On In-game Death.

[UnknownSoldier]

I'm sure this is a bit of an iffy subject to talk about, but I feel that the way that OOC death is handled currently in game is a very, very poorly done. That is not to say that I don't think that it has no merit, I just feel like that it could be much better handled.

Currently, the way OOC death is handled is negative because it...

1. Creates the image ICly that death is only a minor bother that is rectified soon after. This is because when someone dies, whether it be through PVP means or by questing out in the world--they will turn up again in either a matter of minutes or matter of hours. Unless the player chooses that each death will be a perma for that character, but who really wants to perma their character while out fighting goblins alone? You and your party valiantly fight your way through the ogre caves, and a powerful blow from the chieftain manages to kill one of your allys. It is not a matter of horror or astonishment, or even worry. It is simply "Find a priest, they will be okay."

2. It does not promote Roleplay and actually fosters grinding. Let's face it, people like to grind because they want more powerful characters. So, say the level 13 dies out in the woods. No one is around to find him, so what does he have to do? Sit around in the fugue and wait. This is time that could have been spent with community members roleplaying, creating a more rich enviroment with everyone else. Now, however, he only sits and waits. Maybe reads a book in real life while he hopes someone finds him and decides to not put him in a sarcophogus where he may never be seen again. As to how it promotes grinding, the fact that death can take away a large portion of your experience--and even levels--makes people want to regain what they loss. They die, so they fight harder and longer to make up for the time that was wasted before the death. That, or they just log off because it is a waste of time. This, again, is all time that could be spent doing roleplaying with the community.

Another side effect is that it makes the level cap system not work how I assume it is intended. I figure the level cap system is made to make sure people roleplay between their grinds. But, if someone dies and their experience is essentially reset, the level cap continues to go up and they don't need to take time out to roleplay.

3. The punishment far outweighs the risk in many places. I can go with a full party to deal with Argyle or the Lizards and not get much out of it besides the possible green item and experience. Argyle crypts especially. Not even the main boss, who can clearly two shot people if he gets lucky (Actually, any named mob can seem to get a lucky shot off and instantly end a groups fun.), drops any noticible loot. It's just a bit upsetting that you fight only for experience in this area, and if you die...There goes your progress for the week.


These are the main problems I have identified, and I know many will choose not to agree with them, but I think that its at least worth discussing.

I do think some changes need to be made in place. Specifically, I think that the current "Death" should be made into a "Seriously Wounded, Unconcious" state. What this would do is immediately eliminate issue number 1, because death would not longer be thrown so forcefully on the table for us to swallow. Death is no longer an average occurance, and instead can remain a serious issue. As well, considering the servers primary purpose is RP, I think there needs to be a certain line drawn between OOC mechanics and IC reasoning. Just because we think of the -10 health as a death, doesn't mean it really needs to be a death.

Going along further with this idea of serious injury, though. The person should be able to recieve assistance from others nearby through use of bandaging or healing. This allows parties to recover faster after lucky shots from bosses. I am not saying this should go without consequence, however. As someone who suffers serious injury is not likely to just "Get up" and shrug it off, there needs to be an effect in place. I think that a randomized punishment ranging from Broken legs to broken arms, or other ailments should be in place that puts a SERIOUS hamper on your OOC killing abilities.

What this does is successfully create a punishment for those that die, and actually encourage new RP. Now you need to face the consequences of your actions and your character must deal with this problem for a certain length of time, be it in game days or real life days. As opposed to waiting in the fugue for someone to res you, you can not get up and out and Roleplay with others, with the added dynamic of knowing your character is injured.

I also feel that in this situation, there should be a heavier punishment against those that are soloing. If you are not helped up by others within a certain length of time, you do wake up...However, you do so with more dire consequences to your body. Perhaps preventing you from even considering the idea of PVE for a few days. Notice though that I did not suggest an EXP loss. I feel that EXP loss in general is a horrible OOC method that does not represent IC correctly. For example, if my character is a level 6 palemaster, he has his Undead Grafted arm in place. He dies, loses the level and the arm's ability, how is this correctly explained? Did it fall off and he forgot all the methods that he learned?

Anyway, this is just my two cents...I would like to spark some discussion about it.

[Saulus]

Well I happen to disagree about the poorly done part, because really what are you comparing it against.

