Task System (preliminary work)

[So_1337]

That sounds about right. I'm trying to remember the different quest types. I remember kill and collection, as those were the easiest. My friends and I pretty much kept requesting a new task until we got one of those, heh. Again, though, this only applies to LDoN. I suppose it could apply to many different quests that came later and fit the format correctly. Might need someone with a little more insight as to how it was used on Live, but your understanding of it sounds pretty spot-on thus far. It's the application of the system that's going to take some understanding.

[Derision]

Originally Posted by So_1337

I'm trying to remember the different quest types. I remember kill and collection, as those were the easiest.

There is an 'Activity Type' field, which determines, whether the activity is loot, deliver, kill etc. I've not tried all the possible values yet, but I know there is an 'Explore' type, which I imagine could be tied into the quest proximity detection in some way.

[Andrew80k]

Originally Posted by Derision

There is an 'Activity Type' field, which determines, whether the activity is loot, deliver, kill etc. I've not tried all the possible values yet, but I know there is an 'Explore' type, which I imagine could be tied into the quest proximity detection in some way.

Yeah, set up an invisible mob/object and set a proximity around it. Have the quest for that object send a task update. If you have the task your task updates, if not the client will likely ignore it.

[Flare83]

Awsomeness Derision, did you used to work for Sony? lol j/k but nonetheless great work.

[Flare83]

Damn edit button

The main things i remember from the task system was

EQlive must of kept a table for what quests you completed. Becuase some of the quests where long 12 mission arcs.
DoN used it heavely for its raids/group content.
GoD/OoW used the alt+z window for it's missions. i think they are alot different but on the other hand might be alot alike /shrug.
Ldon used alt+v i think

[KLS]

No, the way I see it working is, whenever you kill a mob, or loot something, the server will need to check if you have any active tasks, and if killing that mob, or looting that item, was an objective of the task, then incrementing the kill/loot count for the task and sending the Task Complete packet when you have killed/looted the required number.

Basically, we can already handle this kind of stuff via player quests too, proximity mobs for explore etc.

Would add a internal task tracking system for time, completion/failure and maybe item amounts since that would be cumbersome then could probably do the rest via quests.

quest::updatetaskvalue(taskfield,value)
quest::enabletaskforplayer()
quest::disabletaskforplayer()
quest::opentaskwindow()
quest::istaskcompleted(taskid)

etc. probably more or different.

Biggest issue if you've gotten most the packets worked out will probably be trying to with some finesse track the quests offered. Since quests offered to a player will vary based on: who the player is(race,class), what they've done(tasks/quests complete), which npc is giving it.

That said if you need help and I get time I'd be most excited to help you hammer out a system to do it.

[trevius]

Maybe quest globals could be used for tracking purposes for tasks? They sounds to be similar systems and I think you would just need to allow the task window to work with the quest globals system. If so, it seems like it would minimize the work needed to get this finished. Or maybe use some of the code from the globals system to implement something similar to be used only for tasks. I am sure you would need a table for tracking them and similar fields.

[KLS]

Actually it would probably be harder to integrate it into an old system than to create a new one as the system would probably be fairly straight forward really. For performance issues I think also it's probably not a good idea; think every time you have to do a quest action you need to re-export globals, integrating it into qglobals would probably inc the number of globals in use by a lot and make it just that much more work every time the server processed quests.

[Andrew80k]

Originally Posted by So_1337

That sounds about right. I'm trying to remember the different quest types. I remember kill and collection, as those were the easiest. My friends and I pretty much kept requesting a new task until we got one of those, heh. Again, though, this only applies to LDoN. I suppose it could apply to many different quests that came later and fit the format correctly. Might need someone with a little more insight as to how it was used on Live, but your understanding of it sounds pretty spot-on thus far. It's the application of the system that's going to take some understanding.

Most of the task quests involved kill and collect. There were locate explore type quests as well, where you just ran around looking for stuff. These were mostly to get questers familiar with the zones and such. I don't have the latest expansion so I'm not sure if there are other types in the later ones. I've done a lot in the DoN and a several in the Depths of Darkhollow. Most of those were kill and collect.