Campaign creation Part 1 : Planning ahead and filling out basic details

Components of a campaign

• A campaign is a series of quests which are usually following a common story thread. Some examples of this concept in-game would be the Dragonblight quest series leading to the Wrathgate cutscene in Northrend, or the Suramar "Insurrection" questline introduced in patch 7.1. A player can only have one active campaign at a time.

• A quest has the same definition in Extended as in-game : it consists of tasks given by an NPC or yourself that you have to complete, usually for a reward at the end. A player can have multiple active quests in the same campaign at a time.

• A step is a subdivision of a quest, restricted to a basic task. For a simple kill quest, you could have multiple steps : talk to the quest giver to receive orders, kill the required creatures, return to the quest giver to get your reward... They are functional blocks of the quest which help manage the progress through the quest. A quest can only have a single quest step active at a time.

• An objective is an indication on the side of the screen hinting at what the player is supposed to do and potentially keeping track of his progress through the quest. Objectives are purely visual components, nothing you do with them impacts the actual campaign progression in any way. Having all the objectives completed for the quest won't mark the quest as completed. A quest can have multiple objectives displayed or completed at a time.

Planning the campaign

• Before starting working with Extended, it's usually a good idea to lay down the foundations of your campaign in a structured form, listing what the player should do in each quest so you can cut them down in multiple steps. This might also help you with ideas to pad parts of the quest with details : what if the player tried to talk to the NPC before completing the task, should there be a specific dialogue ?

• For each ending to each of your quest, you will need a final step. Reaching one of these final steps is what marks the associated quest as completed in the quest log. This can also let you set up post-completion dialogues.

• Think of the items/documents/cutscenes needed, and when are they needed. How it looks for example. You can create them now, for this tutorial we'll wait.

Example

In "A Matter of Time", the player will receive a letter asking him to go to Gadgetzan to meet with Auctionmaster Beardo, who sends him to unearth a bronze dragonflight relic. He will have 3 choices : bring the relic to the goblin, the dragons, or try to use the artifact himself.

• Quests - We will make two quests : one started by the letter to go to Gadgetzan and discuss with Beardo, and the second one to get the relic and choose what to do with it.

  • First quest steps - There are 3 steps to the quest : go to Gadgetzan, discuss with Beardo, and the final step (to mark the quest as completed).

  • Second quest steps - There are 5 steps to the quest : go dig the relic, choose what to do with it, and 3 final steps corresponding to the 3 endings (goblin, dragons, and self-use). Having multiple final steps will allow to customize the text shown in the quest log depending on your choice.

• Items - We will make 6 items :

  • The starting letter, which will show a document and start the first quest

  • A shovel, which will play a cutscene about digging the relic if used at the relic spot

  • The Chronosphere relic, which will show the self-use cutscene if you use it.

  • The 3 rewards : A bag of gold if brought to the goblin, a wearable ring if brought to the dragons, and temporal dust if used for yourself.

• Cutscenes - In addition to the cutscenes in the shovel and the Chronosphere, we need 3 additional cutscenes :

  • The cutscene to discuss the task with Beardo in the second step of the first quest

  • Two cutscenes to decide on who to give the Chronosphere to in the second step of the second quest : one for the goblin, one for the dragons.

[TODO : Structured image summarizing what is required where]

Fill out basic details

• Campaign info + custom NPCs

• Quest info + objectives

• Step info