Guide NPC

[Hypotemabus]

Had another thought!

The abundance and variety of amazing custom features on Loka creates a very professionally put together experience. Although amazing new players can find getting to grasp with custom commands, how territories work and the rest rather daunting. When I first joined it did take me a while to find my feet. I love what has been done with the NPC's at spawn, quests and dialogue. CaveatCat recently tried to make me play Terraria, the complexity of which merits the existence of a guide NPC. My proposition is each town gets a Guide NPC to explain generator commands. Or another thought may be that the NPC's who already exist in industry buildings could point the way with advice perhaps. The prompts in chat are good but this interface may allow for players to actively seek out specific things which are confusing them in a way which is quite immersive. The NPC's could also point them in the direction of tutorial videos explaining the specific thing a player may have questions about.

 

[Hypotemabus]

It would also be sweet to be able to set and place NPC's in town somehow. I find the thought of a door man NPC who greats players coming out of the town portal rather sweet :')

 

[MasterAegon]

We actually discussed this and there were a few options in the air. Given just how much material it would be an NPC could only be useful to, as you said, point people in the direction of a comprehensive help tool.

One thought was to use the wiki to have a constantly updated help section to teach newer players how so many things work. An NPC would be present to give a little in-game flavor and direct them to the page.

Another suggestion was books or other interface in-game with a GUI to navigate through what they're looking for. This one is nice but it's questionable since we have a potentially massive amount of information to provide.

As for NPCs to place for a little flavor, I like that idea. Crypt will have to weigh in on whether or not that would be possible and if he'd want to add it as a feature. I could probably see some people wanting some other NPCs, though I don't know how custom their dialogue would be.

 

[Cryptite]

I personally think YouTube videos and GIFs are the best way to educate about a lot of these commands. It's just too hard to describe cuboid regions without some sort of visual indicator. Same with zones, etc.

We just need to start doing little 30-second vignettes about simple features of Loka and then have links to them from within /g help. Of course these can get a little outdated, but a lot of things aren't going to change and these will solve most of the problems in the least amount of time.

My 2c anyway.

First one up will be Conquest and what it is and how it works (broad-spectrum, not quite as specific as Master's tuts were)

 

[Ajaxan]

Whenever I've found a video or GIF explaining something on the server that I didn't already understand I did find it very useful and more videos will definitely be a good idea. The biggest thing though is making sure players can find their way to those videos and such. Which is why I like the guide NPC idea. Imagine an NPC that spawns near your generator and wanders around a bit. You can talk to him to ask for help understanding stuff and he'll link you to a video. You could also ask him for a task and he'd say something like "Go gather 2 stacks of logs" and after doing so you'd get a small boost in woodcutting XP for your town.

Obviously this would take some time to make but it combats the problem dark mentioned in tow ways. by providing the info the player needs but also giving them a simple tasks that makes sense in the massive sea of content that loka provides. Many players can have a hard time getting started or need help finding something to do. Now they can get something to do that provides extra benefits to the town.

I'm not necessarily a fan of flavor NPC's though. They'd be great if used properly but I have a feeling someone would quickly find a way to abuse them. If everyone would simplly use them the way you'd expect though, I bet they would be very cool and add a more lively feel to towns.