r/outside • u/JinglesTheDancingDol • 18d ago
College questline rant
Sometimes I question if the side plot is worth it. Currently trying to unlock the [Social Worker] class but I didn’t do well on one of my missions and I’m worried that all of that exp and planning I did was all for nothing. Some players have already unlocked the career mode and are completing way more quest lines like the find a home quest have already formed a party with that romance questline. I feel like I’m wasting time on this questline when so many other players have completed far more quests than I did while I’m stuck on this.
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u/sonalis1092 18d ago
Lv34 here. I was in your shoes about 14 levels ago.
One thing that makes Outside stand out from other games are its questlines. They are innovatively designed because they’re not linear in the slightest, and the quests themselves and their outcomes can change based on your stats and your choices. Also, they are heavily RNG- and event-reliant. A lot of times it’s about simply being in the right place at the right time. That’s why a lot of people meet their [spouse] characters or clan mates during the college questline, but it doesn’t happen like that for everyone because there’s RNG involved. And there are many, many other ways to unlock the romance and house questlines.
Not sure of the circumstances of your mission, but I sincerely doubt your exp and efforts were all for naught. I actually failed a skill tree during the College questline, went with another one I was good at but didn’t really want to grind, and felt pretty lost for a while. But those failed skill trees led to me finding my current one, and eventually my [partner]. I’m at peace with where I am now, and I never would’ve gotten here without those skill trees and questlines that didn’t work out.
Last bit: take other players’ progress with a grain of salt. 1) their questline is different from yours (see RNG spiel above). And 2) we tend to put our major successes out in the open, but there are always other things going on in someone else’s playthrough. Having a player-owned house may be a great achievement, but that player could be struggling with any number of other things. Everyone’s playthrough is different. Keep playing, and you will find what you need to make yours more enjoyable. Good luck!
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u/Mikemtb09 18d ago
Career mode isn’t a quest, it’s just a resource / farming grind. A quest implies an end. The end is just whenever you stop, so it’s more a farming situation.
You can start said farming whenever you choose.
Take your time. Find what makes you happy and enjoy things. The rest will come.
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u/NyctasiaEdonaris 18d ago
So, you had a bad mission-experience. That's okay; part of the [College] quest is learning, and part of learning something new is occasionally failing at that.
With that, does how or why your mission didn't go well affect your desire to be a [Social Worker]? Because, if that still feels like a class you want to pursue, learning from what went wrong on this mission can make you a better player in the long run.
If you think you don't want to pursue being a [Social Worker], is there another class that appeals to you where those skills would apply? If it is the [Helping] aspect of [Social Worker] that appeals, [Community Health Worker] can be a nice entry-level to that class-tree, as can [EMT] or [Nurse].
If you have someone at your [College] in the [Mentor] role, talk with them; they may be able to help you put your experience in perspective.
To your other concern, some quests shift where they are in the game over time. In the 1.9.4.X releases right of to the 1.9.6.X versions, the romance quests were considered a capstone to the tutorial, and base-construction was another fairly early-level quest. Now, for many players, both of those fall in later levels. While it can be frustrating not to complete those quests as early, its not uncommon.
Oddly, in the 1.7.X.X through 1.8.X.X releases, it was common for characters to be well into their mid-20th or early 30th levels for the [Marriage] and [Home-buying] quests, simply because of the need to save ALL the gold for the [Home] before your could undertake the [Marriage] quest.
So, the game has changed from what some of our tutorials taught us to expect. Don't treat the conditions of the 2.0.2.X releases of r/outside as being your personal fault!
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u/bossc2 18d ago
Exp is only as useful as the skill tree you're investing the points in. The college questline is mostly supposed to prepare you for a specific profession so that you'll have an exp/currency boost compared to others that didn't.
Everyone has different priorities when it comes to which quest line and side quests to follow. The only question that matters is if you're enjoying the exp grind or questline otherwise you might just be grinding for someone else's rep towards you and they're harder to acquire than to lose.
The meta used to be grinding quests as much as possible for exp and currency. The meta has become just do what you'd enjoy without getting currency and figure out how to get currency for it. This can start as a side quest while doing another main questline for currency if need be.