Quests

It might be fun to sometimes encounter quests in Crawl. By this I mean vaults with the following properties:

• reward must be earned (i.e. is not just more of the same killing))
• there is an actual decision to be made (between sparing and killing, for example)
• a strong theme (roleplaying often comes from yes/no choices)
• as usual, timers can help with forcing a decision upon the player

You can consider troves as a first incarnation of something like this within Crawl. Similar to portal vaults, such quests should be rare — expected value less than one per game, say. Very elaborate designs have been suggested. As always, we should start with simple designs which carry rich themes. Something to avoid:

• no-choice quests: if it is something that the player would probably do anyway (e.g. killing a depth-appropriate unique), then it doesn't make a good task
• overly rich loot; note that it doesn't have to be items, many other rewards are possible
• multi-level tasks (this can certainly be done but may not be worth the overhead, both in implementation and in player information), also more likely to cause bugs
• quests tailored to species or backgrounds (excluding some species — like the undead — might be okay, and quests addressing gods might also work); in general: the broader the quest's potential audience, the better
• long walls of texts — it is generally better to leave details to imagination
• scumming potential (anything which might players lead to unusual behaviour in order to trigger higher chances for quest generation) — timers can often help prevent this

If you want to make it as easy as possible for an idea to go into the game, you can help by providing lots of relevant data, among them:

• depth (where the quest could come up)
• sample speech lines (these help a lot!) — you may, but don't have to, use the syntax of Crawl's speech files
• description text for the relevant story person

Depth: generated together with Pikel/Kirke

These are vaults which generate Kirke or Pikel (with their bands of hogs and slaves) together with a nearby awake, neutral human (“an acolyte of Elyvilon”). Ideally, the player generally meets the acolyte first. Whenever the player sees the acolyte for the first time, the acolyte asks for help. The player can accept the challenge via the ability menu (a yes/no prompt would also work). Doing so turns the acolyte into an ally and creates enough noise to wake up nearby monsters. Reading the acolyte's description gives a short account of the quest, so that players don't have to consult spoilers. The slaves/hogs will attack the acolyte (as usual) but the acolyte will never attack a slave or hog.

The player wins the quest if the following conditions are met:

1. Pikel/Kirke is dead (or otherwise dispatched: the criterion is whether the hogs/slaves are free)
2. the acolyte survives
3. at least one slave/hog survived
4. the player did not kill any slave/hog

Reward: You receive a single life saving attempt. The chance is (number of surviving hogs/slaves) / (number of starting hogs/slaves) /2, so at most 50%. Special case: if the player already follows a good god, then they get a piety boost instead.

Timer: the acolyte will take on Pikel/Kirke himself. If you don't help him, he'll just die for the cause.

Flavour: the acolyte sometimes heals hogs/slaves, you or himself (these are typical abilities of Elyvilon followers).

If Pikel/Kirke are dead and the acolyte survives, then he disappears (like pacified monsters do).

There are two reasons for the initial prompt: first, players must make a commitment in order to reap the reward (because Pikel/Kirke and the minions will wake up); second, monster AI will work without modification as soon as the acolyte becomes an ally.

The intention of this quest is that players will use consumables in order to protect the acolyte, slaves/hogs and themselves, and killing Pikel/Kirke as quickly as possible. Perhaps they will have to draw aggro from the monsters in order to protect the acolyte. I don't consider the reward to be too strong, although the precise chance for life saving can be debated. Likewise, I have no qualms about giving this reward to characters which are undead or follow an evil god: Elyvilon would acknowledge a good deed, no matter by whom and from the god's point of view, expending a favour on evil characters is a strong way to prove the superiority of the white path. — dpeg 2013-11-09 01:47

There was a more intricate idea for rewarding the undead species, namely to allow subsequent Elyvilon worship. That is interesting but should be ignored for the first implementation.

