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TEST: Illia Quest

Posted: 06 Oct 2012, 22:51
by v0id
I updated the testserver with a new quest.

Use:

Code: Select all

@warp 007-1 120 56
and follow the path to get where it starts:)

The quest is repeatable and is designed for a group of 4 players.
Only one group of 4 players can play it at the same time.
The minimum level is 88, but the recommended level is 90+.

Difficulty

The quest is designed to be very hard: only a team with some skill and a good strategy should be able to finish it -- (think of these optional quests in some RPGs, that are often very difficult).
I would like some feedback on that in particular, to adjust the difficulty as accurate as possible.

Note that the quest's difficulty increases for the next team, when a team fails after a certain progress in the quest.

Debug tools
  • A debug section at the first npc allows to skip the main storyline and start right away the quest with 1, 2, 3 or 4 players.
    Note that if this is your first time on this quest, you won't know the storyline and will not understand what happens later in the quest by using this debug tool.
  • The same debug section also allows to adjust the difficulty of the quest.
  • A npc (Illia Level Jumper) waits at the beginning of 051-1. It allows to jump to any part of the quest that you wish to test.
Particle effects

The quest makes use of particle effects at many places. Make sure to enable them when testing.
Also, the final monster uses special effects that can be viewed only with the mana client or Manaplus 1.2.10.14 or greater. (thanks 4144 :D )

Rewards

The quest has 2 types of rewards: uniques and commons.
Commons are regular stuff typically worn by warriors / archers / mages.
Uniques are 4 new items. 3 for each major class, 1 "neutral". IDs are 877, 878, 879, 880.
Some feedback on the stats of these 4 uniques is welcome as well for proper balancing.


Please comment here :)

Re: TEST: Illia Quest

Posted: 07 Oct 2012, 05:29
by o11c
This is the quest that requires that server patch?

Re: TEST: Illia Quest

Posted: 07 Oct 2012, 08:57
by tux9th
o11c wrote:This is the quest that requires that server patch?
Yes;
sorry for spamming V0id :<

I'm not sure how to finish the quest or do it so I'm going to ask here about the rewards.
How do you get those? You said you can redo the quest as often as you want. So anyone can get those rewards by repeating the quest over and over?

Re: TEST: Illia Quest

Posted: 09 Oct 2012, 15:46
by Whistler
Hi,
what a nice quest!, a lot of work done and it's quite difficult to test
as the content is very rich.
The story is interesting with this humor touch that makes it fit the Mana world,
new maps are well thought and refreshing , ladder, hidden paths, indoors, outdoors ...
It should integrate with ease in the existing world.
Particule effects are nice additions to the story and make it flow in a smooth way.
New monsters really lift the quest to a level unreached yet, their spawn rate is
amazing, mixing a snake-pit rate in a candor close space style, really good !
Regarding the quest's rewards stats or values, nothing seems to be over powered and as any
new gear or weapons, a deep knowledge of the existing or future ones is necessary to balance them.
Maybe a hair replacement for the helmet, like the one done recently with the helmets is to be set.
I found the quest quite hard and it certainly need more reviews, tests by power players to
make it in reach of the average level 90 player.
Overall, this kind of quest, not based of collecting items but on skills and cleverness,
implying a collective team spirit is very catchy.
Hats off.

Re: TEST: Illia Quest

Posted: 19 Oct 2012, 23:30
by v0id
In the past two weeks, we had several tests of the quest.
They allowed to solve a few bugs and improve the player's experience in all parts of the quest (in particular, the players helping the main "hero" know better what to do in each level).
Also, the stats of the new rewards have been vastly adjusted.
The part of the Island has been changed so that the team now needs to reach a certain amount of magic power instead of holding its power for a duration.

However it has been hard to gather a team of 4 players at the same time.
This testing is required to adjust the difficulty of all parts of the quest.

This Sunday could be an opportunity to gather and do a few tests ;)
If you want to have some fun doing testing on a team-based quest, show up and you ll find people for it 8)

Re: TEST: Illia Quest

Posted: 21 Oct 2012, 10:58
by Johanne Laliberté
Hi Void,

Nard and I will be there Sunday at server time 17:00.

Hope you will be there too, then it is a rendez-vous :)

Re: TEST: Illia Quest

Posted: 11 Nov 2012, 16:54
by v0id
Just a quick update about the Illia Quest:

In the last weeks, we continued with testing sessions with a full group of 4 players, to adjust the difficulty of the quest.

