What's Mine is Yours
We're back on the Rework circuit, apparently. Doric's Quest, which this quest replaced, is one of the oldest quests in Runescape's history; it was the 11th quest ever released, and was released in the 5th-ever content update to Runescape. Doric's Quest predates the Fishing skill, that's how old it is.
The rework is also getting on a bit, coming out in late 2012 (we're approaching its 8th anniversary). But despite that, I'm still really impressed by the graphical update to Doric's hut:
It looks really good for 8-year-old graphics.
Anyway, let's get started. We begin by talking to Doric, a dwarven smith whose business is failing.
I mean, I know that we find out later on that his business actually is being sabotaged, but at this point things don't look suspicious: something like 70% of all businesses fail within ten years, and 100% of businesses (within a rounding error) fail eventually. Maybe this is just the Gielinor free market expressing itself?
No, I guess not. That's me, folks, Xurdtwos the Adventurer: Hero of Commerce. Our plan to save his business: make some weapons so good that his last remaining customer, Sir Amik Varze of the White Knights, will have no choice but to...do...something?
It's never made entirely clear how fulfilling Doric's existing obligations to his customer is going to attract him new customers, but whatever let's not question it. First thing's first, we need ore: enough for two bronze bars, in fact. Selling your new business on bronze equipment seems a bit strange (sorry, Choto), but I'm not the master smith here. I think I've got enough ore in my metal bank...
...of course it's not that easy.
I'm joking, honestly. I like this as a mechanic, because it proceeds to introduce us to the four main mining sites in Asgarnia and Misthalin (aside from the Lumbridge Swamp mines): the two Varrock mines, the Dwarven Mine, and the Rimmington mine. This is good tutorialization, especially for free players, because a lot of early mining can be done at those four places; even more prior to the Mining & Smithing rework.
So I'm on a tour of mining sites. At each one, a Living Rock creature spawns. These might be tough for a brand-new player (except probably not, because they're like level 2, but nevermind), but Twoie is OP as shit, and punches them to death with her bare hands:
Such power. The first three sites are pretty straightforward, I find a strange amulet and a diary revealing that some evil dark wizard is behind these rock monsters, but the fourth one is where it gets interesting: it turns out that some mysterious dwarf (GEE I WONDER WHO IT COULD BE) has hired a dark wizard to infest Doric's mining sites with rock golems. Apparently these are supposed to be tough enough that nobody could face them and live.
...no, you just hired a DARK WIZARD to summon ROCK MONSTERS. Maybe you didn't want anybody to get killed, but surely you could have foreseen the possibility? To the game's credit it actually makes this point, and considering later revelations it actually makes sense: Mysterious Dwarf is angry and lashing out, and not thinking terribly clearly about his plan. This is good foreshadowing, despite how much I'm ragging on it, so gold star.
After getting all the ore, I'm back to Doric. Now, in order to show off the capabilities of Doric's smithy, some random schlubby adventurer is going to craft some bronze weapons for him. This is a Good Idea. I especially love that this quest only requires Level 5 Smithing, so Doric could potentially be entrusting the future of his business to the noobiest of noob smiths. Excellent.
Something I do love about this sequence (and I mean that unironically, for once) is how the Make-X interface is subtly overridden. You're forced to use Doric's anvil, and the Make-X interface pops up with the two High-Quality Bronze items you're able to make. There are two things about this that I like, which the default Make-X interface doesn't do:
- The "Number of Items to Make" bar is set at 1, rather than 2
- The interface initially has the dagger highlighted; after you've made the dagger and re-opened the interface, the sword is highlighted
Both are excellent QOL, and avoid new player frustration, while also tutorializing the Make-X interface. Good job!
With the weapons made, we have to go to the Artisan's Workshop to have them finished (as with the mining sites, good tutorialization), and then take them to Squire Cerlyn in the White Knight's Castle to pass on to Sir Amik. Cerlyn, though, reveals that one of Doric's employees is already speaking to Sir Amik, and we go up to sort everything out:
Yep, couldn't possibly have seen that coming. After setting everything straight, we take Boric back to Doric's house to resolve the clearly pretty deep-seated resentments going on there. What follows is a really, really, really cool puzzle.
As has been established many times before in this series, I'm a sucker for dialogue puzzles. I love this puzzle as an elevation of the concept. In most dialogue puzzles, you're basically trying to hit upon the sequence of options that propels the plot forward; it's actually not that different from the Once Upon a Slime puzzle I railed against in the last two posts, except that (if the puzzle is well-designed, anyway) there's more contextual clues for you to decide what options are good and which are bad. But the defining feature is that, if you fail, you need to restart either at the beginning or an earlier stage of the puzzle. I like it for the way it integrates gameplay and narrative, and how well-designed puzzles reward close attention, but it's not exactly a realistic model of conversation, is it?
Doric's Quest has an interesting twist where your goal is to direct a flowing conversation in positive directions. I didn't explore the system in detail, but from reviewing the transcript on the wiki (which flat out says it's incomplete), there are a stupendous number of potential conversations and outcomes, which seem to be unique or mostly unique, and which you use to make the bar on the top of the screen go green (and avoid it going red). This is really interesting both because it's more reflective of how a real conversation works (though not perfect; you can make the tone fluctuate wildly if you so choose), and because choosing a bad dialogue option doesn't immediately kick you out and force you to start again: you can fix your mistakes.
I really liked it, okay?
Once Doric and Boric have reconciled, they give us the opportunity to join their new joint business as a partner. We don't get our name on the sign, so what do we do?
No, that won't start until you get to Miscellenia. Bit of a ways to go there, Twoie. No, they just want us to do a little more smithing (bars are provided), and mine out an expanded basement forge. That done, we have a quick cutscene of Doric cutting the red ribbon, and quest complete!
I don't really have anything to say that I didn't say before, so I guess wrap it up here. Bottom line: it was a good rework, creative puzzles, slightly odd narrative choices. Still pretty good though, despite that; give it an A.