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why permadeath?
ASmith84
Member Posts: 979
seriously. why in the world would you want this? pay a 15 dollar monthly fee to have your character removed because you made that mistake of taken on 5 guys at once or whatever. now you have to start all over. why would people like this? we are just playing GAMES after all. common sense should tell you not to die in games but if you want to go ahead its your money.
Comments
- Burying Threads Since 1979 -
lol
Im sure that reply made the OP pick up a dictionary. All hail tunabun!!
Nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and consciencious stupidity.
This is sad... in all of our replies the only person whos given attention to the topic is tunabun... SHAME!!!!!
Anyway permadeath is a new twist on your average in game death. It puts more worth on a character. On your regular mmo you die and spawn again at another place (ussually with the same stats and skill levels) but in permadeath you would think twice before randomly attacking a monster or char, since you wouldnt want to loose your precious char you worked so hard on. It makes the game more interesting for some people you see?
Nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and consciencious stupidity.
Im sure that reply made the OP pick up a dictionary. All hail tunabun!!
I sure hope not. Otherwise I really feel sorry for the state of education. Tunabun wasn't even using a strong vocabulary and instead was using common everyday words.
Currently playing:
LOTRO & WoW (not much WoW though because Mines of Moria rocks!!!!)
Looking Foward too:
Bioware games (Dragon Age & Star Wars The Old Republic)
The primary problem with permedeath are those situations which are totally out of the players control that end up killing them. I've had these situations happen to me many times such as LD, lag spikes, and bugs. There would have to be a way for the system to identify death's legitimately caused by such errors to prevent exploiting.
Additionally, I believe that there has to be incentive to come back and create a new character once your main has died. Perhaps the new character will level at a faster rate till they hit the level of the deceased character. Another method could be that the player can reroll a new character that is 1/2 the level of the deceased, but these two methods are assuming that the game is based on a level system rather then skill. Although it could easily be adapted to such a system.
Those are just my thoughts on permadeath. I'm kind of on the fence whether i like it or not, but the idea of permadeath definitely is interesting.
the main problem with permadeath, no matter how much you want to go around it, is that it encourage players to play the starting content over and over.
You play, you die, you have to start from scratch again and you are back in newbie land.
Now the biggest challenge is having a game where such start content is not boring or repetitive so that people would actually even consider playing a game based on it.
Of course a permadeath game would not be focused on classical linear pve advancing as that would be quite impossibile, but should be focused on something entirely different.
Still, even considering a sandbox game ala UO where there is no focus but on the virtual life around you, it still implies you need to skill up your character all over again and maybe you had enough of making chairs to get carpentry or fight bunnies to rise a combat skill.
In the end, there are two ways to make permadeath feasible. 1 is not having it, 2 has not been found yet, if you do. by all means, post it here.
"If you give a man a fish, you feed him for a day, if you teach him how to fish, you feed him for a lifetime"
The last game I played that had permadeath was Diablo II, but in D2, as long as you knew what you were doing it was a lot harder to die than in any MMO I've played. Players in general were far more powerful, more mobile, and if all else failed you could just pop open a town portal and away you went if things looked bad. You also leveled much faster, and didn't have to grind (other than killing hordes of monsters, which was a blast anyway).
I think it *could* work in an MMO but it'd be tricky and probably be a single server somewhere thrown up just to give it a try. PvP would either be entirely absent or greatly restricted, there should be a window where you're dead but can still be rezzed by another player, maybe 5 minutes or so, and there'd need to be some way of avoiding death if it's imminent, perhaps a spell that ports you back to the nearest town, but makes you sick for a (real life) day, or puts you in limbo for a while, or something. It's not an ability you'd want people to use except as a last resort.
Common sense should tell you that people have different ways to entertain themselves.
