Bosh on 12/2/2021 at 14:28

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I like many things including:
Having a map - automaps really rock, but any map is appreciated by a directionless person like me!
Listening to the guards chuntering to themselves.
The sounds of bubbling pipes, the wind blowing, creaking wood, cicadas - and so on. Basically, appropriate Thief sounds creating a rich atmosphere.
Garrett quips.
Lost city elements. Burricks and beasts.
An unexpected twist in the plot.
Finding secrets.
A nice intro video setting the scene.
And yes... being rewarded for hauling my arse up somewhere and there is loot, or a note, or something.

fortuni on 12/2/2021 at 15:39

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Interesting that bbb says 'a bit of everything', many a time I have read comments in this forum and elsewhere from people who consider authors who put a bit of everything, ie both Hammerites and Mechanists, as well as Pagans, thieves and every type of Thief beasts, as being unimaginative, cliched, tiresome etc. I kind of don't mind, but it is only the occasional FM that has a bit of everything in it that is good, more often or not I find such missions uninspiring, and usually over long, but as I said some are just great.....looking at you bbb.

Nobody has ever been able to define exactly what makes a mission great, they just have that extra level of magic that comes from attention to detail, tight but not impossible AI paths, well hidden loot without being pixel hunting tedious, superbly written books that are concise and to the point and that don't go on forever etc, but I do have an observation form having trawled through 100's of missions whilst making lootlists and walkthroughs.

Every mission that I think is great, is almost always brilliantly constructed in Dromed, objects and textures are placed absolutely in their correct position, objectives, secrets and everything else that is connected via Questvar links are well thought out, correctly planned and executed. These authors seem to be the ones who do a lot of thinking about what they want to achieve, plan their missions accordingly and are rarely sloppy in their workmanship, and that includes how they approach their work in Dromed as well as the plot and overall look of the mission.

Some authors that come to mind include Christine, only once have we had to make a dml to fix some missing loot in Night Stool, but that was corrected by Christine anyway when she released the Lord Ashton campaign.

Belboz, yes I know he hasn't been around for a long time but I was seriously impressed with his Droming skills, the complexity of some of his objectives even had Unna scratching her head with bewilderment and to this day his missions are still titans in a very over crowded field of spectacularly good FM's.

Zontik. I recently made a walkthough for Patriot and OMG is Zontik a supremely clever man, the complexity of every mission in this campaign is mind boggling, just about every other object in Dromed is linked to something else, causing something else to trigger elsewhere in the mission, something I suggest most authors would advise to be a guaranteed recipe for disaster, but Zontik made a campaign that is seriously clever on every level, he thought about everything on such a deep level, and the result was a staggeringly good campaign, even though it was not to everybody's taste, I'm not surprised it took him 11 years to make Patriot.

So what do I enjoy and prefer in fan missions? Missions that have detailed thought behind them, pinpoint precision planning and execution, missions built by authors with patience, with care and love, and possibly the most important quality in mission building, focus, for without focus missions are often rushed out to release with a 'that will do' mentality and no such mission has ever been called a great mission.

fortuni on 12/2/2021 at 15:55

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Glad you clarified this point about Benny as I was minded to make a comment in the other thread about how tired I get of the drunk Benny, but thought it might be best not to cause another spat in that thread.

Galaer on 12/2/2021 at 16:47

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I like:

1) Lots of platforming.

2) Mean traps. You open door and you get exploded or you open chest and bunch of spiders falls on your head. That's why I love Rebellion of the Builder 1 and I think Patriot is spiritual successor of it. I wish that some day will appear more people liking this gimmick and there will be Troll Contest.

3) Good plot twists and engaging readables. Here I liked main story from Patriot and Death Cold Embrace. For readables - I liked Rose Garden readables and I remember being engaged by reading Tale about Five Tigers in library in Claw of the Tiger.

4) Good map with automap is nice feature.

5) Mansion missions.

6) City missions: flat over vertical. This may surprise you, but my problem with vertical city design is I enter building from one side, choose path and worry about remembering about all passages I skipped. Then I find other exit from building (actually it's different building, because I went through couple of them) and I am confused, because I have no idea where the hell am I. I'm trying to find my position on the map, but it's useless. I hate this feeling. With flat city missions there is no such problem. You just search one house, return to street and go search next building etc. So it makes city exploration easier, less confusing and allows methodical exploration. That's why I like Ultimate Burglary over Rose Garden or Les Paolis.

7) Ambient sound - rain. Especially listening to raindrops in some attic. That's really relaxing and I love that. Good example for that is Patriot Mission 8 or latest contest Turning of the Leaves.

8) Good placement of loot and good amount of it. A lot of FMs creators feels really stingy in that matter. Loot is placed in logical places, but it feels too small, because they left minimal amount of loot available for player. In rare instances authors go step forward and use general rule of placing loot: "one loot piece per room". In some other instances there is opposite situation where one room is flooded with 40-50 loot pieces and that's boring. That's why I like bbb's mission or latest contest Nightwalk. They give around 5-6 loot pieces in rooms for player to gather. Maybe it's less logical, but it's more natural and engaging way of placing loot.

9) Lots of secrets. I prefer finding them by climbing to some less available place rather than finding tiny switch. Also I like when secrets are rewarding. In other words they contain lots of loot or gives access to exclusive bigger areas. Finding secret stash only to find out it contains only one purse is a bit underwhelming.

10) Bots. Unfortunately they are rarely used in FMs. Usually their usage is reduced to watchers.

Lord Taffer on 13/2/2021 at 09:50

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Here's some things that came to mind:

- Flowing gameplay that gives the player multiple ways to proceed in a mission (several passageways).

- A vast landscape view: The Sound of a Burrick in a Room has good vantage points where the player can see how big the city is! Same thing was with Feast of Pilgrims, great view over the city throughout the mission! Also, I have to mention Ascend the Dim Valley which has a different kind of a vantage point (even more vertical) but it's just as grand! Here's just some quite recent example FMs that came to mind and there are many other FMs that has a good landscape.

- I enjoy well placed ambients that strenghten the atmosphere. It's always a pleasure to hear custom ambients in FMs, on top of the great original ones. For example in Builder's Paradise there were those massive horns playing from time to time. For me, that's probably the most memorable moment of hearing custom sounds in FMs!

- I like when the mission seems quite small, but after awhile you discover that it's much bigger than you first thought (good recent examples would be Alcazar and Malazar's Inscrutable Tower). I think often times this "illusion" goes hand in hand with interconnection with lots of buildings/areas.

- I like the raining or snowing in FMs and well considered sky settings that make it kind of a unique experience.