On its simplest level, quests involve giving the player a task to do, checking if the player has done it, and then rewarding the player.

Game-makers tend to stick to certain types of quests, because certain types of quests are easier to check than others. For example, if a quest was for the player to build a house, it can be hard to measure what that means. What constitutes a house? How do we tell when it is done? Something like that could be taken on trust, where the player comes back and tells the NPC that they have built the house or it could be done where Minecraft monitors whether the person puts down a door and a torch somewhere (assuming those are the most necessary things for a house).

In any case, certain types of quests are easier to confirm and reward than others. The following are the basic common quest types:

1. Collection quests, where people have to gather things.
2. Hunting quests, where people have to hunt a particular type of mob.
3. Explore quests, where people have to go to a specific place.
4. Interact quests, where people have to interact with certain other NPCs in certain ways.

So first of all, I’m going to suggest you choose one of those tasks and think of a little bit of a story about it. For example, a collection quest could be gathering three different flowers so that an alchemist could make a special potion or it could be gathering supplies for a birthday party. An exploring quest could travel into the desert and come back to tell the NPC about it. A quest-giver could just say “go get me a slime ball” but it is more fun for them to say that they really need the slime ball because it is the secret ingredient for the medicine they need to give their sick aunt.

Important Questions.

To build your quest then you need to think about:

1. What does the person have to do?
2. What is the story behind that?
3. What reward will they get for doing it?

Once you have notes for that written out for yourself (and you can go ahead and share those notes with me), then the next step is to think of how you code for characters. The basic character script is the same regardless of who your character is. It uses click, chat and/or proximity triggers. How comfortable do you feel using those? Basically you’ll be taking the same sample script and altering it for a new character.

You’ll also need some code specifically for checking whether the person has done the assigned task. I have samples of that in the other documents here, and if you tell me what the task is I can help you with that.

Ingredients to a Quest.

Most quests include:

• Quest-giver.
• Scripts for special items.
• Setting built on the server.

Some quests will include:

• A supporting cast of characters. (For example, you might have multiple people giving the player hints on how to solve the quest. Or you might have extra characters in the same town just to add flavour or to make it harder to find the right character.)
• Special areas marked out. (These can be done with world scripts, to make certain areas of the map react in specific ways to players.)
• Special items. (These are done with item scripts.)

Step by Step To-Do List.

1. Plan your quest using the three important questions above.
2. Make a list of what “ingredients” you need in your quest, from the list above.
3. Write the rough draft of the script for your main characters. Use chat, click and proximity triggers. Don’t worry about the parts you are unsure on coding. Just write little notes like # Check if person has slime ball. If then {  } else { }
4. Go back through your list of chat triggers and ask yourself  how likely it is a player will think to type those specific words. Add hints in the script, either as chat or narration, to prompt the player to type the words you want typed.
5. Go back through and look up how to do the parts you’re unsure of coding. Check if I have samples on any of the pages here and if possible add them in. Try to get the right number of spaces before lines and check whether you have the straight quotation marks or the fancier directional quotation marks. Change them to the straight ones if possible, since that saves me having to do that.
6. Send me the still somewhat rough draft. Let me provide some extra corrections and ideas.
7. Read through my comments and try to make a few changes and corrections, if necessary. Send it back to me.
8. Build your setting.
9. Create your NPCs in your setting. Hook them up and test them.
10. Repeat steps 3 – 7 for any additional characters, item scripts, world scripts, etc.
11. When you think your quest is done, post a message here inviting your classmates to test it for you. Tell them the coordinates of the NPC they should talk to first.
12. Make any changes and additions in response to your classmates testing of the quest. Sometimes when we design a quest it is easy to assume other players can read our minds and will respond the same way we do. Having others test it is important because it reveals the difficulties they might have. A quest is never complete until it has been fully tested and any necessary alterations made.