[Nomic02] Proposal: Quests

[Admiral Jota]

On Tue, 1 Apr 2003, Dylan O'Donnell wrote:

> A proposal for four new rules:
>
>   For It Is Your Sacred Task [Psmith]

Currently nay, but just because I wanted to address some things before it
goes through. The idea itself intrigues me.

>   There shall exist a Roster of Quests, which can contain zero or more
>   Quests. This Roster and any Quests on it are part of the state of
>   the game. A Quest has associated with it: a colour; three different
>   rooms on the map (labelled "home", "locate", and "goal"); and a value.

No names for quests? I guess names aren't necessary, with the colors, but
it did surprise me.

>
>   Some tokens may be designated "quest tokens". A quest token is
>   associated with a particular Quest. Multiple quest tokens with the
>   same name can exist; if two or more Quest tokens with the same name
>   are ever in the same location, all but one of them are removed from
>   the game.

This doesn't specify which one is removed. At the moment, they might be
identical, but there's no reason to assume it'll stay that way. For
example, we might add a "hunny pot" to the game, capable of making any
game token "sticky" without changing its name. Then you'd need some method
of differentiating which one to remove. Perhaps quest tokens should have a
number appended to their names, so they can be considered in standard
order by name?

>   Whenever a player's location is equal to a room that is a "home" room
>   of any Quest, a quest token associated with that Quest is created with
>   the name "<colour> primary", where <colour> is the colour associated
>   with that Quest, and a location equal to that of the player, unless
>   the player is already carrying such a token. Whenever a player
>   carrying a quest token with a name containing the word "primary" has
>   his or her location equal to the "locate" room of the associated
>   Quest, the name of that token shall be altered to substitute "primary"
>   with "secondary". Whenever a player or players carrying a quest token
>   with a name containing "secondary" have their location equal to the
>   "goal" room of the associated Quest, the value of that Quest will be
>   added to the appropriate one of the players' tallies, all tokens
>   associated with that Quest will be removed from the game, and that
>   Quest will be removed from the Roster.

"Whenever a player or players..." -- I don't think multiple players can
carry one token, so it might be better to phrase that differently. Also,
referring to "...the appropriate one of the players' tallies..." suggests
that only one player will get the points, even if several carry suitable
tokens.

>   If at any time there are fewer than three Quests on the roster, the
>   active player may create one as an action. To create a Quest, the
>   player, in strict order, gives it a colour name of their choice
>   different from any other Quest; chooses by Random Selection a "home"
>   room from the set of all rooms not including Mornington Crescent, a
>   "locate" room from the set of all rooms not including Mornington
>   Crescent or the "home" room, and a "goal" room from the set of all
>   rooms not including Mornington Crescent or the "home" or "locate"
>   rooms; and rolls a 20-sided die. If the result of this roll is 17 or
>   less, the value of the Quest will be that many brownie points; if 18
>   or greater, the value of the Quest will be one point of Puissance. If
>   the player, having commenced creating a Quest, fails to complete this
>   series of rolls by the end of the turn, he or she will receive one
>   demerit and the Quest will not be added to the Roster.

How strictly are we defining the word "colour"? Any vague description of
appearance, analogous to "species"? An actual dictionary-listed color?
Something in between?

-- 
                                     _/<-=    Admiral Jota    =->\_
                                      \<-= jota@shelltown.com =->/