D&D 5E Descent Into Avernus & Mad Max: Why the adventure ultimately failed (to me!)

[Paul Farquhar]

Cyberpunk 2077 is one of the worst reviewed games in a long time, and a compelte failure. DA: I is an older game outside of contemporary stuff, and also not super well reviewed for its story.

Regardless, using fetch quests is not the problem. Having a main storyline composed of fetchquests is. I don't know how much clearer I can make this. You are discussing side content, I am discussing the main content.

And in BG3, they are the main content. There is other stuff as well, but there are plenty of fetch quests. It's not a problem, they are good fetch quests. But you can't argue honestly argue that fetching things is something you no longer do in CRPGs.

 

[Shardstone]

And in BG3, they are the main content. There is other stuff as well, but there are plenty of fetch quests. It's not a problem, they are good fetch quests. But you can't argue honestly argue that fetching things is something you no longer do in CRPGs.

That wasn't my argument, its the argument you created to argue with me about.

BG 3 I haven't played, and can't comment on. However, Ruins Explorer says themselves above that you're wrong about fetch quests being central and core to BG 3. You should talk to them about BG 3 and not me, who hasn't played the game. Looking at your other games, most only have a few fetch quests, are poorly designed games, or are older than 5 years old.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Ruins Explorer says themselves above that you're wrong about fetch quests being central and core to BG 3.

Nothing is "central and core" to BG3, it doesn't really have the Critical Path/Side Quest structure of other modern CRPGs. However, you really cannot play it without doing any fetch quests.

And you are still utterly and completely wrong. The current trend for the Witcher 3 copying CRPGs is to have HUNDREDS of fetch quests. Plus crafting, which also requires you to fetch stuff. Most of them are optional, but if anything, the trend is to have more, not less.

 

[Shardstone]

Nothing is "central and core" to BG3, it doesn't really have the Critical Path/Side Quest structure of other modern CRPGs. However, you really cannot play it without doing any fetch quests.

And you are still utterly and completely wrong. The current trend for the Witcher 3 copying CRPGs is to have HUNDREDS of fetch quests. Plus crafting, which also requires you to fetch stuff. Most of them are optional, but if anything, the trend is to have more, not less.

Witcher was made 7 years ago. You are ignoring parts of my posts to say things that are also not true. Your definition of a fetch quest is not what I'm talking about. I have pointed you to ruins explorer's post, which you keep ignoring. This is going in circles now, with you ignoring things I say and focusing only on certain things.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Witcher was made 7 years ago.

And its huge popularity set the trend for the current crop of CRPGs. Cyberpunk 2077 is a straight up reskin.

Your definition of a fetch quest is not what I'm talking about.

Someone asks you to bring them something. You go somewhere, collect the thing (usually involving fights and other obstacles). You return to the questgiver and give them the thing. Boom fetchquest. Not hard to understand, is it?

This is going in circles now, with you ignoring things I say and focusing only on certain things.

I'm focusing on the nonsensical thing you said: that fetch quests are not a feature of modern CRPGs. I've cited lots of examples. You haven't cited any that have no fetch quests.

No point in arguing the things you said that I don't disagree with, is there?

 

[Shardstone]

And its huge popularity set the trend for the current crop of CRPGs. Cyberpunk 2077 is a straight up reskin.

Someone asks you to bring them something. You go somewhere, collect the thing (usually involving fights and other obstacles). You return to the questgiver and give them the thing. Boom fetchquest. Not hard to understand, is it?

I'm focusing on the nonsensical thing you said: that fetch quests are not a feature of modern CRPGs. I've cited lots of examples. You haven't cited any that have no fetch quests.

No point in arguing the things you said that I don't disagree with, is there?

I said contemporary RPGs. Elden Ring, Horizon Zero Forbidden West, and many other indie RPGs have largely abandoned fetch quests, keeping only a few of them around and using them sparingly at best. This conversation is getting stale. The argument was never that fetch quests are entirely abandoned. It was that fetch quests were largely falling out of favor. Additionally, when I was talking about fetch quests, I was talking speciically about the context they play in DiA in relation to its themes, goals as an adventure, and the effect they had on the adventure.

You have repeatedly tried to twist my words about fetch quests into me saying all fetch quests are terrible, which I never claimed. I claimed in the context of DiA they were terrible, and that fetch quests as a format were not largely relied on in cotemporary RPGs to move the main story along.

Please stop harassing me about fetch quests now.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Elden Ring, Horizon Zero Forbidden West, and many other indie RPGs have largely abandoned fetch quests

I haven't played any of those, so I wouldn't know. I have played loads more that have loads of fetch quests though, so maybe you are selecting your RPGs to leave out an element you don't like? Although I'm pretty sure the ones you name have crafting. Does that not require fetching things?

But abandoning a key element of fantasy literature seems like an odd move to me. The Hobbit? Fetch quest. Indiana Jones? Fetch quest.