Part of this comes down to loot & encounters which is something we are going to be reviewing internally with the spawn system. As for the death mechanic we already have a fairly clear direction of where we are going, we just aren't ready to announce any changes in that regard yet.

[Doubtful]

Well and good for PvE stuff, but leaves PvP out there as a bit of a strange beast.

After all, if one toon is offing another they're hardly likely to leave the person in a badly wounded state, they're likely to do everything in their power to ensure that the person is very dead.

Personally I'd just love to see more perma in the world. That'd make death seem a bit more threatening. a random lottery 1:100 deaths is utterly permanent, selected at random by a script.

[UnknownSoldier]

I think poorly done was a bad choice of words, my apologies for that. I just feel that, specifically with the RP part, the aspect of death has almost become something laughable. We are all immortal, essentially. Like I said, I just want to spark some discussion.

As for the PVP aspect, that is true. But, is your character leaving another alive any more odd than seeing said character you kill turn up an hour later, kicking back in an Inn and enjoying drinks?

[Doubtful]

Yup.

Sadly, it is that way.

One of the major issues is that we honestly don't have enough people die for good and forever.

Everyone says they want more perming capacity - So long as it isn't them that's at risk.

Unfortunatly, until more toons bite the bullet and shuffle off into the digital afterlife, death will continue to hold no threat what-so-ever and the discussion of 'how many times did X die today?' will be one of those tooth-grating fireside conversations we all know and hate.

[Raksha]

It's my opinion that the -10 health line is a stupid convention that NWN shouldn't have carried over from PnP, because it was pretty dumb there. Past the first few levels, the line between 'injured' and 'dead' is so razor-thin that stabilization and such may as well not exist. This is especially true if monsters continue to wail on the injured parties.

Personally, I think SoZ and 4th edition got it right with the 'minus half is dead' thing. It allows a substantial zone where players can be revived without affecting PvP much or at all.

[ThePaganKing]

I think the unknownsoldier brought up some good points. I agree that "poorly done" was a bad use of wordage, but I do agree with his points.

Maybe we could go back to I think 3.1 rules and before where you lost 1 pt. of constitution everytime you were brought back from the dead. Then, when your constitution went to 1, you permanently died. I also think taking gold and xp could be taken out of the equation with the -1 con and also with something less permanent as unknown soldier indicated that puts you out of the fighting for a specified time.

I think if you solo, you should still be able to crawl out of the situation. I play at times where there are very few people on the server and they are doing their own thing...so are you telling me I should either log or just sit around and gather the 30 ticker and RP with myself? Maybe make it a bit harsher "heal" penalty, because they had to crawl out of the area, making their injuries worse.

I am looking foward to seeing what the DMs have in store for a possible change in the death rules.

[Kaizen]

This issue came up with myself and another DM.

Essentially, with there being (basically, unwritten, unsaid) no perma rule, my Legionnaire (Shepard) doesn't even take people into prison anymore, he just kills whoever he's after, and moves on.

Putting someone in prison has one of three ways of ending: One) The person rots in prison and is essentially perm'd. Two) The person serves his time, pays his fine, and moves on and Three) The prisoner escapes/is broken out.

Now, Issue One has two sides. On one hand, it's not fair for a player to be able to do this to another player, and that only the Legion faction can do it. To make it even, you'd have to give prison cells to every faction. But if you start applying this rule, then everyone needs their own secret fortress or the option of getting vamp'd or sweet basement to Cyb0r in (for you new players, this is the only reason to join the Corps de Grace).

But that just ruins the unique RP that makes each faction special.

On the other hand ... well, the bad guy chose to roll a bad guy and break the law and get himself arrested/sentanced to prison. It's RP, and my toon just so happens to be RP'd as the lawman who does the arresting.

Issue Two: I don't remember the last time someone did something so innocuous as to earn a fine and then be released. Everyone tends to go big or go home on the law breaking side, and none of the 'lesser' charges are ever brought to Shepard's attention.

Issue Three: This makes the Legion look like a fucking joke. Our prison system has like a 96% (i made this up, on the spot, but its pretty damn accurate) escape rate, or something like that.

Just some input into the 'lack of perma' on the server, 'immortal' characters and how it effects the RP.

[Doubtful]

The flipside of perma of course is the angst-fest that it brings down on everyone.

Just thinking back to the knock on effects of the last two perma situations we've had is enough to make my smiting finger twitch.

