Murk
Arcane
- Joined
- Jan 17, 2008
- Messages
- 13,459
To a certain extent I've always been a fan of games that feature multiple short scenarios that may or may not interlap with one another. A big example of this I can give is Saga Frontier, specifically Saga Frontier 2. Squaresoft apparently made multiple games like this throughout their former career as a rather interesting jRPG developer/publisher/whatever.
Now this is all well and neat, and I did really like those games, but they all had the basic problems that any jRPG does. Atrocious dialog, almost no player interaction, mostly mindless hack-n-slash (though the duel fights with Saga Frontier 2 were slightly more interesting).
Do away with those trappings and instead implement western style gameplay, dialog, writing, and characters. Suddenly, I find myself interested.
But let's get to the real point of the thread - scenario ideas that are interesting and refreshing. One of the biggest appeals of scenario based gameplay is that since the game is composed of multiple small plots you can have any range of them you'd desire. Epic story with BBEG? Sure. Small time story of self discovery? Sure. Single dungeon event where you go kill some monster and find some loot? Done. Situation where you play as the hero in one scenario - the villain in another, and a seemingly unrelated third party that turns out to be the real manipulator of it all in yet another scenario that ties the other two together? Yes please.
So bring forth your undeveloped, half assed, "hey wouldn't it be cool to..." ideas and let's see what you got.
I expect Jarlfrank to post at least once in here.
---
Tragic tale of the low level villain.
This scenario can be modified to fit whatever flavor you want - maybe you're a group of bugbears, a death knight and some ghasts, or a small tribe of ogres, whatever.
You play as Dargur the Youngblood, so called for the fact that you won your first fight to the death at a very young age, even by Orcish standards. You are the youngest Warchief in history of your relatively short lived and small clan, and today you are undergoing the ceremony of Harsghalum to join the ranks of the ordained leaders of the tribe.
During the festivities of your tribe, a group of mercenaries attack having been payed by a coalition of the local villages to rid the mountainside of your villainous people's raids on the lowlands. The scenario takes place entirely in burning village of Orcs that was your former home, and yes, you are evil.
Rough flowchart of events:
Adventurers attack and with some difficulty break through the defenses and the entire tribe is called into battle - you were currently trying to fornicate with some local orcish wenches in the woods, and so you start caught unaware with your pants down (literally). Small encounter of a minor cohort who you dispatch, take some of his gear and go into town. Current party members are you and your wench.
As you get back into town some fighting ensues, you use your wench as an escape route (getting her killed in the process) and use the distraction to get an advantage over your human enemies. During the fighting you meat up with one of your lieutenants who joins you. In the process of fighting through the village towards the Elders' hut you have the option of taking on additional fights that are very difficult to save other Orcs who will join you - sometimes the Orcs just run away, suck in battle, or end up getting killed anyway and you just ended up wasting time.
As you fight your way to the elders' hut you come across the mercenary leader and his personal vanguard of 4, which make the standard party of Tank, Healer, Mage, Rogue, and extra (probably a Ranger/Archer of some kind).
Fight ensues and if you're good enough you win. If you lose, then the game ends in one of the endings and you get a recap of what happened and the consequences of your choices.
If you win then you save the head Elder orc and have the option of restoring peace to your tribe and trying to rebuild, killing him in his weakened state and taking the title for yourself, or to walk away from the situation and turn into a Drizz't ripoff.
If you do choose to save him, you put aside your weapons to help the Elder up when you are surprised by a scream in some human tongue you can barely make you - you turn around to see the Ranger leaning against a wall, covered in blood, smiling as sparks shoot out of his vest. The explosion kills you and your group unless you found an item of fire resistance (optional sidequest). If you did, then you become the new leader and form a new tribe who will one day exact vengeance on the human lowlands, you also get an eye patch and a lot of cool looking scars. You die at the hands of a group of Paladin who were charged to defend the local towns.
If you choose to kill the elder then you try to make it look like one of the humans did it, and in the process of framing the Mercenary leader you see one of them reaching for a last ditch suicide effort - his attempt to light a fuse is cut short by your swift throwing axe.
If you chose to walk away then the building goes up in flames as you leave the village, and you realize that violence only begets violence, you get an epiphany about life and how fragile and precious it is. Regretting your past ways, you decide to turn a new leaf and take on the world for all its glory and beauty. Your dreams end when you run into the back up group of milita that the villagers formed bumps into you, and executes you in a humane and swift manner. They then bury you and give your corpse more respect than you ever gave anything.
