Since I had missed posting “The Adventures of Dwarf & Elf (‘n’ Weretiger!)” last Monday because of the Valentine’s Day comic, I decided to post it today, Wednesday. While I am notorious for being unable to stick to a storyline and finish it, let it not be said that I don’t at least try!
Anyway, today’s comic touches the subject of fetch quests in RPGs, and I’d very much like to know what you all think about them. I suppose most of us have experienced them in video games, so we all probably got something to say about them, but I’d really like like to know if any game masters out there are actually use them in their own sessions.
Personally, I don’t mind fetch quests in gaming as much as most people seem to. When it comes to video game role-playing, I’m seriously a power-gamer. I don’t cheat, but I do enjoy leveling up far beyond what the game expects me to be whenever I hit a certain challenge. There’s no satisfaction in beating a boss through cheating, but killing it with one strike simply because I put in the time and effort necessary to actually be that powerful always brings me a certain sense of satisfaction.
Sure enough, I would guess that most games add these quests as a form of padding to make the game seem larger or longer or whatever. But since it fits my purposes of power-leveling I’d actually enjoy a game less if it didn’t have anything of that sort. I’m not very fond of grinding just for the heck of it, and fetch quests are definitely a way to make grinding seem less repetitive.
What I do have a problem with, however, is how weird fetch quests are when compared to the way I was educated to interact with other people. Basically, I would never – ever – ask some stranger I’ve just met for the kind of favors I get asked in video games. Sure, I can ask for the time or for the annoying lady at the supermarket that doesn’t know how to push a shopping cart without hitting people to get out of the way. But asking strangers to deliver messages and/or goods and/or services, gather objects, get into fights and even kill living beings for me seems to be the kind of thing you only ask people you would at least consider acquaintances.
Because of my power-leveling, whenever I run into a fetch quest in a game that is mandatory in order to continue the main storyline, I’m normally loaded with money I could offer instead and could also probably just kill whoever is standing between me and my goals. That’s why I appreciate it when games give me a chance to offer bribes, persuade, charm, intimidate, beat up or even kill quest-givers as an alternative to actually running their errands. Normally I’ll do the quest anyway, but I do appreciate the option being there.
You know because of the immersion and all that.
Good hunting;
O
…pixie nipples?
The question is… how many nipples does your average pixie have? Is it a standard 2-per-pixie, or do some have like… six, while others have none at all? Inquiring minds must know!
…and why would anyone want half a nipple anyways?
half pixie nipples are worth 2 cyclops’ eyes or 1/3 golden fleece
Finally someone who shares my feelings about secondary/random/fetch quests in RPGs!!! I seriously thought I was alone there as anyone else always seems to dislike them.
I think you zeroed perfectly the point, they “make grinding SEEM less repetitive”.
Tell me O, do you hate PvP in MMOs too? I do with all my heart, I think it’s stupid, boring and pointless.
@Mich: Well I don’t like MMOs at all, so I guess technically I don’t like PvP either. So yeah!
Would be interesting if you got rich enough, you could hire other adventurers to do your fetching for you.
Although, you would have reached full circle.
That’s one of the things I dislike the most about the Zelda games. It seems that the whole society is built around Link doing all the boring stuff for them….
Some fetch quests can be cool if they are part of the storyline, but the completely random “filler” ones are just boring…
We have a thing in Warcraft we call “FedEx” quests where you are basically sent to the opposite corner of the world to talk to someone or deliver something. I hate FedEx quests with a passionate hate since they can take upwards of a half hour of travel time and you can’t do anything else while flying from one end of the continent to the other. Well, except go get a sandwich or chips or something but other than that, travel time is incredibly boring in that game.
Fetch quests aren’t so bad because you might get something else to drop off a MOB while looking for pixie nipples or what have you and sometimes the quest does make sense (“If you want a demon steed, I will need the essence of 40 demons.” Fair enough). What I find really weird are the quests where the giver says “Go talk to Bob about this.” and Bob is quite literally 5 feet away. You would think the quest giver could maybe just holler over his shoulder at Bob or something.
I ran into a weirdly coded quest once where all X types of quest givers had the same message (Go talk to Bob about your pony)…including the quest target. So when you went up to Bob, he said “Go talk to Bob about your pony” which…I was already doing. I was pretty amused by that.
The only tabletop I’ve ever GM’d was Shadowrun and, when it boils down to it, about 85% of the runs I’ve done were glorified fetch quests. Some were simple “go get me this” missions and some were of the more complicated “go get me this and don’t get caught” flavor. On rare occation, I’d throw in a “go get me this and don’t get caught AND don’t kill anyone” runs just to mess with my runners.
occasion*
I. Just. LOVE. That axe!
Fetch quests may be a starter in the campaign, also “rescue the princess” and “return the scallywag” are fetch quests of a sort. My group played the Pathfinder module D0 in our D&D3 + Trollmann-and-K-Tomes-game (http://www.tgdmb.com/viewtopic.php?t=48453), it was great fun all along. But I think they’d hate something so uninspired as the typical MMO quest.
