How do you do natural sounding quest text?

[DRD1812]

When it comes to handing out quests, there’s a tightrope that GMs walk between clarity and characterful exposition. The back and forth of letting players know what's expected without sounding like World of Warcraft quest text can be difficult.

“Bring me XYZ and I shall reward you with ## gold” might be easy to write, but it isn’t all that interesting. Therefore, I'm looking for a little perspective from all the GMs out there. What's the best way to deliver "the quest" without sounding forced?

Comic for illustrative purposes.

[Quixote]

I feel like most of the quest tropes in general are pretty tired.

I just tend to avoid "get X, get Y" type adventures at this point, unless I'm leaning really hard into the typical S&S settings (I have a pretty well-established Adventurer's Guild with a wall of jobs, etc). But for the most part, I try telling stories that feel sensible and organic and avoid the whole issue all together.

[Minigiant]

I had a game cancelled because of the pandemic.

In the 5 or 6 sessions that I got to run I lent into the whole quest thing by creating a Skyrim style quest manager.

The quest giver could give the quest in whatever style best fit that NPC, then I as a DM handed them a laminated quest. That they got to put onto their magnetic board under main or side quest.

It helped the newer players visualise what options they had available to them, prioritise what they thought was important, helped me see what they as players wanted it, and helped that out of game DM-Player communication.

It was a promising system

[LunarVale]

I have never done this, nor am I greatly interested in playing in campaigns where this kind of thing is prevalent, but I also don't want to make it sound like I'm implying that it's intrinsically wrong. Different people are looking for different experiences, after all. As a GM, I want to bring the world to life and make the experience as organic and immersive as possible, and I try to seek out the same type of experiences when I'm a player. With that said, I've seen it more than a couple times from the player side.

To answer the actual question posed, though -- I think the best way to deliver "the quest" is...don't. Don't do it. There is no "the quest." Or at least, there doesn't need to be. I'm not saying that there shouldn't be goals in the campaign, whether it's a broad overarching task or simply a set of things the party has set up as their present goals, but there's no need to frame it in a game-like sense. At the end of the day, the players are calling the shots and making the decisions. I am handling everything else.

To frame it another way, if there is any "quest" in a game I am running, then it's one that's been delivered by organic dialogue anyway. Someone has, as a real person with real wants/needs/goals within the setting, either asked, told, or commanded the party to do something. And they can do it, refuse, or inquire further at their own discretion, as well as reap the consequences of those choices, both good and ill.

[Mark Hoover 330]

This may be more directed by the players than the GM. Depending on the group I may not even need to hand out quests or even plot hooks; rare players sit down at the table and begin asking questions to generate their own goals from scratch.

Then there are players on the other extreme who will literally just stand in the town square, having their PC make Endurance checks for hours or days, waiting for some NPC to come up to them with the narrative equivalent of a quest menu on them.

Most folks fall between these 2. To tread that middle ground I've had adventurer's guilds that give out missions and bounties, introduced NPCs to simply lament their woes in earshot of the party, had evil villains coerce the PCs into taking out one of their rivals, and so on.

There is nothing wrong with "quests" in the video game sense of the term, but the unfortunate side effect of running a game built around them is that, in their absence, players can become frustrated. If the first few games involve an NPC running up and saying "good adventurers, if you go and do 'x', 'y' will be your reward!" and then you stop providing those NPCs players can feel directionless and lost in the campaign.

As with all things, moderation and caution.

[SheepishEidolon]

In my current campaign, so far I used "remove the monsters" twice, "find and remove the monsters" once, and "bring me XYZ" once. The latter wasn't "bring me 20 monster ears" though, they had to get some beer from a moody hermit dwarf, competing with two other groups, so it was rather about skill checks and roleplay.

I plan to use "bring me 20 monster ears" or the like some day, but then it will turn completely different from the expected grind. Maybe they will face completely different challenges first, then they will find a twenty-eared mutant. Maybe they will find another bounty hunter willing to sell theirs - for a steep price. Maybe they will find a magic item that creates copies of small things. Maybe they will figure out the quest giver just sent them away on a nonsense quest so he can execute some dark scheme without heroes interfering.

On the other hand, "## gold" can be good enough as a reward. If they are looking forward to buy some fancy item (or maybe an important teleport service), getting closer to the goal by some coins is already exciting.