The acolyte of Elyvilon pleads to you: "[player name], will you help me free these [hogs|slaves] from oppression?"   [acolyte approaches hero]
The acolyte cheerfully exlaims: "Together we will free these poor souls from [slavery|martyrdom]"                    [hero accepts challenge; noisy!]
The acolyte sobs: "[player name], we have failed."                                                                   [acolyte lives but all slaves/hogs dead]
The acolyte cries: "No, [player name], no! The end never justifies these means."                                     [player has killed a hog/slave in sight of the acolyte]
The acolyte gracefully says: "I will send my prayers to heaven, asking Elyvilon to look after you."                  [reward message]

Depth: range of Orc entrances

These are vaults which feature

• a number (between 3 and 5) orcish statues
• two or three orc priests
• a neutral orc (named “heretic orc”)

The heretic is near an orcish statue, hostile and carries a wand of disintegration. He is generated in sight of an orcish idol. The orcish priests are generated as a band, but not necessarily nearby.

When you meet the heretic orc, he approaches you whether you will help him destroy the orcish idols. If you agree (either ability of prompt), then he becomes allied. The description of the heretic explains the quest.
Special case: if the character is an orc following Beogh, the heretic orc stays hostile.
Special special case: a Hill Orc following Beogh (and thus not approached by the heretic) can join the heretic if he abandons Beogh (and uses the 'a'bility to hook up with the heretic).

In any situation, the heretic always has a chance to use his wand of disintegration on orcish idols. Beogh anger will damage but never outright kill you or the heretic. If you or your allied heretic destroy an orcish idol, the orcish priests know your presence, and you get a level sound (message). The player always knows how many orc priests are still hunting him.

You get your reward if

1. the orcish idols are destroyed (generally via disintegration),
2. the priests are dead,
3. the heretic is still alive.

Reward: the heretic drops a branded orcish armour/weapon item. This is an orcish weapon/armour piece with an ego and positive enchantment. Afterwards, the orc disappears like pacified monsters do.

Timer: the heretic is treated as an ally of you, so the priests will just kill him if you don't aggravate them.

In this quest, the choice is between killing the heretic quickly (to get his wand of disintegration and avoid getting toasted) or helping him (hoping for a decent item). The latter carries a risk, from Beogh punishment and from the orcish priests who will arrive whenever the heretic destroys an idol. We don't want the player to suffer instant deaths, hence the precautions: Beogh punishment is not outright lethal (i.e. always leaves player/heretic with at least 1 HP — this could also apply outside of this quest); the player knows how many priests are hunting him; if the heretic is hostile, he will not unload his wand of disintegration upon the player (because he has to save charges for the idols) but he will use it occasionally (10% of usual chance).

The player can accept the quest simply to avoid getting attacked and disintegrated by the heretic. (He can also accept and then betray the heretic. If he does so, the heretic becomes hostile and the orcish priests will attack both player and orc indiscriminately, i.e. the heretic is still considered an ally for monster AI purposes.)

The heretic orc asks you: "Will you help me destroy the graven images to the false god?"                    [heretic approaching hero who doesn't follow Beogh]
The heretic orc screams: "Begone, foul [idolator|swine] of the tin god]!"                                   [heretic rejects heroes following Beogh]
Your hear screams of anger out of [one|two|three] throaths: "Death to the heretics!"                        [level sounds by orcish priests when an idol is destroyed] 
    "Burn the sinner at the stake!", "This sin must be avenged with blood!"
The heretic orc beams: "Their false god betrayed them in life, and will still betray them in death."        [all orcish priests dead, heretic alive, idols left]
    "The worms shall dine on these putrid idolators. We will not bury them."                            
The heretic orcs insists: "Let us find all idols on these grounds and topple them!"                         [orcish idols left on the level after destroying another one]
The heretic orcs looks happily at the dust: "Now we must only baptise the idolators in their own blood!"    [all idols destroyed; some orcish priests alive]
The heretic orc smiles at you and says: "I am very grateful to you, [player name]. ...                      [reward message]
     ...Please accept this token of my esteem. I have more idols to destroy."