I play in a perma-death guild in DDO and I have a lot of fun. I think perma-death is fun, because it is a true test of a persons skill in the game. A newb to the game won't get far without dying, but each time he re-rolls he makes it farther than the last time. Eventually, the idea is that you learn how to fight each encounter and eventually beat all the content without dying once. It is more realistic in a way to have only a few people that are really powerful in the world. If you play with perma-death rules, you know that the person who is a higher level than you is actually worthy of that rank. People in DDO who play by perma-death rules only play with their guild who also plays by perma-death rules. This ensures that you are grouped with people who take every encounter seriously as if it is a life or death situation, because it is. People who put themselves in this situation play to their upmost ability. People who play to their upmost ability usually play smarter and make far fewer mistakes than someone who knows that they can just /release and meet back at their bindstone. I've never played with a perma-death person who required you to be awesome in the game either. Most perma-death players play with a perma-death ruleset to enhance their gaming experience, not to exclude a type of player. That's what your typical raid guild does, not a perma-death player.
MMORPG's w/ Max level characters: DAoC, SWG, & WoW
Currently Playing: WAR
Preferred Playstyle: Roleplay/adventurous, in a sandbox game.
I wouldn't mind if at character creation it could be turned on or off. But if it was turned on my permadeath character should be 10 times more powerful than someone who has permadeath turned off. I'm tired goodnight.
In America I have bad teeth. If I lived in England my teeth would be perfect.
And that's precisely why we won't see a pay-to-play MMO with permadeath. Could you imagine the CS nightmare a system like that would cause? It would be ridiculous. People already petition and whine about much smaller issues. Their character permanently dying due to a lag spike, bug, LD, or even a server crash? It would be total chaos. No way, no how, does any pay-to-play developer want to deal with that.
Of course, this doesn't stop anyone from making a free-to-play MMO with permadeath. I just don't see people willingly paying a monthly fee for a game like that.
I know we are talking MMOs here but people do pay for MUDs that have permadeath. Dragons Realms as one example.
I don't think permadeath can really work in a MMO at the moment like it does in a MUD. You just get so many more details and just depth in a MUD that you don't get in a MMO at the moment.
Although some of you enjoy the idea of a permadeath, a lot of it has to do with how much time the majority of people have to play the game itself. Many people have jobs, girlfriends whatever it might be and with the work they put in when they can, the last thing they want to see if their character dissapear. If I had 24 hours a day to play I probably wouldn't care if there was a permadeath but for those still without carpel tunnel syndrome or a shaking addiction to sit at the computer for 20 hours at a time, thank god we have "respawns"
There is an independent MMO in production that someone linked to long enough ago for me to have forgotten the name. Anyway, if your character dies you return as their offspring, naturally inheriting some of their skills.
@Daemon. Although time is a factor I think it has more to do with how a player approaches a game than how much time they have to play. Not all of us are interested in reaching max level asap or reaching max level at all come to that.
I fail to see how it would be so hard to implement perma death in a MMO. I'm currently working on one currently. (which could end up as vaporware but it's beside the point) So here's the 2 way we're going to implement this:
First: There will be "zones" with perma death. The loot or special trainers (for new abilities) you can get there is better then your average respawn zone. The players can sell that loot since it's not bind on pick up, and they can even sell their knowledge. (Or share it if that's what they want) This way, it gives you an incentive to play there and doesn't force you to go. You can always get the money to buy the stuff from player in those zones by other means if you never want to expose yourself to it. (Most people will have a main character, and try those crazy zones with an ALT)
Second: You create a "class" that is perma death. The perks comes with it, but not necessarily in the form of "i one shot kill everyone" type of thing. Of course, you have greater survival abilities.
I believe a game with full perma death would never work from a business perspective. But if you give the choice to your player base, you'll be surprised over time, to see a lot of players who wants to try something different to give it a shot. There is no greater reward then a "do or die" situation. The thrill of this feeling might eventually grow into our player base, which will in turn make perma death a more mainstream play style then what is currently offered on the market.
What deserves to be done, deserves to be "well" done...
How about a better death system? If permadeth means wiping you of all your xp because your connection failed or an emergency came up and you had to afk, then I am strongly against it as a standard in an MMO. However, I would like to see different penalties for different types of death. While solo grinding I would expect to see a low death penalty, while endgame boss raiding; a very high death penalty, in the form of xp and gold loss. This would help ensure that your raid means business and that people in your group do their homework. I would also like to see a sort of pvp death penalty also as it would help weed out the less skillful and the leechers.
