This is where I'll compile my ideas for holiday quest lines. Thoughts and ideas are always welcome so I can flesh out this quest line even more.
Overarching story
In my mind the overarching story line is fairly cliche that some "evil" character is attempting to lower the morale of the lands of Melvor. They are doing this by making sure that holiday events can't occur for one reason or another.
The reason that they are doing this is something that I haven't thought through yet... But a good reason could be that they are a creature that feeds of misery and holiday happiness hurts them in some way.
This story line could then be revealed over the year as event after event the same names keep coming up as the villains in the quests. There could even be this epic redemption arch after the year in which the player finds or builds a way to keep the "Grinch" safe during holidays.
A main goal of this quest line for me is that it has to be playable after the holiday is over. This way the event will provide content after the event and all players will be able to access the content and get their quest count up. This also means that some quests can have a higher skill requirement.
Individual events
I don't have a story written out yet for every event yet, but the ones that I do have some ideas for a listed below. I presume that the first event we'll have is Easter and have written the story line that way. But, a few events could probably be added before Easter if the quest system is added earlier.
0. List of events I want to include
I would like to have one event per month. Below is a list of events. The ones in italics I have written about below.
- Easter (April)
- Mother's Day (May)
- Father's Day (June)
- ??? (July)
- ??? (August)
- ??? (September)
- Halloween (October)
- Thanksgiving (November)
- Christmas (December)
- New Year (January)
- Valentines Day (February)
- St. Patrick's Day? (March)
1. Easter (April)
Easter is a fairly simple event to disturb. In this case the "Easter Bunny"'s usual supplier of chocolate has gone out of business. The player has to supply the chocolate or Easter will be a disaster.
I imagine there being two quests in this event which can both be completed by the player.
The short term solution
The short term solution is that the player has to provide the Easter Bunny with say 10000 chocolate eggs. These are crafted with the cooking skill from cocoa beans and sugar beets. Cocoa beans come from the cocoa tree. Both the tree and sugar beets have to be farmed.
If Easter is the first holiday event that will happen then the update that includes it could also include other confectionery items for the cooking skill.
The long term solution
The long term solution is that the player has to somehow get the chocolate manufacturer back in business. This process would include finding out who the manufacturer was, finding out that a local gang has pressured him into going out of business. The player then has to confront the gang. They have to fight a couple of the gang enforcers and then the gang leader. Once the gang leader has been defeated they "promise" to leave the manufacturer alone.
The gang leader could be a recurring character in other holiday events. He could be one of the main henchmen of the "Grinch."
Next year
I think a good idea for the story line for next year would be the origin of the holiday characters. Where did they come from. How do they get their powers. Why do they do what they do. That kind of thing