There's that one vault where a band of kobolds has a caged up bunch of young halflings. How about that only spawns on a given floor after you encounter the grieving parents? Make them friendly to prevent players from killing them on sight, and have the messages, “The grieving mother mourns the loss of her kidnapped children,” and “The grieving father curses the kobold kidnappers under his breath.” Then, when you find the standard kobold vault later on (maybe with more big kobolds and some guaranteed curare needles and branded weapons to make them less insignificant), you also find a key (or a one-shot wand of disintegration) to open the cage with. Get the screaming kids back to their parents in one piece for a sizable gold reward. This makes them worth something beyond snack time for troll players

Fragile, unique friendly spellcaster who spawns extremely rarely in the Abyss or Pandemonium. Shouts out, “I can return us to our world! Just keep them off me for a minute!” Doesn't move, doesn't fight, but very slowly and noisily creates a doorway back to the material realm. He's at 10% of max health, so you'll have to either keep him very safe or just worship Elyvilon and heal him to keep him standing for the duration. It shouldn't be TOO hard, as the only reward here is a fairly easy Abyssal or Pan exit. If you worship Lugonu or Makhleb, he is instead hostile, but poses no real threat.

OPTIONAL: Xom enjoys turning him into a giant newt or teleporting you away the moment he finishes, “NO CHEATING!!!”

Depth: shallow dungeon

Note: multiple levels

When RNG rolls this early game quest, it means that Terence, Jessica, Ijyb, or another early “scrub” Unique has a chance to spawn at a suspiciously deeper point in the dungeon than you'd expect, but before Lair spawns. Killing the unique leaves a note behind (a special “unrandart” scroll) that when read simply gives the player a message saying, “Meet us in the Lair of the Beasts. Your first test is to find us. If you succeed we can discuss terms. — The Guild.”

When player reaches Lair there is a guaranteed spawn of a special vault protected by a runed door (late Lair, say floor 5 to 8). Behind it, player will find Sonja and two or three other early or mid-game “bounty hunter” uniques hanging out, as if in a meeting—Maurice, Erika, maybe bring back Jozef for this :) . If you manage to take them out, you will find “The Guild's” stash of items (some good weapons and armor). If you come back later in the game to the runed door, however, upon opening it you will find two or three corpses, plus a mortally wounded and disarmed Sonja, with all the Guild's loot gone. If Lair spawns before you have killed the message-bearing unique earlier, then this quest doesn't happen, even if you go back and kill the early-game unique. (No note drops, or anything.)

Lots of flavor, without having a ton of stuff explicitly spelled out. (The implication is that if you wait very long before opening the door, what's happened is that someone in the Guild has betrayed them, stealing the loot, and the thieves and bounty hunters turned on each other after discovering this. None of this is said in game, though, it is simply suggested.) Not much spoilery stuff, besides having to kill the unique, but that's why it is a relatively easy unique (spawning lower than usual—he/she's looking for the Lair, after all!) who holds the quest-initiator, so nearly all games where you roll this quest you'll end up initiating it. (Who wouldn't take out Terence on D8?) You could accidentally skip the unique and miss the quest and you wouldn't know it, or be bothered with it. If you do get it, you have an interesting choice: Take on some dangerous enemies in Lair for good rewards, or skip it, foregoing the loot, but still getting a bit of flavorful story later on.

EDIT: I suppose someone could game the system with spoilered info by waiting to go onto Lair:5 or deeper, but if you really want to deprive your character of more than half the Lair experience and loot, gimping your character just so you can be sure you can get a few extra items from uniques who will no longer pose a challenge…. Sure, go right ahead. :) So long as the only differences in gameplay that spoilered info can bring are strictly disadvantageous, they are fine.

Upon striking the last blow on a unique, there is a chance that this unique offers a choice: sparing his life (you still get the xp and the credits for defeating him), in exchange for information. Information on the whereabouts of another unique. For example:

Code:
  The mortally wounded Sigmund thanks you for sparing his life and says: "Louise is carrying a powerful, stolen item. She is where the snakes are."

Now you have to option to be quick enough at the specified place, and you find that unique with one additional item. The unique would show up on Ctrl-O in some form, and would be un-quested after a while (could still show up, but the additional item is gone). If we make all such items special (randart weapons and armour pieces, books for the casting uniques, jewellery choice for everyone), then that might be interesting sometimes.

