Surgud Island Quest - To Catch a Thief

The first thing I want to say is that I believe most Quests take the form of 'fetch and carry' or 'kill this bad guy' albeit with some nice titles. In Skyrim the first major quest for most of us was to 'Retrieve the Golden Claw' essentially a 'fetch and carry' quest. Now there are little choices other than these two when designing a quest for a game and I have nothing against them other than after running back and forth 10 times for the same thing it can get a bit annoying.

So what is the solution?

I believe that quests should firstly be 'Linear' in nature rather than 'Ping Pong' (from point A to B then back to A again). What I mean by 'Linear' is that a Quest should make you go to new places and people to solve it rather than return you to the original quest giver. In the case of the Golden Claw it would have been more interesting if you hadn't found the claw on 'Arvel the Swift' straight away but instead find a clue of some sort to tell you where he is, then finish the dungeon and proceed to next new place to find Arvel then get info out of him about where the Claw is, maybe he sold it, so off to new place to see new person then retrieve Claw by killing or barter or whatever then return back to Lucan. So in this way you are solving the Quest in a Linear fashion and being forced to explore areas and meet new people which in turn can give other Side Quests. You may say that my 'Linear Quest' idea is a series of 'fetch and carry' rather than one and you are essentially correct but it can be made more interesting by what is added to the chain than a straight A to B to A Quest. The second thing to make Quests more interesting is to have different options to solve it, for example keep the Claw for yourself or return it, you still complete the quest but if you keep the Claw then maybe word can get out that you have it and your reputation goes down or something like that, return it and your reputation goes up. The point is your choice should have consequences in the game.

So with my 'Linear Quest' idea in mind I tried to create something interesting. I am going to walk you through the quest as the player.

The Quest - To catch a Thief

When you arrive on the Island one of the first buildings you come to or see is the Customs House which controls all the goods imported onto the island.

The building on the right in the picture below.

When you enter the building you will come to the main office which contains The Head of Customs (the guy in the fancy blue jacket in the far corner, middle of picture) a Customs Official (Khajiit on the right hand side of picture) and a Clerk (Argonian on the left of picture). The Customs House also contains the main Barracks for the island and so is full of guards some of which are there to watch that stuff does not go missing.

The Khajiit is the one that starts the Quest so talking to the others will only give you normal dialogue options. When you speak to the Khajiit he will ask you if you want to make some money, if you say yes he will offer you the Quest - To Catch a Thief. If you are interested he will direct you to the Head of Customs.

The Head of Customs will tell you that someone is stealing from Customs and he suspects it to be an inside job. Because you are an outsider they can trust you rather than get the guards involved who may be involved themselves. He also tells you that it has to be investigated hush hush because if the ruling house of Surgud Island find out he will be in for the chop. You are further given full access to the Customs House and complete freedom to question anybody employed by the Customs in order to find the Thief but you have to find PROOF to implicate the thief before collecting the reward.

You can ask the Customs Head if he has any suspicions and he will tell you to speak to the Customs Official, the Khajiit, as he knows everything that is going on within the Customs House. Next you can, if you are suspicious of everyone and you should be, ask the Customs Head himself if he is involved in the theft and he will answer no and offer complete access to his house if you want to investigate it for evidence. You have a choice to check it out or not.

Next up the Khajiit, when you ask him if he is the Thief, he will give you the same reply as the Customs Head, no and offer complete access to his house if you want to investigate it for evidence.

You have a choice to check it out or not. If you believe him and then ask about the workers he will give you a list of all of them which you can use to follow up on. If you ask him about his suspicions he will tell you that the Clerk, the Argonian, is a good for nothing layabout and has just suddenly started to wear some expensive clothing which he cant afford on a Clerks wages.

(Notes - I have added some racial tension here Khajiit vs Argonian and if you are attentive you would have noticed that the Head and the Official gave the same reply to your accusation. A clue to be found in that.)