[Evilserran]

I do a combination of general conversation as appropriate for the npc asking/demanding for aid, and in large towns or cities there is also a task board like in the witcher, that the players and sometimes even nocs take and try to do.

[Bjørn Røyrvik]

LunarVale wrote:

To frame it another way, if there is any "quest" in a game I am running, then it's one that's been delivered by organic dialogue anyway. Someone has, as a real person with real wants/needs/goals within the setting, either asked, told, or commanded the party to do something. And they can do it, refuse, or inquire further at their own discretion, as well as reap the consequences of those choices, both good and ill.

Ditto.

One thing that really helps getting an adventure started is that my players are fine with a bit of railroading. I can, if need be, simply say "You are headed to X to do/get Y for person/reason Z" to get things moving and everyone is cool with that.

[ErichAD]

Near the end of my most recent game, I started keeping a list of ideas that the players had come up with while searching for solutions to various problems. It sort of looked like a video game quest list. I usually present the problem rather than the solution to the problem though, so it wasn't populated by standard quests. Information fetch quests.

That relies on players to be active and attentive though, keeping a list of the quests they generated for themselves helped prevent them from endless mulling, but it wouldn't work for idle players.

[Mark Hoover 330]

Gods I envy you folks. I used to have players that did some of these things, talking around the table and tossing out ideas, setting goals for themselves and going out to achieve those goals.

I miss games where I had one player hear the description of the slums, all the orphans living there, and he made it his mission to build a guildhouse and train these kids in a skill to better the community, or where arcane casters built new magic items or invented new spells. Games where the PCs encountered some orcs outside a tavern in session one and then doggedly pursued the orcs while essentially INVENTING an entire campaign while they wondered out loud why the orcs were there in the first place.

My current games' players are only interested in having the campaign handed to them through rumors, missions and quests. They don't invent anything, create anything, or otherwise develop anything that is specifically theirs. The only thing the players discuss at the table are real world aggravations and rulings/mechanics of PF1. And when they DO get an obvious plot hook, they just work it, start to finish, without deviation.

I'm not saying that it's bad or wrong to play this way; this is how Adventure Paths are structured and I definitely have enjoyed these in the past as a GM and player. Its just that its not the way I WANTED to play my current game.

I'm venting here and in other threads b/c I didn't make this desire any kind of secret to my players. I tell my players in session 0 of my games if this'll be a more linear or sandbox type game, how I'd like it to run and so on. Thing is, I can't MAKE them play the way I want them to.

So for now I just keep making rumor tables, handing out missions from organizations and generally pushing the payers towards the next thing I think they should concern themselves with.

[DRD1812]

Minigiant wrote:

The quest giver could give the quest in whatever style best fit that NPC, then I as a DM handed them a laminated quest. That they got to put onto their magnetic board under main or side quest.

I'd heard about GMs doing quest bulletin boards, but not an ongoing quest trackers like this. My knee-jerk reaction is to turn up my nose and go, "Ugh. Video game tropes! Not on my tabletop!" But really, I bet this would do an amazing job of focusing players and getting everyone to stay on task.

[DungeonmasterCal]

I've used the "Here's my offer of X in exchange for your acquisition of Y", perhaps too many times. Back in the days when we were gaming on a very regular basis and didn't have so many real-world things to take over our time it wasn't always necessary to use this trope as the players were often much more invested in the way we built our settings communally. But even though I still play with most of the folks from that time (the late 1980s to 2000 or so) very few of my players seem to want to spend much time fleshing out our realm together or even spending much time working on their own characters' goals. It's largely boiled down to me (the GM) being the driver in the little clown car who drops off the PCs and they then run amuck for a few hours with varying degrees of successfully achieving the resolution of the adventure.

We've only played four or five times since COVID shut us down for a year. Lots of the restrictions about gathering in groups have been lifted now but because of an extra six months (and counting) tacked onto that year due to personal issues, it's my hope that we'll be able to get things back to something similar to the way we used to do things once we can start playing again. And if "X for Y" is the way I have to structure things to get things going again I'll do it. I just hope I don't have to use it so often anymore.

[Derklord]

Late to the party, but since another thread reminded me of this topic:

I think they're three main aspects to doing natural sounding quest text.