Anti-abuse: of course, we don't want to have players leave early uniques aside for long (e.g. ignore Sigmund), so as to make this quest easier. One simple approach: the chance for this to kick in (small to begin with) is set to zero if time between “unique seen” and “unique killed” is too long. A flavour rationale, if you need one: if the unique is addressed too late, he has no reliable information about other uniques anymore.

The option to not kill the unique is for role-playing only. You are free to kill the unique afterwards (you scoundrel!).

Spawns: “Early” (D13 to D14, post-Lair but pre-runelock); or “Mid” (D16 to D19) Trigger: You come upon a special vault that looks like a mini-corrupted portion of the dungeon, with a human corpse sprawled out before a gate to abyss (“early” spawn) or Pan (“mid-game” spawn). Flavor: A young man meddled in forces beyond his ken….

The human corpse has a scroll beside him, a portion of “The Last Will and Testament of Emrys the Great,” which reads, ”… And finally, to my son Merl, I leave my prized ring, on the condition that he promises to cease his dangerous magical experiments.” A trail of blood leads from the corpse to the gate to abyss / Pan.

Will you avenge the hapless Merl and retrieve his father's keepsake?

If you go into the abyss or Pan, after some number of turns spent exploring, you are guaranteed to eventually come across a demon who will be identified (with red message) as coveting a small, shining object. Kill him and it drops a semi-randart ring, always named “Emrys' Will.” The ring is basically a randart, but it is guaranteed to have a beneficial base type, and to spawn with 2 (if retrieved from abyss earlier in the game) or 4 (if retrieved from Pan) guaranteed-beneficial affixes. So basically its like the “faerie dragon armor” but as a ring. [In the abyss, once you see this special demon, you are guaranteed not to get a sudden random Abyss-teleport for, say, 50 turns, or until you have picked the ring up—whichever comes first.]

A orc knight and an orc sorcerer (or a hell knight and a necromancer, later in the dungeon) are spawned together. When the mage half of the duo comes into view of the player, a message “The <foo> shouts, 'You'll never get the treasure!'” If the other is in view, you get “The <bar> growls, 'come back, you coward! We'll slaughter this fool.'” The fighter, when seen, moves to fight. If the fighter is slain, it drops “half a treasure map”.

The first time the mage is seen, it starts a teleport and gets fear status. If the mage teleports away, it is removed from the level and will be placed on a future level. On future levels it starts a teleport if it takes damage, but doesn't gain the fear status. It can teleport to a deeper level a few times, potentially, and after a few of these, it is replaced with a lich monster. If the mage is slain, it drops “half a treasure map” and a wand of digging.

If the player obtains both half-treasure maps, a wall segment will be highlighted on the floor the duo is first encountered on. If that wall tile is dug out by any means, it reveals a portal to a small treasure vault, like a lesser trove.

Using fire attacks might have a chance to burn the “half treasure map” objects, unless that seems to obnoxious.

Spawns: Randomly in late Dungeon (not guaranteed to spawn in the game) Trigger: Discovery of the temple antechamber—a little vestibule area with a yellow staircase that leads down to a whole new branch. Flavor: A very powerful Demigod with especially pronounced divine features has managed to attract a large band of worshipers, allowing him to ascend to a near-godhood status. Will you stop his ascension, and preserve the delicate balance of theological forces?

If you ignore this optional branch for too long, eventually the followers will desert it anyway, as they will go out to proselytize, leaving only an altar behind. When you try to go downstairs, you get a warning that the staircase has a special mechanism that can lock it behind you.

If you choose not to ignore it, you will go down into a new level, and the staircase will be blocked so you cannot exit. You will find a bunch of fanatics devoted to the fledgling near-god, whose name is randomly generated. The fanatics should all get one or two randomly generated invocations abilities to use against you. If you wipe out all the fanatics you get pretty good loot from them, and the staircase opens back up into the dungeon, but you have also averted the fledgling, would-be god's path to full apotheosis. He will quickly fade into oblivion, but in the meantime, he will attempt to exact revenge: You will suffer wrath effects (randomly determined from a list), but on a much shorter time line than usual. Needless to say, the loot from this quest should be very good.