As the difficulty is gradually increasing with every level, the first levels weren't a problem to adjust.

Starting from the Illia Island, many efforts were made to adjust pretty well the difficulty, and so far they are successful.
The Illia Island, and the lobby and storage of the Inn are now a pretty good challenge.

Since the last testing session, we are now putting our efforts in adjusting the final boss which is for now still very tough despite a first adjustment :p
I've been busy last week but this week should be fine so if there are any volunteers for a testing session, please post here or find me on IRC :)

So that's the boss we want to kill and failed so far :
Illia Quest's final boss
Illia Quest's final boss
ManaPlus_Screenshot_14.png (51.59 KiB) Viewed 5694 times
Good luck :P

Re: TEST: Illia Quest

Posted: 11 Nov 2012, 23:12
by Johanne Laliberté
Hi,

Anytime V0id, just send me a call in game or pm me.

Johanne :)

Re: TEST: Illia Quest

Posted: 14 Nov 2012, 01:23
by sango98
Wow this quest looks great I'm gonna also gonna try to play on Sunday if I find a group to be in .

Re: TEST: Illia Quest

Posted: 13 Dec 2012, 10:06
by Kazenawa
As there were nobody connected, i did the quest alone and it was really difficult... Thanks to @heal i survived ^^
I did it at level 255 with amazing items available on the test server, but i'd love to try it as i would do it regularly on the main server, because i can't really judge the difficulty the way i did it.

Among others, that's amazingly well made, maps' design are new, storyline is greatly made, i see nothing wrong in it. Rewards aren't god killing items, so i think it won't really unbalance the game if somebody have them in the main server.

The only thing i haven't understood is... Ho to enter the inn... So i skipped it ^^

I'm hurry to try it on the main server, and also to try it on test server with other players. If you plan doing it, let me know, i'll join if i'm there to play.

Thanks V0id for such amazing creation :)

Re: TEST: Illia Quest

Posted: 13 Dec 2012, 12:03
by v0id
Hey Kazenawa,

Tonight (around 18, 19 server time), i ll be there to try with you, and maybe others if they wanna join ;)

Re: TEST: Illia Quest

Posted: 24 Dec 2012, 13:08
by v0id
It's been a week since the Illia quest has been released.
Some parts of the quest has proven being sensitive to the not-so-recent lag happening here. At some point, that probably stuck you in some dark place with your 3 other teammates. We had a restart saturday that made the script more robust to the lag so this shouldnt happen anymore.

Some people weren't teleported if the host made a case mistake in their name. This has been fixed saturday as well.
Saturday again, you probably saw the map around the witch changed: you are now able to see where the current is, by finding the latest purple/blue/black flame lighted.

This is quite a difficulty quest, but (that's why) the rewards are worth it.
So far, 4 teams succeeded at beating the witch... If you didnt yet, keep trying and you may be the next team :wink:

I ll take this post as an opportunity to thank all the testers that has been involved for adjusting the quest's difficulty and finding bugs. This lasted a few months and took a few evenings of their life :P : Nard, Johanne, Silent Dawn, Travolta, Zirry, thx1138, NitayandaRama, Monomu and maybe others i forgot :oops: . And of course Jenalya for the (long) review of the code :p

yet another technical issue

Posted: 09 Jan 2013, 23:05
by o11c
in db/mob_skill_db.txt, there is this line: 1102,Luvia@SC_SPLASHER,any,189,1,10000,0,10000,no,target,always,0,,,,,,

This is incorrect - "189" refers to a skill ID (which is NPC_WINDATTACK), not a status change. What is this *supposed* to do? It is usually not a good idea to try to make the server do new and strange things.

Incidentally, this is a great opportunity to show why TMWA needs cleaning up ...

Re: yet another technical issue

Posted: 10 Jan 2013, 15:48
by Nard
Wouldn' t this post be better placed in http://forums.themanaworld.org/viewtopi ... 13&t=16225?

I could not find skill id 189 in db/skill.db, is it passed to map server when there is no defined skill in that file?

Re: yet another technical issue

Posted: 10 Jan 2013, 17:16
by o11c
Nard wrote:Wouldn' t this post be better placed in http://forums.themanaworld.org/viewtopi ... 13&t=16225?

I could not find skill id 189 in db/skill.db, is it passed to map server when there is no defined skill in that file?
Yeah, there are all sorts of hard-coded skills. skill_db.txt pretty much only sets the maximum level you can raise a skill to, and the associated stat for pool skills. I'm not sure if "type: weapon/magic/none" has any effect.