FWIW: I agree on the jail situation, the choice is between perma-jail and making the Legion look like a bunch of muppets most of the time, and as we're nice people we often side on the Legion=Inept.

Again, I think the solution is more permings, we've been a little soft and a little to nice to people, and we've compromised the setting as a result.

[Kaizen]

Should think of a system where the 'perming' isn't dictated by DMs, only player actions. IE, a life point system.

That way, you can throw favoritism out the window.

This will also encourage players to be 'thoughtful' of their actions, and know that death is a very real part of the game and the safer you play, the longer you live ... but the more risk you take, the bigger the payoff.

I was in a vent conversation the other day, and a very neat system that had been used had been brought up. I don't know much about the system (but what I do know is pretty BA), but if he reads this, maybe he'll throw in his input.

It involved 100 life points or something, with a death taking a few away. The longer you stayed in game though, without adventuring or dying .. you regained those life points back. So a nice ebb and flow, and if you played it too risky then bam, you're dead. Or something, like I said, I dunno the specifics.

Maybe convert that horrid and dreadful and painfully torturous Fatigue System to life points? lol. I think Shepard mined adamantine three months ago and he still has FP.

However, there are some situations that just completely warrant a permadead. IE, your PC commits suicide. Or tries to fight a living incarnation of Bane, etc etc.

FWIW: I agree on the jail situation, the choice is between perma-jail and making the Legion look like a bunch of muppets most of the time, and as we're nice people we often side on the Legion=Inept.

As a Legion player, I'm perfectly fine with the Legion = Inept when it comes to the Jail House issue, as the perma death/ perma prison rule is a little stetchy at this point in time and will just leave a sour taste in everyone's mouth.

[crazyjerren]

I agree that Death is a touchy issue. I like the idea of an 'injury' over a death system. Also the death at -10 HP, I agree, is silly and my as well be 0.

My personal ideas would go for a system that goes to half your negative, or even negative your total hp, and then maybe at each quarter % of your negative there is a more severe injury, where upon the set negative value you are so far gone that only the aid of a cleric - or the power of a raise dead like spell can bring up back while out adventuring. For example, you have 20 hit points and you are brought down to -3, you get a -1 to a random Physical ability score. Your allies are too busy fighting off the enemies and can't heal you. You bleed down to -5 and get another -1 to a random physical ability score. Another at -10, etc until -20 (if you were doing the -THP).

Respawning could be explained as some knight or guard company finding you barely clinging to life, incurring further ability decreases. Each point of ability drain could only go away every 'in-game' 24 hour period where you must make a fort save to remove one point, or a heal check could be used to aid in the recover process, either receiving a +1 on the fort save or maybe used in place of the save entirely. This could also add to the RP of someone healing from their wounds.

Saving actual death for DM events, RP reasoning, and PvP and possibly having an even severe, and possibly permanent, effect.

Just my two-cents, and I trust what you guys have working on behind the scenes will be good regardless of what it is.

[Dirty Goblin]

I'd love to see death taken a bit more seriously

If you want an idea of how rediculously mundane death has become, an extreme example mind you,

Just sit in on a conversation between Aeria and Johanna at the crossroads, and ask about Aeria and Vampires.

You'll pretty much hear how he dies every other day in the same place.

True, Aeria is kind of an uh... Exception >.> To things.

Buuuuut it gives you an idea o fhow casual death is taken sometimes.

But! Some people take it very seriously, I've had some roleplay where I let my party know I would respawn rather than ask them to pay money to rez my ass, and they still drug my "corpse" to the temple, I respawned, and had my char chill in the bad and we all had some roleplay about the "near death" experience. She was never told that she actually died, merely that she fell.

So!

The death thing sort of varies from person to person.

[Starrizer]

Should think of a system where the 'perming' isn't dictated by DMs, only player actions. IE, a life point system.

That way, you can throw favoritism out the window.

This will also encourage players to be 'thoughtful' of their actions, and know that death is a very real part of the game and the safer you play, the longer you live ... but the more risk you take, the bigger the payoff.

I was in a vent conversation the other day, and a very neat system that had been used had been brought up. I don't know much about the system (but what I do know is pretty BA), but if he reads this, maybe he'll throw in his input.