Rationale: Nice to have a quest that makes the whole religion aspect of Crawl a bit more interactive, and I really like the idea of having a lot of the risk applying *after*, rather than before, you've received the reward. (I don't think there's anything quite like that in Crawl, as it stands.) This could be a wiz lab, but it works better like this, as its lingering effect is not something that spawns in the future, but rather the fact that you have to deal with wrath as you carry on afterward.

Spawns: Late game Trigger: Discovery of the sepulcher Flavor: An ancient tomb has stood for ages in the Dungeon, sealed by powerful magic and apparently abandoned. But recently, sinister flames have appeared around it, wreathing the basalt masonry in unnatural light. As you approach, its great door is wrenched ajar—from the inside.

Do you enter?

Basically, the design here would be very similar to a “mini-zig” of 10 levels, but which only has loot on the final floor. You can exit on any level (or perhaps, only exit on any level after the 5th?) but you won't get anything from it unless you survive until the end. The 10th level consists only of a single powerful undead enemy (a. lich, guardian mummy, or curse skull) and a ton of loot, plus a portal out. When you exit, the entire structure collapses.

Depth: an abandoned shop on some level where shops are possible; a neutral character in Abyss:1.

If you meet the lost shopkeeper in the Abyss, you have to make the choice (yes/no prompt) whether he will be friend or foe.

1. You decide for hostility. Then the shopkeeper starts fleeing (and abyssical monsters ignore him — we rationalise this as the crowd realising that you're the real problem). If you kill the shopkeeper, you find a little loot on his body. Loot is one out of
   • a few consumables (curing, heal wounds, speed potions — presumably these have kept the shopkeeper alive so far); the shopkeeper would also them occasionally (so you have to kill him quick, or they're all gone!)
   • one or two items that fit his shop's stock
   • a personal item, i.e. a randart with the name shopkeeper's name (need not be very good!)
2. If you make him an ally, he will follow you; if you leave the Abyss (including Lugonu's power), he will leave as well. Doing so gets you the reward, all related to his shop, which is mentioned to open again (Falumbori gladly announces that his shop on Snake:2 will open again.) You get one out of
   • a sum of money (business people)
   • a special discount in his shop, and all a lesser discount in all shops of the same type
   • you can choose two items for free from his shop

For additional flavour: the shop sells one or two items that indicate the shopkeeper has been to the Abyss, even if they don't fit the stock. For example, a mediocre randart with “Lugonu” as part of its name, a randbook like “How to survive in the Abyss” (only spell: swiftness) etc.

Description of the shopkeeper (what you get with 'xv'): 
This shopkeeper seems to have travelled far away from his story. Whether this was out 
of curiousity, for business reasons or deceit, you may never know. The vendor looks 
very distressed and would certainly want to leave the Abyss. If you help him to escape, 
you will certainly be rewarded in some way. On the other hand, who knows what kind of 
reward you could reap from his dead body?

Depth: any level which can naturally feature shops and is part of Maurice's generation depth (or slightly earlier)

On this dungeon level, there are:

• an abandoned shop (jewellery, armour, weapons — stock which can be named individually); the level layout should be restricted (connected area, open is preferable)
• nearby, this store's shopkeeper (same name), a neutral, awake human
• either Maurice
• or a number of semi-uniques dispersed over the map (hostile, awake humans with similar names, e.g. Joe, Jeff, James)

Upon meeting the shopkeeper, he will tell you that he's just been robbed. He promises a reward if you help him get his goods back. This quest comes in two flavours. Either you are asked to bring the head of the thief (Maurice), or you are asked to fetch back the stolen goods.

You can always take the evil path:

• You can kill the shopkeeper for his gold.
• You can kill the disposers (if they are generated) and keep the stolen items.

In this case, all subsequent purchases in shops across the whole dungeon will be more expensive — no shopkeeper is going to like customers such as you!

The shopkeeper begs, “Will you help me retrieve my goods from the scoundrels? You will be richly rewarded!”

The disposers try to leave the level (like pacified monsters, they also disappear completely once they get off the level) but will make a stand and fight if you meet them. Killing one leaves a single stolen item of the shop's type whose name matches the shopkeeper's. These items don't have to be randarts, let alone good randarts.

