresses.

Pros:

Rampaging WA: While in a perfect world it would be 100% dynamic, but if the choice is between event based advancement of the WA and none at all, I'll take event based any day.

Design of Daknor: Difficult, but not impossible. While not being a clone ofSoG/Valkor/Reklar and thusly favors different group make ups and tactics.

Lore: New Lore that's nonconflicting with existing lore is a good thing.


Cons:

Drop rate on the 2nd/3rd hides so far

Design of quest 2 in thatthe 2nd hide no longer seems to be dropping now that the 3rd is.

[Deth]

I got this reply from a support case about the leaving the Area and returned to get the piece to pop.

"John,

The Scrap drop on Dakron is rare, and not supposed to drop every time.

Thank you for contacting support.istaria.com.

Sincerely,

-Reyem TG

<-CSR, Tulga Games->"

So back to farming everyone.

[Smeglor]

We've been down due to the move. I've looked into this, and there is indeed a bug. I'm fixing it now. I'm also fixing the "run away and come back and loot it again" bug. So while you'll actually have a chance to get all of the hides, you'll only get one chance per kill, as intended.

I'm not sure how long this will take to get fixed, tested, and released, but it is my top priority.

[Deth]

Smeglor is the scraps suppose to be random drop between all the scraps or are they "timed" 1 drops one 1 another the next week and so on? For those that may not have gotten older drops?

[Smeglor]

Random. There was a bug where there was only one of the hides possible. Which one was determined arbitrarily by the order in which the possibilities were returned by the database. That order may have been shifted each week when we optimize the database during maintenance, creating the feeling that one was being released each week. Completely unintentional.

[Deth]

Thank you very much for the info.

[shadow_wyrm]

ty for the feedback......so from the sounds of things we all need to put daknor on hold until it is patched and fixed.

i do have one more question. is the whole quest bugged. meaning is there only those 3 pieces but the quest is bugged and won't progress or is ther actually more that we need to do? dont tell me what i just want to know if there is more than 3 pieces and if so why has no one in the game got it yet.

i think we all have oh say about 10 of the scorched hide

[Tzael]

I really appreciate you coming here and letting us know what was happening Smeglor, my frustrations have been blown away in the wind after reading your posts [:)]

I am pleased to say that Unitarians can expect me to be proactively pursuing Daknor once more instead of only helping kill him when people need assistance !

[Lumineux]

i think we all have oh say about 10 of the scorched hide

Not me. Even with the multi-looting, I still havent gotten anything other than the very first piece ><

[Aamer Khan]

I'm glad you discovered a bug or two Smeglor, but one question remains...

Why are all hides only dropping from ONE mob? I never tried the quest on blight, but what other players have said, is there the hides dropped from all the kewllen mobs.

Is this ALSO a bug and will it get fixed, or is it intentional that you have all hides on one mob?

[shadow_wyrm]

lumi i have extra hides i can give ya.... just remind me in the game

[BKBanzai]

It was suggested in IRC that this has been fixed. Can we get confirmation? Daknor was killed again on Chaos after the announcement on IRC and still dropped only the scorched hide.

[Helcat]

if it was fixed, it was probably fixed on Blight,
and is being tested. With any luck we'll see it
patched in during Tuesday's maintenance.