... Kay, your turn.
Now this is all well and neat, and I did really like those games, but they all had the basic problems that any jRPG does. Atrocious dialog, almost no player interaction, mostly mindless hack-n-slash (though the duel fights with Saga Frontier 2 were slightly more interesting).
Do away with those trappings and instead implement western style gameplay, dialog, writing, and characters. Suddenly, I find myself interested.
But let's get to the real point of the thread - scenario ideas that are interesting and refreshing. One of the biggest appeals of scenario based gameplay is that since the game is composed of multiple small plots you can have any range of them you'd desire. Epic story with BBEG? Sure. Small time story of self discovery? Sure. Single dungeon event where you go kill some monster and find some loot? Done. Situation where you play as the hero in one scenario - the villain in another, and a seemingly unrelated third party that turns out to be the real manipulator of it all in yet another scenario that ties the other two together? Yes please.
So bring forth your undeveloped, half assed, "hey wouldn't it be cool to..." ideas and let's see what you got.
I expect Jarlfrank to post at least once in here.
---
Tragic tale of the low level villain.
This scenario can be modified to fit whatever flavor you want - maybe you're a group of bugbears, a death knight and some ghasts, or a small tribe of ogres, whatever.
You play as Dargur the Youngblood, so called for the fact that you won your first fight to the death at a very young age, even by Orcish standards. You are the youngest Warchief in history of your relatively short lived and small clan, and today you are undergoing the ceremony of Harsghalum to join the ranks of the ordained leaders of the tribe.
During the festivities of your tribe, a group of mercenaries attack having been payed by a coalition of the local villages to rid the mountainside of your villainous people's raids on the lowlands. The scenario takes place entirely in burning village of Orcs that was your former home, and yes, you are evil.
Rough flowchart of events:
Adventurers attack and with some difficulty break through the defenses and the entire tribe is called into battle - you were currently trying to fornicate with some local orcish wenches in the woods, and so you start caught unaware with your pants down (literally). Small encounter of a minor cohort who you dispatch, take some of his gear and go into town. Current party members are you and your wench.
As you get back into town some fighting ensues, you use your wench as an escape route (getting her killed in the process) and use the distraction to get an advantage over your human enemies. During the fighting you meat up with one of your lieutenants who joins you. In the process of fighting through the village towards the Elders' hut you have the option of taking on additional fights that are very difficult to save other Orcs who will join you - sometimes the Orcs just run away, suck in battle, or end up getting killed anyway and you just ended up wasting time.
As you fight your way to the elders' hut you come across the mercenary leader and his personal vanguard of 4, which make the standard party of Tank, Healer, Mage, Rogue, and extra (probably a Ranger/Archer of some kind).
Fight ensues and if you're good enough you win. If you lose, then the game ends in one of the endings and you get a recap of what happened and the consequences of your choices.
If you win then you save the head Elder orc and have the option of restoring peace to your tribe and trying to rebuild, killing him in his weakened state and taking the title for yourself, or to walk away from the situation and turn into a Drizz't ripoff.
If you do choose to save him, you put aside your weapons to help the Elder up when you are surprised by a scream in some human tongue you can barely make you - you turn around to see the Ranger leaning against a wall, covered in blood, smiling as sparks shoot out of his vest. The explosion kills you and your group unless you found an item of fire resistance (optional sidequest). If you did, then you become the new leader and form a new tribe who will one day exact vengeance on the human lowlands, you also get an eye patch and a lot of cool looking scars. You die at the hands of a group of Paladin who were charged to defend the local towns.
If you choose to kill the elder then you try to make it look like one of the humans did it, and in the process of framing the Mercenary leader you see one of them reaching for a last ditch suicide effort - his attempt to light a fuse is cut short by your swift throwing axe.
If you chose to walk away then the building goes up in flames as you leave the village, and you realize that violence only begets violence, you get an epiphany about life and how fragile and precious it is. Regretting your past ways, you decide to turn a new leaf and take on the world for all its glory and beauty. Your dreams end when you run into the back up group of milita that the villagers formed bumps into you, and executes you in a humane and swift manner. They then bury you and give your corpse more respect than you ever gave anything.
... Kay, your turn.