It involved 100 life points or something, with a death taking a few away. The longer you stayed in game though, without adventuring or dying .. you regained those life points back. So a nice ebb and flow, and if you played it too risky then bam, you're dead. Or something, like I said, I dunno the specifics.

Maybe convert that horrid and dreadful and painfully torturous Fatigue System to life points? lol. I think Shepard mined adamantine three months ago and he still has FP.

However, there are some situations that just completely warrant a permadead. IE, your PC commits suicide. Or tries to fight a living incarnation of Bane, etc etc.



As a Legion player, I'm perfectly fine with the Legion = Inept when it comes to the Jail House issue, as the perma death/ perma prison rule is a little stetchy at this point in time and will just leave a sour taste in everyone's mouth.

<I> Agree </i> - If I am reading it correct. Basically you have a 100 point life system. When you die you loose # of points, when it reaches 0 you are permanently dead. However, for every 5 hours you are alive and kicking, you gain back 1 point. It makes perfect sense. I mean hell - here is a good example.

Jeremy - 100 HP.
The next 2 days, he dies evading, from killing mobs, questing, and just being stupid 8 times.
Jeremy now has 20 HP.
Jeremy better stay out of trouble for a while or Jeremy gonna end up biting the bucket.

Jeremy however will be perma-killed if he purposely slits his throat as a legioneer tries to detain him. Because obviously he is just being an ass and exploiting the revive system.

When Jeremy dies, he shouldn't loose Gold or Exp. Jeremy forgot his past few hours of encounter sure, but Jeremy still remembers how to fight and his body only took a nap.

Idea for Death when you die of course:
You loose nothing.
Your body was only napping.
You wait in the fugue, that should stay.
When in the fugue - you must wait to be revived.
If you are NOT REVIVED within 24 hours (1 day), you are allowed to respawn thanks to the shadow.
24 Hours (1 day ) meaninng literally that.. I don't mean Game Play Time.

When Arrested - Their is no excuse for breaking out. Unless a DM organizes a break out, you should not play that character. If you do log on that character to check somthing, and for some reason you are not in jail. You should probly contact a DM if one is on to have you put back in Jail. This should be a rule - Because unjailing yourself isn't suppose to be somthing you just do.

When Killed in PvE: You loose 10 HP.
When Killed in PvP: You loose 20 HP.
(This should help make PvP events be more Diplomatic rather then Smackomatic.)
When a DM says you are Permad: What.. hes the DM.. Bye

No favoritism for anyone, if a DM watches you slit your throat to avoid arrest. He is probly going to Perma you. If you are caught and questioned of being Black Hand, and they decided to execute you, then bye bye.

However - The reasons for Perma-Death should be well looked into. Hopefully no DM would ever allow a arrest and question of being BH just because "I think he is BH, we should interrogate him."

I went a little to much in detail :P but just my 2.. no.. 4 CENT! MWAHAHAHA

[Kajae]

There was a system somewhat like that on the old Necrosis server. Had a seperate resource system called 'vitality' that dropped whenever you died and very slowly regenerated over time. Die too much in too short a timespan and you were automatically perm'd.

[Sypthe]

Should think of a system where the 'perming' isn't dictated by DMs, only player actions. IE, a life point system.

That way, you can throw favoritism out the window.

This will also encourage players to be 'thoughtful' of their actions, and know that death is a very real part of the game and the safer you play, the longer you live ... but the more risk you take, the bigger the payoff.

I was in a vent conversation the other day, and a very neat system that had been used had been brought up. I don't know much about the system (but what I do know is pretty BA), but if he reads this, maybe he'll throw in his input.

It involved 100 life points or something, with a death taking a few away. The longer you stayed in game though, without adventuring or dying .. you regained those life points back. So a nice ebb and flow, and if you played it too risky then bam, you're dead. Or something, like I said, I dunno the specifics.

Maybe convert that horrid and dreadful and painfully torturous Fatigue System to life points? lol. I think Shepard mined adamantine three months ago and he still has FP.

However, there are some situations that just completely warrant a permadead. IE, your PC commits suicide. Or tries to fight a living incarnation of Bane, etc etc.



As a Legion player, I'm perfectly fine with the Legion = Inept when it comes to the Jail House issue, as the perma death/ perma prison rule is a little stetchy at this point in time and will just leave a sour taste in everyone's mouth.

GBX mentioned such a system to me.

It sounds amazing. Count me in for that!