I'd appreciate it if you would speak only for yourself. I am a 30ish parent, have a busy life, and I still would prefer a perma-death system. Most of your old RPG's had a perma-death system. Granted, you could just load up your last save point, but that's besides the point. I don't really see a solution for perma-death in current MMO's, but that doesn't stop anyone from adopting their own perma-death rules and applying them to their non-perma-death games. Again, that is what my guild does in DDO. We all play under a strict perma-death ruleset. Our goal is to bring the experience in-game closer to PnP type games.
MMORPG's w/ Max level characters: DAoC, SWG, & WoW
Currently Playing: WAR
Preferred Playstyle: Roleplay/adventurous, in a sandbox game.
It's not that it would be all that hard to implement. It's that most developers for pay-to-play games really, really want to avoid dealing with irate customers as much as they possibly can.
If a server crashes for any length of time, it's not uncommon to see threads on that game's boards demanding that the devs compensate players with free playtime because they couldn't play. People will complain about losing items, or experience, or money due to things like lag, or bugs. Those threads would pale in comparison to people permanently dying due to something beyond their control, like a bug or a crash. And that's something that no developer wants to bother with.
It's hard enough dealing with irate players over lesser issues, but permanent death due to a crash, or a bug? Most devs would rather shove bamboo under their fingernails while listening to both High School Musical soundtracks on an endless loop than go through that kind of hassle, especially if they're charging people a monthly fee to play. It's just not worth it.
Permadeath *can* be done on an optional basis, as another poster in this thread does in his guild's DDO rules. They've willingly chosen permadeath rules for themselves in order to more closely mirror PnP gaming. That's cool, and it's really about as close as any of the current MMO's will ever get to permadeath, simply because it's the players deciding their own rules for themselves, and guiding their characters in that fashion. It takes the burden off the devs and puts it on the players instead.
You're right. It wouldn't. It would be a customer service nightmare.
As long as MMO's cost millions to develop and maintain, I really don't see permadeath becoming a very mainstream idea. If you're a dev in a situation where that kind of cash is flying around, and you need to recoup your costs in order for your game to survive, no way will you introduce something guaranteed to piss off your playerbase should anything go wrong with your servers or with your code.
That said, nothing stops indie developers, and free-to-play games from offering permadeath rules for their players, whether it's confined to a particular zone or class, or if it's across the board. But the chances of it ever becoming a widespread or mainstream practice in MMO's is unlikely.
I still play diablo2 now, just because of the permadeath aspect. Without that edge, the game is boring for me. That is my opinion. I am not alone in that opinion.
Permadeath doesnt have to mean 1 death and your character is gone. A popular MUD that I wrote in the early 90s gave players a 'fate point' every few levels, which would allow the character to 'survive' a death.
These can be used to overcome the inherent issues with permadeath on an internet-based game (lag, discons).
The MMORPG Trials of Ascension (RIP) was going to implement something along these lines (rather than a one strike and you're out rule).
What I dont understand is why some of the people who dont want a permadeath game begrudge the rest of us for wanting one MMORPG that would implement this and give us back the thrill that we seek.
You said it yourself. We are playing games after all. It doesn't matter, if you loose your character. It just a game. And permadeath makes games harder in the way that you have to think twice before doing anything.
If you don't like permadeath, don't use it and don't complain about.
I hate it when people complain about stuff (like monthly fees). It's just better when those whiners aren't there to play with you.
Think about PvP in Diablo 2 on hardcore server. I could never do that myself though
I think you need to be a little masochist to like a game with perma-death. I think most peoples, including me play a game to have fun, not to get pissed off. What fun is there in having to start over after hours and hours just because you made a mistake ? Hell i hate loosing my time, a game that makes me start over because i made a mistake would never see my business.
The risk of real PvP is permadeath. Anthing less is just a "carebear" take on player vs player combat.
Too many games don't have any penalty for dying, and I don't see the point in just making the player I just killed to be able to dust himself off and go on about his business.