So onto the Argonian Clerk. When you tell him that the Khajiit thinks he is the Thief, he tells you that the Khajiit has it in for him because he is such a good worker (opposite to what the Khajiit said) and that the Khajiit is afraid that he might lose his job if the Argonian's hard work is noticed by the Head of Customs. When you ask him about the expensive clothes he will tell you he has come into an inheritance recently. He also makes the same offer complete access to his house if you want to investigate it for evidence. You have a choice to check it out or not. If you believe him and ask him if he has any suspicions he will tell you that one of the dock workers, a male Redguard, has been hanging around the wrong part of town and has been seen with some shady characters recently.

Now you can choose to question the guards now as you are still in the same building. Here I have given all the guards more or less the same responses which is that they are way too loyal to be involved and you are free to search their private lockers if you wish. they offer no other clues or suspicions. Your only lead is the male Redguard Dock Worker.

Venture outside and  you will encounter the Redguard Dock Worker. When you confront him with the Argonian's suspicion he will tell you that he is innocent and make the same offer, complete access to his house if you want to investigate it for evidence. You have a choice to check it out or not. When you tell him that he has been seen with some unsavoury types he tells you that he is secretly in love with a female Redguard Dock Worker and that he has been following her in order to protect her from these same unsavoury characters that he is accused of been seen with. If you believe him seek out his love interest.

(Notes - I have added in a love interest now and some more racial tension Khajiit vs Argonian vs Redguard and if you are attentive you would have noticed that the Head, the Official, the Clerk, the Guards and now the Dock Worker all gave the same replies to your accusation. A clue to be found in that.) Sorry no pictures of the Redguard Dock Worker.

When you find the Female Redguard Dock Worker and confront her with the allegation that she must be the Thief she will tell you that she is innocent and make you the same offer as the rest have. You are free to check out her house. When you ask her about why she is hanging around with these unsavoury types she will tell you that she is being blackmailed by a Dunmer Dock Worker that is in love with her. (the love triangle) She explains that this Dunmer threatened to kill the first Redguard Dock worker, whom she really loves, if she refused his attentions. That is why she is involved with this bad guy. If you believe her you can move on to the Dunmer, remember you have the complete list of workers and you will notice that the Dunmer is the last one on the list.

You will find the Dunmer in one of the seedier Taverns located in the Dock area. If you confront him and you still have no evidence other than the allegations then he tells you to 'get lost' as you have no proof. (Notes - if you realized that the same responses involved searching houses you could have gone around and broken into all of them, without prosecution if you are caught as you have permission from the Customs Head, until you discovered some of the stolen loot and a note of some interest). If you confront the Dunmer and you have proof then he turns nasty and draws his weapon and attacks you. He also has help from his buddies in the Tavern if they are present so can be a tough challenge. You can also choose to go to the Customs head once you find the stolen loot in the Dunmers House and end the Quest there. If you have to kill him and then go to the Customs Head he tells you you did the right thing and rewards you anyway. There is also a third way of solving the quest and that is if you are in the said seedy Tavern, by chance, and questioning the occupants the Dunmer will act very cagey and tell you to 'stop asking questions and get lost' or he will make you 'go away'. If you persist he attacks you, if you kill him and loot his body you will find his house key, if you go to his house you will find the loot. Job done.

( Notes - on the Dunmers house, if you break in without the key you set off a poison trap which could kill you unless you are resistant or have a potion. The Stolen Loot is inside but you also find a note from the Morag Tong threatening the Dunmer with death if he does not pay off his debt to them. The reason behind the thefts in the first place.)

So in conclusion the elements in the Quest that make it interesting are Racial Tensions (Khajiit blames Argonian who blames Redguard), Office Politics (Khajiit afraid of a co-worker), Love Triangle (male Redguard female Redgaurd and the Dunmer), Blackmail ( Morag Tong) and good old fashioned Financial Problems (Dunmer)! The choices you can make to resolve the Quest are firstly to go through questioning each lead one by one until you get to the Dunmer or secondly to stop and go through the list and investigate each persons house until you find the Loot or thirdly, unbeknown to you, to randomly stumble upon the Dunmer in the Tavern and persistently question him until he becomes hostile and attacks you and you have to kill him.

That is my example of a 'Linear Quest' with a choice of how to fulfil it.


Once again apologies for no pictures of the good stuff.

Let me know what you think with some comments below.