Are quests really different?

[sarasun]

So, a few of my friends bought the game and REALLY enjoyed it at first. They all actually unsubbed WoW and wanted me to try it out.

However, after two weeks, I talked back to them. They were all pretty dissapointed. They said the questing, aside from the class quests, was just dull and didn't bring anything new or innovative. It also did not give them that epic feeling they got in the class quest, it was just...boring.

My question is, is questing, aside from the class quest, really different from what we have seen on WoW? I'm burned out on it right now, but i don't wanna switch on another game that will be the same routine all over again.

[Deleted]

it seems it depends on what class you pick, cause im hearing stories that some class quests are lame, while others are awesome

[unholytestament]

Tattooine was kind of boring, but I liked all the other planets.

[JustintimeSS]

What a surprise...

Another "I heard this one thing sucks/broke/missing", should I play it thread.

If you truly want to know then play the game yourself. The game has quests like any MMO.

No one here will give you the answer you seek. This thread will serve nothing more than yet ANOTHER place for people to bicker and bash/defend swtor.

These threads are nothing more than clever ways to start arguments and I'm at the point where I don't even want to be part of this community anymore because of it.

[Fencers]

My question is, is questing, aside from the class quest, really different from what we have seen on WoW? I'm burned out on it right now, but i don't wanna switch on another game that will be the same routine all over again.

It's a theme park MMO with the structure of Warcraft. The new things SWTOR brought to questing were deeper story integration to killing 10 rats/rancors/goblins.

By in large, theme park, hotkey MMOs are mostly the same in gameplay. If you are sick of that style of MMO-- play another type of game.

[Koalachan]

It also did not give them that epic feeling they got in the class quest, it was just...boring.

Side quests are side quests because they aren't as epic. In any MMO you won't be able to make every quest some ginormous feat, there's gotta be filler; hence the standard go here and click on this, or kill this. Not much story needs to be in these quests, and at the same time, you don't need to do them if you don't want to.

[StationaryHawk]

No, they're not. The quests are as generic as any other MMO, with the exception of typically having much better stories.

I was completely expecting this, though, so maybe that's why it wasn't as much of a disappointment/shocker to me.

[Stevegasm]

Said it before, and I'll say it again. It's an MMO. You kill/collect stuff, turn it in. Must like most MMOs, it's a game based on cooldowns and cast times, though there is no auto-attack timer. The main fun of the game is getting together with groups and conquering difficult content. If you're not into that, you're not into MMORPGs. If you're trying to figure out if you like this game more than WoW, or any other MMOs, you gotta look at the little things that set it apart. For some people (such as myself), it's those little things that make me feel this game is a better fit for me than WoW.

[-aiko-]

If you're looking for innovation I'd try looking elsewhere. SWTOR doesn't reinvent the wheel. What it does instead is try to improve on the formula that we are all familiar with. Each quest is part of an overarching story for your planet. You're meant to care about what is going on around you. Every NPC is voice acted. You're given dialogue choices. At the core you aren't doing anything you haven't done before, but there is supposed to be more meaning behind it. Whether or not you end up caring about what you're doing is entirely up to you.

If you're the kind of person that just doesn't care for story than I can tell you right away that this is probably not for you. Maybe you can wait until a free trial comes out to try it? Or see if your friend lets you play on their account for a while.

[Height]

All I know is that I'm enjoying it. I hit fifty already and I'm still having fun and leveling alts to see different stories and play different class play styles. I've definitely played it enough to make it worth buying. I don't regret getting it at all. I'll likely still be playing it for at least two more months if not more depending on how consistent they are with updates.

[Ogretron]

The regular quests are about the same as anything else out there, but with voice and choices it has more immersion. Heroic quests can be like mini dungeons, really fun to group up and knock those out. It's also nice that I haven't had to stand around to wait for a named NPC to kill because most of the important quest objectives are phased so there is no competition to tag them first.

Questing is a step in the right direction, definitely better than WoW as I very very rarely had to wait around for something. Replay value is also a huge plus.

[DetectiveJohnKimble]

The first couple planets are actually pretty well done in terms of questing, and for the most part quests are decent as you start levelling through the game. In my experience though, the same general structure was used repeatedly and often questing devolved into the standard 'Kill X enemies', and the conversations got tedious because a lot of it just felt like hot air that is better done through just reading text. There are subtitles, though, so the quests still amount to the minimum you see in other MMOs like WoW.

There are some quests that are more RPGish, like a few on Voss, but those are relatively few in number.

[abijax]

Basically what they said is "People don't read books, people watch TV" and changed the way you get quests accordingly. And apparently from the amount of people that are amazed by the story integration looks while they couldn't find it in WoW looks like they were right.

