Two scenarios. Pick one.

[Deleted]

A.) You arrive in a small village in a MMO and John is standing there with an ! on his head. When talking to him he sends you to Mary, who sends you to the soldier who sends you to talk to the trader, who offers you some coin for 10 pelts from the wolves in the area.
You perform this task and after killing 15 wolves you have the 10 pelts. In the end you get 10 silver coins and 150XP total. Well done.

B.) You arrive in a small village in a MMO. There are NPCs working and walking and talking as you would expect. One of them is a vendor and he has a list of items for sale for 10 x (wolf pelts, spider venom, bear testicles, orc foreskins, wild boar trotters, vulture feathers, kobold candles, demon blood or wild dog teeth). You decide to go out in the wild to see what you are in the mood for killing and collect enough items to buy a piece of gear from the vendor.
You get 10 x of item X and trade it with the vendor for an item you like. In the end you collected about 10 silver from mob drops and got 150 XP for the kills.

Which of these 2 scenarios would you rather perform in a MMO?

[Val the Moofia Boss]

Scenario B is far more immersive, because in real life people don't say, "Go out and go hunt down 10 wolves and I will give you 10 silver", but rather "If you have time, you could bring me wolf pelts and I will pay a silver apiece for them." Also, scenario B is optional, rather than a forced quest to level up.

[Fencers]

B, I think it is a much more organic approach.

[Dezerte]

B, it feels more involving (setting your own goals & figuring out the necessary steps needed to reach that goal). It's also far less immersion breaking, and gets away from the whole "You are special" (despite everyone else is doing the same thing).

[Wilian]

Neither really, my dream MMO will have far more sophisticated solution.

[Neganova]

I like how you just slipped in orc foreskins, all quiet like, hoping it'd get lost amongst everything else. Thought we wouldn't notice, eh!?

[Gritches]

Option B. Getting 10 pelts from 15 wolves would piss me off. Option B also feels a little more believable. Are wolf pelts the only thing worth money, and only in a quantity of exactly 10, and only to that particular trader? Option B doesn't do all the thinking for you but on the same coin allows that virtual world to make more sense.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

Option B. Getting 10 pelts from 15 wolves would piss me off. Option B also feels a little more believable. Are wolf pelts the only thing worth money, and only in a quantity of exactly 10, and only to that particular trader? Option B doesn't do all the thinking for you but on the same coin allows that virtual world to make more sense.

Yeah, you have a point, the OP's point is that B is more believable, and, like everyone else said; more involving of choice.

[Itisamuh]

I prefer to have direction and story in my questing, so even though B might be more realistic and fluid, I find A more engaging because it gives a background for why I did what I did, rather than just shopping for gear.

[Deleted]

Scenario B is far more immersive, because in real life people don't say, "Go out and go hunt down 10 wolves and I will give you 10 silver", but rather "If you have time, you could bring me wolf pelts and I will pay a silver apiece for them." Also, scenario B is optional, rather than a forced quest to level up.

Actually they do. Most work is contract-based, not just random people going up to shops and sweeping the floors and asking for payment afterwards.

I prefer A, tbh. Preferably blended in with a general story-line. Most work happens as a quest in WoW does, the "extra loot" in life is not the main way to gain capital nor even "experience".

[Eace]

These two scenarios are basically the same. In both of them you talk to people, and then go kill a few monsters for some drops. The only difference is in the presentation. Sure, B has the illusion of immersion.

[Erolian]

B. Also the illusion of immersion? lol

[zealo]

Option A) in a themepark MMO, option B) in a sandbox one.

[Saxtorph]

A.) You arrive in a small village in a MMO and John is standing there with an ! on his head. When talking to him he sends you to Mary, who sends you to the soldier who sends you to talk to the trader, who offers you some coin for 10 pelts from the wolves in the area.
You perform this task and after killing 15 wolves you have the 10 pelts. In the end you get 10 silver coins and 150XP total. Well done.

B.) You arrive in a small village in a MMO. There are NPCs working and walking and talking as you would expect. One of them is a vendor and he has a list of items for sale for 10 x (wolf pelts, spider venom, bear testicles, orc foreskins, wild boar trotters, vulture feathers, kobold candles, demon blood or wild dog teeth). You decide to go go to the edge of town to see which creatures are closest and collect enough items to buy a piece of gear from the vendor.
You get 10 x of item X and trade it with the vendor for an item you like. In the end you collected about 10 silver from mob drops and got 150 XP for the kills.

Which of these 2 scenarios would you rather perform in a MMO?

Fixed that for ya. Because we all know that the typical MMO player is most interested in doing the least possible to get through these things called "quests."

[shokter]

B because bear testicles.

[chazus]

Really the difference is "Kill 10 of X" or "Kill 10 of any X Y Z"

B is actually worse, largely because you end up using 2-5 bag slots instead of 1.

The 'people wandering around doing stuff' is just a matter of if the designer wants that or not.

[slime]

B because starts with B.

[MrKnubbles]

B sounds cool at first but I would hate every quest to be like that. I think B would be nice on occasion.

[zealo]

B sounds cool at first but I would hate every quest to be like that. I think B would be nice on occasion.

B is not really all that much of a quest, its just a vendor using other items in the game as a currency which is then left up to the player to figure out how to obtain.

[Hottage]

I prefer a mix of both.

Jumping into a fantasy environment with no obvious goal can be bewildering and leave you lost, but too much quest-based approach can lead to corridor-syndrome.