Fixed Escort Quests: Does not Proceed for Destinations without Assigned Ports

[Jason]

I took the merchant escort to Smugglers' Lair. Ship was attached but the quest did not show up in the quest book. I went to Leviathan Rock on Smuggler' Lair and into the village. The Merchant did not show up either place.

 

[Hylie Pistof]

Perhaps you should have landed at Sunny Haven instead? I am just guessing here as an escort to that place sounds unlikely as there is no dock.

 

[Jason]

I will try that and the port as well. In the past I have always refused this quest.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Do you have a save just prior to accepting the quest? If not, a save with the quest active would do too.

If I recall, a shore on Grenada is the default destination if the game can't find anything else.
Maybe that applies here?

 

[Jason]

I regret to say I don't have a save. I'll try to get it again.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

You can make a save prior to talking to the barman, then reload until you get it.

 

[Jason]

Excellent!

 

[Jason]

Here is a save just before I got the quest.

 

[Jason]

And here is a save just after I got a quest to buccaneers' camp on Hispanola. Same markers as before in that no mention in the quest book, no location noted on the map, but the ship is listed as my companion in the ship menu.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Will check next week.

 

[Jason]

Well, FYI, I took a merchant escort to Grand Turk and every thing was fine. Went into the quest book, ship attached and when the quest completed the merchant met and paid me on the dock on Grand Turk! He even paid me extra because we were attacked in the harbor. So it looks to me like the escort quest is broken to smuggler's lair and buccaneers camp, probably because the precise location doesn't exist as a place to dock a ship, Advice to players, always decline these two escort missions.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

They should work, so if they really don't, I'll do what's needed to fix them.
I seem to remember fixing them before and those quests conclude on a shore somewhere.
But probably those ones could use some more work to ensure they're clear and complete properly.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

I managed to confirm this just now as well for the Smugglers' Lair on Grenada.
Very curious; looks like the required code DOES trigger.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Extract attached to PROGRAM\QUESTS to fix. There was a 'break' statement that used to be in a for-loop, but wasn't anymore.
Therefore the code was aborted too early for any Escort Quests that went to towns without an assigned port (so most pirate/smuggler ones).

This used to be part of the code to correctly identify the destination, but that code didn't even DO anything in its current state in the first place.
So I've removed the line that caused it to break AND corrected it so that you get told exactly what port OR shore to go to.
Which means that if you're sent to the Pirate Fort on Bonaire, it will tell you to meet the captain at the appropriate SHORE location.

The reason why @Jason apparently kept noticing this is also an interesting one:
The game tried to find towns friendly to your SERVED NATION for some reason.
Since he started with Brave Black Flag, served nation was pirate and of course the only towns friendly to the pirates are pirate towns and only two of them have ports (Nevis and Turks).
It makes no sense to have that particular check there in the first place, so I have changed it so that the destinations must be:
- Friendly to the player
and
- Friendly to the nation whose town you're currently in (unless that is pirate)

That makes a lot more sense to me and should hopefully make for a greater variety in destinations too.

Thanks for catching and reporting this one, @Jason! It was very much wrong.
Hopefully this will take care of the original problem AND improve on it in various other related ways.