A Few Examples of how Chained Missions could work in Beyond

[Marc_Hicks]

In a separate thread, I suggested how nearly all Missions could spawn multiple potential Follow-on Missions. In this thread, I wanted to put forward a few examples of how that could work.

Take Black Box Salvage. At the moment, the only chain that will trigger is an Assassination Mission. However, this time, when you arrive at the station with the salvage your mission givers say "According to the Black Box Info, the ship's pilot-& their passengers-were taken hostage to a planetary facility. The pirate who attacked their ship is known to operate from <$System Name>, so that would be the best place to look. Please liberate these hostages for us!"

So your commander finds the planetary PoI, & liberate the hostages & return them to the station. This then triggers a new Mission. "Commander, the passengers you helped Liberate were highly important to our future economic interests in <$System Name>. We were hoping you could transport these passengers for us."

Your Commander transports the CEO & her entourage to <$System Name>, then you get another follow-on mission "Commander, the CEO you just transported has learned of some important trade data in <$System Name>, could you get it for us?"

That would then probably mark the end to that series of chains. However, see how-using only the mission types already within the game-the chain mission system could be used to form something much closer to a true "mini-story"? And that is even without any mission wrinkles adding in any additional variation

In another example, again using the Black Box Salvage as a starting point. "According to the Black Box Info, the Pilot who destroyed our ship stole some valuable military plans, we need you to liberate it from <$NPC Name>'s ship"

So you take on the Liberation Mission, & bring back the Military Plans, which triggers a new Follow-on. "Commander, according to these military plans, there is a enemy surface facility located in <$System Name>, we need you to scan it for us!"

You complete that mission, & your mission givers say "Thank you Commander. We have extracted all of the most important Intel from the data you obtained. Would you be able to Courier the info to <$System Name>?"

The mission might well end there, but completion of this mission might lead to another follow-on "Commander, according to this Intel, an enemy General will be in <$System Name> at this particular time, could you please assassinate them for us?"

So, same starting mission......but entirely different narratives coming from them. However, for the second mission chain, imagine if the Liberation Mission had instead led to a Massacre Mission......& from there a mission to transport a passenger vital to the War Effort, who then asks you to go & purchase some weapons & bring them to the station? Again, totally different narrative outcome.

The point is that, if primary missions can have multiple potential chains-& if those chains triggered more frequently-then you can get nearly infinite variety in the missions you do.....even without adding any new mission templates.

Anyone got any other examples of "mini-narratives" that could be created by Chain Missions *if* primary missions could lead to multiple possible chains?

 

[[Diplomacy] Carnegie]

I get where you're coming from, but the problem for me is that the constant changing of mission task would result in a constant changing of ship to one suited to that task. Add to that the fact that I there are mission types that I don't enjoy and the result is (as is currently the case) that I pay no attention to chain missions.

I think, however, that if a source mission had multiple follow-on options then your idea could be made to work (for me).
For example:

A donation mission could lead to the option of a courier, scan or assassination mission, which in turn lead to delivery, return with goods, hostage rescue - there being multiple options at each tier, as we now have for mission rewards. That way there could be a sense of narrative about the chain, without forcing players to do missions they're not interested in/equipped for.

 

[wstephenson]

An important feature of a mini-story is a narrative tying it all together. A series of log entries "You salvaged a black box, that lead to a hostage rescue for Faction XYZ, and finally you transported the hostage back home" would aid the formation of this narrative in the player's mind.

 

[Marc_Hicks]

An important feature of a mini-story is a narrative tying it all together. A series of log entries "You salvaged a black box, that lead to a hostage rescue for Faction XYZ, and finally you transported the hostage back home" would aid the formation of this narrative in the player's mind.

In fairness, the one thing they have definitely gotten right with Follow-on missions is that little bit of text you get after you accept it. If they expanded on that, by offering more detailed text during the mission offer, & by having it for primary missions too, I think it would definitely achieve the goal you're talking about.

That said, the underlying principle of things like follow-on missions & mission wrinkles is *fantastic*......but they really need to "open up the throttle" & really flesh the systems out in a big way. Hopefully the next 2 chapters will give us that!