Additionally, when I was talking about fetch quests, I was talking speciically about the context they play in DiA in relation to its themes, goals as an adventure, and the effect they had on the adventure.

I wasn't talking about that, and never said I was. I said earlier, I haven't read DiA, so I'm not qualified to comment on it at all. I was only talking about your absurd claim that fetch quests are not a feature of modern CRPGs.

You have repeatedly tried to twist my words about fetch quests into me saying all fetch quests are terrible, which I never claimed.

No you didn't, and I never said you did. If you feel I implied that you did, I'm sorry, that was not my intent.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

This is a rather disingenuous additional condition. You can't only play the critical path, since you need to do side quests to gain power and levels. And as I already mentioned, it makes those "huge" games very short. Witcher 3, Cyberpunk 2077 and Dragonage: Inquisition in particular are jam packed with sidequests that don't even bother to dress up their fetch quest nature.

Sorry nope! Check out the post you responded to:

the ones I can recall they are very minimal and optional, not the core storytelling technique of the work.

So let's be clear on this. I didn't add this condition. It was already present. You ignored it. I merely rephrased it because you didn't seem to have taken it on board. You thus do not get to complain about being called out on it. You certainly don't get to call it disingenuous just because you missed it the first time.

Also, that's bolded bit is some shocking ignorance on your part.

As a simple matter of fact (not arguable) in all three of the games you list, you can in fact easily just play the critical path, because of how they're designed re: scaling/required power. Witcher 3 is about a 50-60 hour experience if you do (usually closer to 60 unless you're extremely efficient). Cyberpunk 2077 is more like 30-40 hours. Dragon Age: Inquisition is the only one which suffers significantly - it's about 20 hours. However, if you include the companion stuff in DAI, only, little/none of which is fetch quests, though there is at least one boring collection quest with Varric.

You seem to be under the misapprehension that modern CRPGs aren't typically built to scale. Now, I know some people don't like it, but most are, either with limited ranges to their scaling (i.e. place X will scale between level 10 and level 20 but never be higher or lower than those), or with unlimited ranges (i.e. place X will always be your level +2). For example, Deadfire uses the former method, and Skyrim uses the latter.

Cyberpunk 2077 is one of the worst reviewed games in a long time

Absolutely untrue.

Sorry to be having to punch both of you in the nuts here, but you're both wrong. On PC at least Cyberpunk 2077 has an 86 Metacritic, which actually makes it one of the better-reviewed CRPGs in gaming history, especially in the recent era.

Cyberpunk 2077

Cyberpunk 2077 for PC game reviews & Metacritic score: Cyberpunk 2077 is an open-world, action-adventure story set in Night City, a megalopolis obsessed with power, glamour and body modification. Assume the role of...

www.metacritic.com

On consoles it did much worse, but that was because of technical issues, not game design ones (obviously, given the game design in the same on all platforms).

DA:I was also well-reviewed on PC with an 85 Metacritic.

Dragon Age: Inquisition

Dragon Age: Inquisition for PC game reviews & Metacritic score: Select and lead a group of characters into harrowing battles against a myriad of enemies – from earth-shattering High Dragons to demonic forces from the other...

www.metacritic.com

I was only talking about your absurd claim that fetch quests are not a feature of modern CRPGs.

But that was never his claim. His claim was that they generally weren't part of the core storytelling, which I would extend to say they're rarely a feature of the main plot at all. And he's correct to say that.

You haven't disputed it, I note. You've only talked around the issue. You've avoided it repeatedly by misrepresenting his position, and refusing to engage on what he actually said.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Does that not require fetching things?

Not in either of those games, no. You typically pick stuff up as you go, and you do all the crafting yourself as well in Forbidden West (in Elden Ring you do some of it yourself and other stuff at NPCs, but there's no "I need X, bring it here" in the crafting - unlike some games).

 

[Paul Farquhar]

I didn't say Cyberpunk 2077 was bad. It's structurally uninspired through, with a railroad main story and a ridiculous number of trivial sidequests (not all of which are fetch quests). The driving bits would probably be better if you are not trying to steer with a mouse! BG3 is shaping up to be much better in terms of storytelling.

It does have some Mad Maxisms if you like that sort of thing. Personally, I hated Fury Road.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

BG3 is shaping up to be much better in terms of storytelling.

I'm surprised to find myself disagreeing actually.

Cyberpunk 2077 has a lot of problems (and yes oh god the driving argh no), but the main story is extremely well-told (like genuinely some of the later story-telling is up there with the very best I've ever seen in a CRPG), and whilst it is a "railroad", none of the games you listed have anything but a railroad main story. BG3 most assuredly has a railroad. It some tracks you can choo-choo-choose, certainly more tracks than 2077 (based on the first act), but it's a railroad nonetheless. You will go through the same stations and you will end up in the same city.

