I graduated from a small private school 22 years ago. We didn't have orienteering back then ( You know you're old when you say "Back Then" ). In any case, math isn't my strong point so a protractor compass would do me no good. I did google orienteering and it's much more complicated than I thought. That would be a little too hard core for me.

I'm fine with "Head North till you find this tree split down the middle and then head North East till you reach the desitination". Those are directions I can follow and so should anyone else.

"Excellent. Now listen closely. Nestled in the mountains to the west lies Fort Sutch. It is the home of the warlord Roderick and his mercenaries." people never leave you without direction

A thing you pull out while in the menu. You actually have to look at the compass and see only North, South, East, and West.

http://www.oblivionmap.net/Cyrodiil.html
Click "Bump".
Does "Mountains to the west" narrow things down much?

No quest markers! Let NPC's give more detailed instructions on where to go.

Since there's no HUD for first person, I'm optimistic the markers may not feature...

yeh it does because we know it is talking about the Colovian Highlands it also gives you a little bit of a description of what it looks like. "Not far from from the ruins of Fort Sutch lie the ruins of a tower. That tower was once part of the Fort Sutch Abbey."

This is exactly what I said on similar topics, but there is one thing. Maybe they could make it possible for you to ask ANY NPC about other NPC's whereabouts (like in Arena/Daggerfall)? Like, the first NPC told me he'd seen x at y. While walking to y, erson b said she hadn't seen anyone like described, but along the way person d said he'd just seen him at e. Hope that didn't get too complex

Okay, let's take a look at Quill-Weave's schedule.

You are a player and you have to speak to Quill-Weave to finish a quest. You look in your journal and it tells you that Quill-Weave can be found inside her house, except for twice a day when she leaves her house. If you do not find her in her house you might look over at The Count's Arms. If you do not find her in The Count's Arms you might find her in Lelles' Quality Merchandise. If you do not find her in Lelles' Quality Merchandise you might find her in Anvil Castle. If you not find her in Anvil Castle you might find her in the Imperial City. If you do not find her in the Imperial City you might find her in Chorrol. She'll be following Casta Scribonia around Chorrol while she's there, so look for Casta Scribonia. Some of the places Casta Scribonia might be found are the Mages Guild and the The Oak and Crosier. If you can't locate Quill-Weave in Chorrol with Casta Scribonia she may have returned to Anvil.

It gets worse: some of this behavior is unpredictable. She doesn't always go to the Imperial City. Sometimes she stays in Chorrol for a week, sometimes for a day. Journal directions cannot tell you when she will be traveling or where she will be at the moment you need her.

What happens if, while following Agarmir, something in real life distracts you for a few seconds? When you turn back to the monitor Agarmir is gone. How do you find him now? Your journal won't tell you.

Given the advances in technology, I think we can expect that AI behavior in Skyrim will be even more complex than Quill-Weave's behavior. So no, I don't think a journal entry is going to work in Skyrim.

"Exclusively" hardcoe crowd? Sorry friend, they're not catering us at all anymore. Btw, I happen to agree that quest and NPC markers should be in the game, as an option. If not for more to get the needed help on a quest that was messed up due lack of information. But even when active, I think they need to be rewamped. "Swarley Swazenoskie" showed us the "perfect quest directions" - not all quests are as obvious as this.

Not sure why everything has to be some damned binary all the time - on or off. Show some imagination and come up with good alternatives.

Ok, do you realize how large the Colovian Highlands are? Not the smallest place in the world. And, yeah, you find a tower wandering through the mountains (lol what are the chances?). Where do you go now?
And if you want an example where literally no direction is given here is one:
"I have received my new orders from Lucien Lachance. I must go to Leafrot Cave and kill a Necromancer who has begun the process of transforming himself into a lich. This Necromancer, Celedaen, has not yet completed his metamorphosis but is still incredibly powerful -- possibly too powerful to kill if faced directly. I should search the cave for Celedaen's writings, and try to discover his weakness."

