Aemanyl on 15/9/2018 at 21:24
Greetings, fellow Taffers, and Tafferettes!
In today's post, I would like to elaborate on the topic of difficulty in fan missions. Do you like difficult missions? As far as your opinion is concerned, are there any specific factors that make objectives hard to complete? Which difficulty factors are challenging (in a positive sense) for you, and which are frustrating?
As for myself, I thoroughly enjoy playing difficult fan missions. When I open up DarkLoader (or FM selector for T1) at the end of the day, I do not want to experience mere entertainment and relaxation. I want to constantly improve my playing skills and use my brain to complete challenging objectives.
The following is my personal list of "difficulty factors" that make fan missions either enjoyable or frustrating:
Enjoyable:
- patrol routes hard to avoid,
- scant equipment,
- "do not kill any humans" objective,
- traps,
- undead enemies/monsters,
- most of the puzzles,
- well-lit areas,
- loud surfaces,
- acrobatics (climbing/rope arrows/rooftops etc.)
- forced ghosting.
Frustrating:
- keyhunt,
- well-hidden switches,
- loothunt,
- difficult mathematical or musical puzzles.
It would be cool if you could post your own lists :-). Thank you for reading and have a great day/night.
downwinder on 15/9/2018 at 21:42
i voted :)
fortuni on 15/9/2018 at 22:03
You forgot crate stacking in your poll. I hate crate stacking :mad:
jiansonz on 15/9/2018 at 22:47
I really don't like the 'fail on see' objective!
I suppose it's fine if it makes sense, story-wise, and it's only in a small part of the mission or tied to 1-few people.
Other than what's in the poll, I have problems with:
* switches that open something far away. (this is OK if there are decent enough hints. For example, it's nicely done in the OM Undercover.)
* things that change in the middle of a mission for no logical (for the player) reason.
Things like:
- something that wasn't frobbable before now suddenly is.
- an unfrobbable door is now suddenly open
(again, this is fine if there are good hints, but I suppose good hints would make it logical for the player, which would actually move it out of this category...)
Gloria Creep on 16/9/2018 at 01:08
I have the same opinion as you all.
I love a challenge, but it has do be doable. I love zombies, spiders, skeletons, treebeasts, bugbeasts a.s.o. but what I hate are math riddles and poem riddles. I always need help with those, perhaps also because of the language difference. I'm not good at math either.
I don't like hidden switches that aren't seeable so you just must click on every nook and corner and under desks a.s.o. and I dislike very long readables, but I need to get enough information to know about the plot.
With all these years of playing (and testing) I somehow have earned my skills, but it's very frustrating to come upon a problem jump outside or in a tunnel or something, that almost isn't doable.
If I'm testing a mission which has me stumped I always will tell the author that players will let go of the mission if they have to walk around without clues or have to make impossible jumps or whatever is coming to mind.
Of course that's the sort of thing a tester will have to mention, because the author already knows all ins and outs from building the mission and the gamestory.
Glyphs are awesome, but I had a lot of trouble to call them up in the mission: Finals at the Academy. It's such a great mission. I tested it 29 times and each time about 4,5 hours of playing time. Larry G. was the builder and he surprised all of his testers with a big coffiecup with the text of the mission and the name betatester. I'm so proud to own this cup. I earned it and his mission was awesome. I advise you all to play it again some time.
What I mostly like is the fact that I learn a lot of some history facts playing these games such as Lady Bathory, the Dracula campaign and some more.
I also like the paintings and some author's who put them in a mission, just to show some real art, like Cardia does.
I can go on forever talking about these fanmissions here.
I'm glad that 2 of my grandchildren are already really interested in playing Thief, although they think it's sometimes very creepy. And that all when they have there own modern computergames. I LIKE IT!
They now know why I'm called Gloria Creep on this forum :cool::D:thumb:
And then there's this part of my life where playing and testing missions was a lifesaver to me. Enough said.
So let's continue to make missions, test them and upload them.
Hang in there Taffers!
Creepy greetings from me, Gloria Creep :angel:
Renault on 16/9/2018 at 06:45
Quote Posted by fortuni
You forgot crate stacking in your poll. I hate crate stacking :mad:
Are there that many FMs that require crate stacking? I can't think of any. Doesn't seem common enough to include in a poll.
LostCitizen on 16/9/2018 at 09:14
The current poll results pretty much resemble my opinion. Along that I would add-unclear readables. Sometimes they may point you (non-deliberately) to the wrong direction (procedure).
ZylonBane on 16/9/2018 at 13:09
You forgot "Maze-like level design". Little will make me hate a mission more than when there's no straightforward way to get from point A to point B even after I've unlocked and opened everything in the mission (I'm looking at you, Calendra's Cistern).
R Soul on 16/9/2018 at 13:16
Related to the above is a missing automap.