BG3 has a serious problem though in that Larian are writing it, and Larian come from the old-skool pen-and-paper DMing approach of "Every NPC is a total, unmitigated c-word with no redeeming features beyond snappy dialogue, but only that if you're supposed to like them". And I do mean every NPC. They can't help themselves. DOS2 before the enhanced edition was a particularly ghastly rendition of this juvenile approach to writing/DMing (Enhanced really surprisingly contains some significant re-writes which reduce jerkishness of some NPCs). You sometimes see P&P adventures written this way, including WotC ones, sadly. Some DMs are like this too - of the three other DMs I play with semi-regularly, one of them is like, borderline like this, like he tries not to be, but his instincts from years of DMing are to make NPCs into utter jerks of the very worst kind.

Now, let me say, Larian got massive pushback on this. Really massive. They casually dropped this straightforwardly grimdark crapsack world take on the FR, which was more like Warhammer Fantasy, with maximum-jerk NPCs all round, and were very pleased with themselves, and the feedback they got was intensely negative, and to the tune of "This isn't the Forgotten Realms" and "Why is every NPC, especially the companions, a totally horrible person?!". They didn't account for the fact that the FR is not, in fact, a "crapsack" or "grimdark" setting, nor that FR/BG fans expect some characters to be actually nice/good people.

So they've been backpedaling ever since then, and pretty much every patch we've had more and more dialogue options and action options to be nicer to NPCs (that was another issue), NPCs have been less needlessly hostile (even Meany McGith, bless her heart), less randomly jerk-ish, and companions in particular more, well, companionable*. But they've got a long way to go, because they went absolutely Full Warhammer in terms of NPC personalities (never go Full Warhammer - not even Warhammer goes Full Warhammer these days - you know the new Rogue Trader CRPG won't) at the start. I do expect that before release Act 1 will be fairly reasonable, but based on DOS2, Act 2 & 3 (as I understand it there is no Act 4 with BG3) will not have been revised in the same way, so will still likely be grimdark-ish and full of loathsome NPCs and brow-furrowing situations (in a bad way).

TLDR: Given it's Larian, I don't expect them to tell the story well overall. If I am pleasantly surprised, great, but like, given Larian put in a situation where you can bust in on an orc/ogre sex scene which is graphically and disturbingly described (Eric's grandma would shoot me with lightning if I said more, but jesus wept), and which is just totally representative of both the grimdark setting and the utterly juvenile minds of the lead devs, I don't expect anything good except in gameplay/visuals.


* = except Jerk McVampire, but that's his vibe - btw what on earth is with these gen-Z girls and boys swooning over him? He has the accent, attitude and appearance of a disreputable art teacher who smokes hand-rolled cigarettes behind the bike shed. Are kids into that? They're acting like he's Aidan Turner with his top off when he's cut-rate Richard E. Grant in a bad wig!

 

[Paul Farquhar]

you know the new Rogue Trader CRPG won't

Pathfinder Wrath of the Righteous has a goodly share of jerk NPCs.

It is true that Cyberpunk 2077 has some NPCs who are actually likable.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Pathfinder Wrath of the Righteous has a goodly share of jerk NPCs.

It is true that Cyberpunk 2077 has some NPCs who are actually likable.

WotR has a mix, like yeah it definitely has plenty, for example Regill and Nenio are absolute trash-people of the very worst kind, who exist solely to jerk the place up and make bad suggestions. But Lann, Ember, Seelah and even weirdly Daeran (if he takes a shine to you, otherwise he's a huge jerk lol) are pretty likeable. And most of the major questgiver NPCs and the like are fairly reasonable, or if they're jerks, you get a chance to take them down (either entirely, or a peg or two). The previous PF game was worse here for jerk NPCs.

It's not grimdark either, despite WotR being set in easily the most grimdark-esque part of Golarion.

And looking at the trailer and concept art for their Rogue Trader CRPG I don't get a "full grimdark" vibe at all. I just hope it has good mechanics.

 

[Jefe Bergenstein]

This is a rather disingenuous additional condition. You can't only play the critical path, since you need to do side quests to gain power and levels. And as I already mentioned, it makes those "huge" games very short. Witcher 3, Cyberpunk 2077 and Dragonage: Inquisition in particular are jam packed with sidequests that don't even bother to dress up their fetch quest nature.

D&D at it's core is a fetch quest. Go into the dungeon, bring out treasure. If the bar is "someone wants you to do something for them so they pay/help you", then I don't think I'd want to play in a campaign that didn't feature some sort of deal brokering on a basic level.

To me, true fetch quests are "obtain meaningless item for near meaningless reward" with little sense of why and low engagement. "Go out and bring me 10 bear butts (where weirdly not every bear has a butt)". Moreover, the means to accomplish said time waster needs to feel rote. "Go steal the Death Star plans" might technically qualify (and no, not the best kind of qualifying), but I don't think most would put it in the same category.