The dialogue choices are most of the time fluff, like 20% of the quests offer you a option to refuse the quest in the dialogue, about 5% or less will change what you do (most of them in the class story though) and the rest just pop an entry in your quest log if you started talking to the npc, regardless of your answers (leading to some pretty dumb situations when you repeat 3 times you don't care about the quest and then you still get it).

The main issue is they didn't have the balls to do a short game so they artificially lengthened it with poor content. I'd rather have a 30-50 hour game with proper content for each class then a 150-200h game where I play 1-2 classes then cba grinding through all the tedious content for tidbits of class quests.

[Deleted]

First time I played wow I played for like 30 mins and never come back. After the 2nd wall of text just to send me kill more troggs I logged out. 2 years after in TBC I logged again and forced leveling just to play at level 70. Worst experience ever I had on an MMO.

In tor I logged, created my IA and bam! Hooked to the story of the class (My own story, with my decisions) and the leveling procces. Im happy because the game is not all end-game with a tedious leveling, is just a game with a amazing leveling process and a lot of end-game (yes, a lot, just need a little tuning). I'm happy because I can raid when I want without feeling like a job, choosing my difficulty and enjoy the game overall, not just 1 level, the level whithout experience bar.

[Nirawen]

If you truly want to know then play the game yourself. The game has quests like any MMO.

Superb advice for someone asking about something that could possibly stop them buying it, /golfclap.

To the OP, while not radically different I found the non-class quests fun enough to never really get bored and never had the immersion breaking feel of repetitiveness that I normally get with other MMO's.

[Larynx]

The difference between WoW and TOR questing is this:

In WoW, quest givers tell you to kill 10 NPCs.
In SWTOR, quest givers give you a reason to kill 10 NPCs.

There's several different types of quests in SWTOR, class quests, quests for the planet's storyline, side quests, and bonus quests.

Class quests provide you a guide from 1-50, and give you an actual personality. You're more than an avatar.
Quests for the planet's storyline provide you a guide through out the planet. These are basically class quests, but for a single planet and not restricted to a certain class.
Side quests are quests that have no chain, and are usually just that random no-name NPC over there telling you to do something.
Bonus quests are picked up either by going into an area (known in-game as area quests), or as optional objectives for quests.

There's also several difficulties. The normal ones. Heroic 2, Heroic 2+, and Heroic 4. (And they are usually not soloable by someone of appropriate level)


Also, I believe there is one quest in WoW that actually allows you to have an effect on the outcome of the quest. In SWTOR, most quests have this.

Now, some bad things about SWTOR questing are this: The questing is not as refined as the Cataclysm questing (some quests are ridiculous with distance, or how many mobs you have to kill to get to the end), and what's actually involved is usually really simple and not as... whacky as WoW. For example, you never get to drive a siege tank roflstomping orcs in SWTOR. Or even use a turret, or something along those lines.

Overall, in my opinion, TOR feels much more RPGish then WoW. It's not as good as an RPG game (for example Deus Ex or even KOTOR), but it's definitely fun for me.

[kynthrus]

new + innovative doesn't make a good game, a good game makes a good game. MMO's are grindy and you won't find much differences in the way quests and missions work, that's just how it is.

[Televators]

There's nothing different about questing in SWTOR. There's nothing really different about anything in SWTOR. That's not a bad thing. It's just the way it is. The cutscenes are cool. I've leveled a Consular to 20 and a Commando to 28 and I'm not tired of the voice acting or cutscenes. Just spam space bar if you don't feel like listening and get right to the choices. SWTOR is a super fun single player game (while leveling) that has optional grouping. I don't know how it is at 50, but finding a group for heroics is tedious and not worth waiting around while leveling. They need to add a heroic queue. Starting over every time someone needs replacing is dumb. The UI is bad, unit frames are awful and it needs a ToT window. Other than that, this game has some real upside and I hope they polish it into something really excellent because I need an alternative to WoW -- which I still play and enjoy, but less lately in favor of SWTOR.

[abijax]

In WoW, quest givers tell you to kill 10 NPCs.
In SWTOR, quest givers give you a reason to kill 10 NPCs.

Do most people really see text as a dirty area on the screen? No wonder RPGs had to prostitute themselves into action games or twilight quality soap operas.

[Larynx]

Do most people really see text as a dirty area on the screen? No wonder RPGs had to prostitute themselves into action games or twilight quality soap operas.

Reading doesn't invoke the same emotional response as actually hearing it.

And most people, including me, stopped reading the three paragraphs of text for every quest after the first few hours. It just gets tedious. I'm going to go make a poll in general on this topic, actually.

Think about it, if you've ever played an RPG, would you rather have it in an almost essay type format with text, or voice acting? And besides, you still CAN read the subtitles and mute the voices if you for some reason hate it, or space through it.