*checks* Daaaaaaamn ! :blink:


... Obviously not. :mellow: Maybe an additional script or whatever telling the NPC to remain in a reasonable radius around the direction given, once a quest is activated ? :hehe: I really don't like the quest compass.

There should be a simple check list at the beginning of the game.
Would you like quest markers? yes/no
Would you like fast travel? yes/no
Would you like a compass? yes/no
Would you like a map? yes/no
the list goes on....

I though people didn't want the quest marker so they could explore on there own?

ok that one you have me it does give no directions, but still a lot of the quests do, and it tells you what cave to go to

and they did say the HUD would be toggle-able, so if you want to go without markers you can

You are clearly not getting it. I do not want to be hand held like a baby to my destination. I do want to have at least a general idea of where I need to go, else I would be asking for absolutely no journal, no compass, and no map...

you dont have to be for the most part people will tell you were to go, although the journal doesn't always have it, and even if there is quest markers in Skyrim you don't have to use them because you can just disable HUD. in the other 2 examples were general directions that you were told to go. Its not like people say that you need to do this, but give you no idea where to go.

I see the news article now,

Boy, 14 saves family lost in wilderness buy building a compass and navigating to town based on knowledge gain in new video game.

Why do you think I have both maps pinned above my computer ? Decoration ? I doubt I'm the only one to do that, too.

The Cyrodiil map is pretty, but so empty and unhelpful. :mellow:

This would be great. I don't see how people could object to a compass if it could be easily disabled. I hope Bethesda does this. Choice is good.

Compass and map both as functional in-world items that you pull out and look at in your hand.

Option to "enter" the map which brings us to a copy of the map that you can mark locations on by hand.

Well... With so many... ...:s... I must say that... the thing that I'm about to say... is actucally this.. thing... that I'm saying... here...

...

I want it to show where I am supposed to go, but only the general direction. Once I'm there, the compass should be highlighted with green so I know I'm in the right area.

Darknified UI for Oblivion gave me the choice of what I wanted shown on my Compass, give players the choice when they create their character and make sure journal entries explain location in detail. I think fast travel should be handled the same way.

The moving quest targets seem to be the biggest problem if they choose to remove the cheezy quest arrows, or make it optional. By having the NPC in question head to a "known" location once the quest is given, that should solve the problem. If they aren't there yet, you just have to wait or go back shortly thereafter to find them. That way, 90% of the quest NPCs will be wandering around "normally" at all times, but ones where you have a mission which features them started will stay put.

I found the mini-map and built-in compass perfectly usable in MW, and the tiny bit of disply real estate it chewed up was well worth it. If you needed to see more, you could call up the menu with the big map; otherwise, it was sufficient. The quest compass in OB felt intrusive, by displaying far more about everything nearby than I wanted to know, and which the character wouldn't know.

Contrary to the one biased opinion expressed earlier here, 99% of the potential buyers don't necessarily want a mandatory quest compass, probably more like 50% or less, but apparently someone wants you to THINK that only 1% would be happy without it. Still, if anywhere remotely near 50% of the players love it and the other 50% hate it, that's a large group disappointed either way.

Exactly!

And I never thought about that. That's very true! This makes me relieved sort of, thanks a lot!

Quest arrows definitely no
Compass? if the map is very accurate and has clear landmarks then i don't need one , if it is generic then i really need to be able to tell where i am ; if you have played Gothic 3 you know that there is no compass and you have to open/close the map and figure out from the "green" area. MW's mini map was nice and very helpful during some trivia quests where i had to find shrines.
I would also like the option to mark location's names in my map , for example when i find a mine go close to it's door and "X mine" name appears i want to have a choice to "write in my map" so when i mouse over the map this place's name appears. Of course having the ability to keep notes on yourself is okay but sooner or later the map will get covered with notes and misspelled locations.

While playing Morrowind I always wrote down where I dropped something (or who I sold it to)... that way I could always get it back...