Fun is Where You Make It

By Shayalyn

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“Whee! That was fun. Let's do it again!”

That's what I remember saying after completing the Stormcleave instance in Dungeons & Dragons Online for the first time, and my teammates heartily agreed--it had been an interesting zone with a fun quest, and was worth doing over. I've also never grown weary of Sorrowdusk Isle. (I tend to like zones that involve wide open, outdoor spaces.)

“Whee! Let's do that again!”

I said it sarcastically after struggling through a quest that started in House Phiarlan, the name of which I've blocked out because it was just that traumatic. I should've known that a quest issued by a hobgoblin could only end in tears. Aha! Tear of Dhakaan--that was the name.

Listing the best and worst instances or zones in any game is a difficult task. For one, it's subjective--one person's fun challenge is another person's nightmare of death and despair. (Okay, so I'm playing it up a bit...but that Tear of Dhakaan quest resulted in enough exp debt for me and my group that the thought still makes me shiver.) Instead of giving you a list of my own favorites and not-so-favorites, I've decided to offer up my thoughts on what makes an instance fun...or not-so-fun.

The Challenge Factor

Fun and challenge are difficult to balance. If an instance offers up a quest that's causes a group of average gamers (and by “average” I mean not too casual, and not too hardcore, but somewhere in between) to struggle and curse and die repeatedly, then the challenge factor is too high and most players simply aren't going to enjoy themselves. On the other hand, if a quest is so simple that running through it seems trivial, then the challenge factor is too low. If, however, the quest poses enough danger to make it fun, but not so much as to make it seem impossible or frustrating, then it's going to rank high on most people's lists.

Risk vs. Reward

I don't know about you, but I'm more apt to want to risk my character's neck (and that little line indicating debt on my exp bar) if the rewards of a quest merit the danger. This was one of the factors that ruined Tears of Dhakaan for me. In my run through it (I've never attempted it again), not a single one of us received an item worth bragging about, or even worth keeping. Our group wiped several times, and in the end we had nothing to show for having completed the quest. It was a lengthy exercise in frustration, but had the reward been significant, it might have (almost) been worth the struggle. Players are willing to risk more when they know that their reward is going to be something of value to their character, whether it's a significant amount of experience, or the phat loot most of us crave, or (under the best of circumstances) both.

Repeat Offenders

There are certain instances DDO players who've been around for any length of time will never want to enter again. Waterworks is one such quest--everyone does it, and for every character they have. You can't progress beyond the harbor without completing Waterworks, and so it's not high on anyone's list of fun things to do. After the first few trips through, it amounts to little more than drudgery.

Admittedly, my two favorite quests, Stormcleave and Sorrowdusk, leave some people cold. Many have done them often enough that they're weary of the same old same. We're driven to repeat quests that offer good rewards (in terms of loot or experience), but when the repetition becomes just another form of grinding, entering the instance becomes a chore. Although Turbine has wisely limited the amount of experience a player can grind from a quest (quests cease to give rewards after they've been repeated often enough), most quests, if not all of them, become tedious long before they cease to give experience.

Designed for Fun

A well-designed and unique instance can make up for a lot of other flaws. While the loot may leave something to be desired, or the experience may be better on other quests, if the quest itself offers something that goes beyond the same old dungeons with the same old monsters, the fun factor increases. This is why extremely difficult quests gain high marks with some--by their design they pose a challenge that other quests don't offer. One could argue that a room full of rapidly respawning hobgoblins in Tear of Dhakaan, plus a waterfall leap that tests one's jump skill (not to mention real-world manual dexterity), makes the quest both different from others...and significantly more intriguing. Can intrigue equal fun? Absolutely! (It just wasn't fun for me. But I digress.)

Another subset of the design aspect is story. While I'll admit to a certain degree of impatience when it comes to gaming (I enjoy myself most when I'm out with my group slaughtering monsters, not reading some NPCs lengthy explanation of why I should undertake his quest), I'm still a sucker for a good story. Occasionally, the story behind a quest will captivate me. Even the dreaded Waterworks manages to have a good storyline for those willing to take the time, at least once, to fully explore it. I'm of a mind that DDO really isn't the ideal game for those who like to rush through quests, because repeating them can become so mind-numbing. But if you take time to explore and enjoy the story, they can be truly fun. I've had some good times with the folks I occasionally get together to RP with, because we take our time to enjoy both the story the game has to offer, as well as one another's company. Speaking of company...

The Company You Keep

Entering an instance with a good party can certainly make it fun, and entering an instance with a fun party can make it memorable. My best times in DDO have been spent in the company of some of my guildmates, all of whom seem to have great senses of humor. Even the worst of quests can end up being enjoyable overall when you spend the time in the company of people who have the dual gifts of humor and sarcasm. There's also something to be said for marching through a dungeon with a group of solid gamers who know their stuff (the same people, in my experience). When a group knows how to play the game, and knows how to have fun together, there's nothing stopping them from having a great time.

When I asked Darkgolem (one of our staff writers) for his take on the fun instances in DDO, he mentioned to me that there were several he had a love/hate relationship with. This seems to be the way things go in Stormreach. It's true that every dungeon has its good points and its bad. Some have a high fun factor but lousy experience or loot. Others have great loot and experience, but are done to death and have become repetitious. For some, the group you're with can mean the difference between a fun experience and a lame (or even painful) one.

In the end, perhaps there's no such thing as the perfect dungeon; it's all a matter of what you make of it.  

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