Variety Part 2 - Exploration
Posted: Fri Apr 16, 2021 8:49 pm
Based on the first and fourth part of the labs, I have done a lot of exploration around the game and tried to use various items and walk through walls. There are almost no surprises in the game or advantages for exploration (other than exploration poles). I think that is a great opportunity to add something.
1. Have secret areas and change them up.
Just make a wall so you can walk through it or make a light usable to give you a key or something. Easter eggs are a good example of this except you don't have to do any exploration to get them and they take up all your inventory.
You would probably want to change these areas every couple months or so.
2. Lockboxes
This was talked about in another thread. Drop lockboxes in areas that are rarely gone to. I'm pretty sure I've never seen someone in the pentagram quest below sergeant major, for example. I'm sure there are other places no one goes. You can drop them in all areas, but the longer they go without getting picked up, the more valuable or rare the item in them becomes. If they sit for a full year, they would become very valuable.
3. Trivia Quest
Have a trivia quest where you have to learn obscure trivia. At first, it's the same for everyone because that will be super easy to create, maybe someday you can request a topic.
You go the trivia quest giver and he says "I am currently fascinated by ratlings. Do you know a lot about ratlings?" You can say yes and the trivia starts immediately. You can so no and he says "You have one year (or however long is left on the quest in game time) to learn everything about ratlings. I will reward you greatly." When you come back, he just asks the same thing but the time he says will now be like 10 months. No new logic required. If you come back in 20 hours, then the first quest will have ended and the new quest will be about greenlings and you missed your boat on ratlings.
I think also the more trivia quest you do, then the more of an explorer you are. The more of an explorer you are, you can go up to a guy in town and tell him where you want to go (Let's be real, it's going to be the pentagram quest or AT) and you just go there without having to walk. You have to have answered the questions about that area to get that ability, though. So if you answer ratlings, you can go straight to the ratling king perhaps. If you answer about AT, then you can go straight there. It shouldn't be "once an explorer, always an explorer." If you do an AT trivia quest and get the ability to go straight to AT, then there is a second AT trivia quest and you don't do it, at the end of the second AT quest you will lose your ability to go there.
Obviously, this would also give experience.
I can make this a lot more complicated with things like an actual explorer skill that helps you find missing walls and traps and lockboxes, but what I listed above would probably be a good starting place that would be easy to make.
1. Have secret areas and change them up.
Just make a wall so you can walk through it or make a light usable to give you a key or something. Easter eggs are a good example of this except you don't have to do any exploration to get them and they take up all your inventory.

2. Lockboxes
This was talked about in another thread. Drop lockboxes in areas that are rarely gone to. I'm pretty sure I've never seen someone in the pentagram quest below sergeant major, for example. I'm sure there are other places no one goes. You can drop them in all areas, but the longer they go without getting picked up, the more valuable or rare the item in them becomes. If they sit for a full year, they would become very valuable.
3. Trivia Quest
Have a trivia quest where you have to learn obscure trivia. At first, it's the same for everyone because that will be super easy to create, maybe someday you can request a topic.
You go the trivia quest giver and he says "I am currently fascinated by ratlings. Do you know a lot about ratlings?" You can say yes and the trivia starts immediately. You can so no and he says "You have one year (or however long is left on the quest in game time) to learn everything about ratlings. I will reward you greatly." When you come back, he just asks the same thing but the time he says will now be like 10 months. No new logic required. If you come back in 20 hours, then the first quest will have ended and the new quest will be about greenlings and you missed your boat on ratlings.
I think also the more trivia quest you do, then the more of an explorer you are. The more of an explorer you are, you can go up to a guy in town and tell him where you want to go (Let's be real, it's going to be the pentagram quest or AT) and you just go there without having to walk. You have to have answered the questions about that area to get that ability, though. So if you answer ratlings, you can go straight to the ratling king perhaps. If you answer about AT, then you can go straight there. It shouldn't be "once an explorer, always an explorer." If you do an AT trivia quest and get the ability to go straight to AT, then there is a second AT trivia quest and you don't do it, at the end of the second AT quest you will lose your ability to go there.
Obviously, this would also give experience.
I can make this a lot more complicated with things like an actual explorer skill that helps you find missing walls and traps and lockboxes, but what I listed above would probably be a good starting place that would be easy to make.