Rewards: if you drop all the (remaining) stolen items on the shop's location, the shop is immediately set up again and you get one randomly out of the following

• The shopkeeper will buy up to five randarts of his shop's type from you.
• For armour/weapon/jewellery shops: the shopkeeper offers to increase an enchantment. (Apply four Enchant Armour / Enchant Weapon III scrolls on a chosen item, or increase the value of a mundane ring of Gain Strength/Dexterity/Intelligence or Evasion/Protection by 3).
• You get a personal item of the shopkeeper. This is a randart, guaranteed to be not bad (but not necessarily really good). Item quality is random, but tends to increase with number of retrieved goods.

Technically: as long as there are disposers alive on the level and/or stolen (i.e. named) items not on the shop's location, you are treated like in the evil case (more expensive shopping): The shopkeepers asks you to help him, lest the whole guild mistakes you for a robber. If all stolen goods still on the level are dropped on the shop's location, you are rewarded.

Timer: no quest left as soon as all disposers have fled from the level.

The shopkeeper pleads, “Will you go and hunt down the master thief? He has been ruining our businesses for too long. Please hurry!”

The shopkeeper is walking around his abandoned shop, (quite helplessly) looking for Maurice. His description (or the messages) mention that he expects Maurice to leave the level, now that he has stolen everything from the shopkeeper.

Maurice is generated on the level; his remaining time is generous (several hundred turns). If you kill Maurice, there will always be a corpse, and if you get in sight of the shopkeeper with Maurice's corpse in your inventory, you are rewarded with one of the following chosen randomly (these reflect that the guild of shopkeepers has set a bounty on Maurice which is why your reward is dungeon-wide):

• You can get an item from any shop in the whole dungeon, for free.
• Entering any shop (known already or not) will give you gold, once. (Amount proportional to total value of the stock.)
• You get a dungeon-wide discount on all shops.

When Maurice leaves, he is slated for a deeper level. As soon as Maurice leaves, the shopkeeper disappears, thus rendering this quest void.

Timer: You have to defeat Maurice before he can kill the shopkeeper.

Spawns: Mid-game (later than D16); can spawn on Vaults:1 Trigger: You come across “Orland's Abnormal Apothecary & Sundries,” which has the usual store-front appearance, but rather than selling you items, Orland has something else to offer…

Orland has no wares to trade at the moment, because his assistant has not returned with new supplies. He can offer you a free sample of an extremely powerful, experimental potion Orland has been working on, however. If you choose “yes,” you become horribly mutated with numerous bad mutations, semi-randomly. (Should be stacked to give one or two “high-level” mutations that really affect your game, like Slow Healing 3, in addition to one or two more mild ones like Blurry Vision 1.) Orland, aghast at what his (apparently contaminated) potion did, promises to rectify your ailments. But he'll need the supplies from his assistant, who ventured deeper into the dungeon with some bodyguards in search of useful alchemical reagents…

Three or four floors below where Orland's store spawned, you will find the assistant slain and the mercenaries who betrayed him arguing over how to divide the spoils. Dispatch the mercenaries and get the assistant's satchel. Upon returning satchel to Orland, he does indeed cure your ailments, and is surprised to find that his assistant had stumbled upon a rare and valuable breed of flower prized by alchemists (a fact that one of the savvier mercenaries perhaps caught wind of, precipitating the betrayal). With this, Orland can make some potions with extraordinary effects.

Reward: Orland's store opens up and operates like any other distillery. In addition to a selection of potions that are determined in the usual way by the RNG, Orland is guaranteed to have 2 or 3 potions of beneficial mutation, and one potion of experience, in stock. Orland's shop also is guaranteed to offer you max discount (i.e., lowest price for base value), in light of all the trouble he put you through.

A small vault room featuring a “terrified shop keeper” and a OoD shop Mimic on top an abandon shop. Once the shop keeper comes into he shouts something and the mimic is identified with exclusions put in place. You can always kill the Mimic and let him open shop or kill the shop keeper for his Gold.