The latest Dev Q&A from Gods & Heroes: Rome Rising is all about quests. This time around Senior Content Designer Todd Bailey is on hand to answer questions covering all things questing, from lore to rewards.

For more information read the full Gods & Heroes: Rome Rising questing Q&A after the jump!

Q: What has been the biggest challenge for updating and creating Quests?

A: The biggest challenge was just discovering not only how the tools work, but getting really comfortable with them. There’s a lot of stuff there that didn’t make sense at first glance, but now that I’ve been deeply involved with it for a while has become sort of second nature. In the beginning it was very confusing. It’s kind of like getting a new cell phone. At first you’re like “All the buttons are in the wrong place!” and then after a couple of months you can dial all of your friends numbers without even looking at it.

Q: Will we have specific quests for our chosen Deity?

A: A lot of the deity quests are general quests, not specific to any deity, though the beginning ones in Ostia and Aricia were written specifically for each one. One of the challenges of writing quests is that you don’t want to get too specific because you’re creating content that at most 1 out of 8 people are going to play, so it comes down to a matter of economy. If I spend two days writing this quest is it better if it’s for 1/8th of my audience or is it better if my entire audience can play it? If we had a larger team there would probably be a lot more specific quests, but since we’re so small we kind of have to hit the bigger audience whenever we can.

Q: Do you feel that the quests immerse you into the Lore & Mythology of Ancient Rome?

A: I hope so. I’ve done a lot of things that people may or may not notice with quest ideas, names, the dialog that certain NPCs use that kind of references things that happen in mythology and in the actual history of ancient Rome. The biggest challenge there is writing dialog that doesn’t feel stilted, but still feels like it could be Roman-esque, if you get my meaning.

Q: Are there quests which will reward you with vanity items or pets?

A: Sure. There are actually a couple of quests already that give you some vanity items.

Q: What are your favorite quests to re-work or write?

A: I play through the content and I ask myself, “If I had to play that quest again, would I bother?” Sort of the way I play any MMO. As an altoholic there are quests in MMOs that I’ve done probably 20 times with different race/class combination, and sometimes I get a quest and I go “Ugh, I hate this quest.” And I just drop it. When I find a quest like that I try to rework it as something that I think I could do more than once. Those are my favorite kind, the ones where I feel like I took something that was annoying to me and made it a little more interesting, even if it’s just changing the dialog.