First, and most important, is having natural sounding quests. When a quest makes the players think the GM took it straight from WoW, it doesn't matter how well it's presented, it will feel video-gamey. A GM should ask themyself: What would a 'medival' person hire others to do? Hired freelance work and day labour aren't video game tropes, they're a common thing in real life, even to this day.
Say there's a wolf 'infestation', the village elders looking to hire people to fix that wouldn't say "bring us exactly 10 wolf pelts, and we'll reward you with X gold", they'd more likely say "we'll pay you Y gold for every wolf pelt you bring us". It doesn't work in video games with respawning enemies, because players could either get the XP reward by bringing just one pelt, or they could farm gold or XP with that constantly open quest. But Pathfinder doesn't usually hand out XP or items as quest-reweards, so a GM doesn't need to set a designated number. If the PCs have killed five wolves, and come upon wolf tracks on their way back, they'll almost certainly follow these.

The second part is to make handing out a quest a dialogue rather than a monologue. Don't info dump on the players, only give information to make them interested. If you present the quest via an NPC, do not include turn-by-turn directions or what kind of weapons the bandits are said to have, hand out such information only after the players have shown interest. Most importantly, do not state the reward in full detail right away. Don't say "kill the ogres occupying the nearby cave and we'll reward you with 12gp, 50sp, and Area 52 Defender's Pants 4132 gp and a pair of Boots of Elvenkind", say "kill the orges occupying the nearby cave and you'll be rewarded handsomely". Have the players inquire for the reward, and maybe even haggle - that way you have an interaction between characters instead of a quest board.

Third, always remember that every quest offer, be it in person or as a bulletin in a tavern, is by an NPC who is looking to hire someone, and thus the basic rules of advertising apply: Capture their attention, get them interested, make them desire what you have to offer, and prompt them into action. It's in the NPC's interest to present a quest in a way that the PCs will take it, and as a GM you have the duty to transmit that to the players.
If you have a clergy looking to hire seasoned fighters that can destroy the undead in the nearby graveyard, have them approach the PCs as they are walking through town in their armor and draped in weapons (that way it doesn't feel unrealistic that the NPC approaches the PCs and no one else). Compliments ("I immediately saw that you people are true professionals, and aren't afraid of anything"), presenting the quest as easy/quick money ("I'm certain you folks won't have any trouble"), and shilling the quest ("everyone in the town will be grateful, and <deity x> will watch over you") are all things such a person would do, and thus the GM doing them makes both the NPC and the quest seem natural. You might even adopt some of the techniques home shopping salesmen use ("It's worth more, but I'm desperate, so I'll reward you with this beautiful mithral breastplate if you stop the goblin raids on the road! But know that I'll make this offer to every adventurer who comes along, so you better act quick!").

Challenges and competitions also tend to work well, as not only are most people naturally competitive, it's one of the main draws of Pathfinder (compared to more rule-light systems). If you want spice up a "bring me 10 ratfolk tails" quest, make the PC fight against a high score (which also includes a time component, something often missing from the game).

[Mark Hoover 330]

Here's a question I never know how to answer well: why aren't local NPCs handling the quests?

1. The local NPCs are not powerful enough to deal with the threat: my players then reason out that the locals KNOW the exact level of the threat, they're scared, and if they're in or near a Settlement, that also means the threat must be too much for local spellcasters-in-residence to deal with

2. We're too busy to handle this ourselves: this works about half the time, but the other half it just doesn't make any sense. Like, the powerful high priest is too busy to go and a. hunt down an enemy of their own devout faith, b. save innocent lives, likely those of their own parishioners, and c. further the tenets and will of a deity at the center of their whole life? Plus my players understand the mechanics for PCs of running a business, crafting items and other Downtime activities, so they know how easy it is to put a project on hold or set your business on autopilot for a couple days while you deal with this task

3. We can't afford local talent: for Settlements that have spellcasters-in-residence or feature some kind of military attribute in their statblock, the players usually learn of this detail as they enter the place. So, let's say a farmer wants a bunch of rats cleared out of an old, dilapidated barn on the edge of his property; if he can't afford to hire the local militia or pay the 25 GP for the town witch to cast a Sleep spell on the things and murder them while they slumber, what possible reward could they offer the PCs to make it worthwhile?

I'm sure there's other scenarios I'm forgetting but those are the major questions I usually have to answer before I hand out a quest to the PCs.