I’ve used fetch quests a few times in my d&d games, but rather then send them out to get n
totally random things, they have to get one, maybe two, harder to attain objects. I don’t
like the repetition. Better to send them out for a rare book or the like then to disfigure 9
innocent pixies
Hey guys,
I recently played Vampire the Masquerade with my D&D group.
There my players were presented a fairly simple fetch quest (get the vampire-prince one vampire of a certain group for interrogation).
However along the line two other factions with an interest in the players NOT fulfilling the fetch-quest presented themselves and offered a better reward. My players were given a choice: do I complete the quest or go for an alternative with better reward but I have to find an excuse for screwing up…
The result and internal struggle was really quite funny, in the end my players chose for themselves and powned everyone else, which was pretty cool.
I think filling a simple fetch-quest with some intrigue and mystery could make for a great quest in the end.
Best regards!
First of : brammedoris: Le sweet! Love vampire, wish I were still playing cause you just summed up the lovingness about the system, intrigue, backstabbing and the like!
Second: grinding for xps is way lamer then having lame quests for grinding:) Im just like you O, in the way I love to powergame, having the bestest stuff and being the strongest just because I could spend a bit of time getting better is sweet.
In my campaigns though I try to make the Quests a part of the flow. We are playing the Kingmaker module from Paizo(adventure path) and they have these optional quests theat my players sometimes do and sometimes not. But they are basically fetch Qs. “get me a few X and Ill give you Y”
I don’t really mind fetch quests, as long as they make sense within the context of the world. For instance, the party may need an alchemist to brew them a special potion that will make them immune to the poisonous touch of a monster they must slay, but the ingredient the alchemist needs grows only in a dangerous swamp infested by trolls, and nobody dares brave the swamp to gather the ingredient. (Not to mention it’s a very specific concoction, so the alchemist doesn’t keep any spare stock on hand.) So, the party must go and gather the ingredients themselves and bring it back to the alchemist.
Just don’t overuse this and send the players out after one ingredient after another.
Adventurers = Mercenaries
It’s as simple as that. You ask them to do something and offer them recompense for it.
I don’t mind fetch quest in a general manner, but they must be optionnal quests, or if they’re part of the main story they must really make sense. (“We need to repair our airship, go gather 20 mithril plates!”) But I’m a video-game player. I harldy ever played tabletop RPGs.
I think if I did and was confronted with a fetch quest, I’d ask if the GM is trolling us or something… There are so much interesting things you can do in a tabletop that require creativity and imagination, a fetch quest is just lame…
Although yeah, as you said it’s a good alternative to grinding… Not playing tabletop RPGs, I can’t evaluate the need for grinding, but if ever the need shall arise, I guess a fetch quest is better than aimlessly wandering and slaughtering every monster you meet.
Oh, and also, I don’t consider quest like “go gather 20 of that item” are the same as “go get that unique plant that can only be found in that ominous place infested with deadly monsters”. The first is a fetch quest, the second is pretty much equivalent to a dungeon run.
I smell Skyrim from very far… fetch alchemy reagents, bribe/persuade/intimidate the npc, absurd or trivial quest (talk to/bring item to/ kill /steal) from the first talk, kill the npc before/after the quest, grinding too much (the poor Alduin went down in one hit, really unpleasant), and the stony town really resemble Markath
There’s a quest in Fallout:New Vegas that I guess I’d call a fetch quest – although it’s really the opposite – you get given new radio codes and have to deliver them to five different locations (Ranger stations in the Mojave wasteland). The biggest annoyance is that the locations are on all corners of the map and the quest comes up fairly early in the game so you are forced to wander the wasteland for hours discovering the five locations and getting mashed periodically by wandering mutant insects that can kill you with a single melee punch. PS – I’m a mile behind the times – I own Skyrim but haven’t played it yet…
I was more hoping to see the party going out to fetch said pixie nipples, with a bunch of dead pixies attached. My Goliath Warden would collect 9 dead pixies, and tell the rest of the party they’re fresher this way.
He also combines meatshield with trap detector. (Sense of self preservation = 0)
Watching that gate guard I come to the conclusion: that for such a thin neck he needs a really big neck guard.
I -REALLY- hate fetch quests that have no reason to be there. I think it’s great when you have to do a fetch quest that actually follows the main storyline, or when the fetch quest is directly linked to something you want (like collecting the ingredients for a potion you want). But when the quest is just a “Go do this as a favor to me and I’ll give you EXP”, I want to punch the NPC in the face. Just sayin’.
You mention fetch quests as a form of currency in the comic, and I think that’s a funny idea. If currency is not stable and things run on a barter economy, or a system of tribute, this could make a lot of in-game sense.
The other way to do things is just to make a group exclusive and present their problem separately. Maybe they’re even unwilling to talk about it at first. If the party puts two and two together on their own, it might feel less like being lead along by the nose.
And violence should always be an option.
well, I have to say that I don’t mind fetch quests neither. The only thing I hate about them is the way you gather for example bodyparts (eyes of WhatsTheirName), where just one or even none dops, even though the monster has at least two of them. In that case I always wounder how the monster is fighting without eyes? I then explain it for myself that the bodypart got destroyed while I was killing the thing but… come on. Killing dozens of monsters to gather a couple parts is just … you know..
And the axe still has that gnome-pilot’s face on it!
Just brilliant