Very Interesting Article on the Death Penalty in MMORPGs

ChildoftheShadows

Amaranthar said:

ChildoftheShadows said:

Amaranthar said:

ChildoftheShadows said:

Kyleran said:

Now, if you a developer,  how do you create a death penalty which libertarian minded Iselin, (I have a right to my fun, nothing must disturb it) carebear EQ1 players, (give us tough death penalties, err but not really too tough) or sturdier gamers (if it didnt really hurt to obtain it, what is the point) such as I will enjoy?

Just like getting "carebear" PVE players to enjoy and stick around your OWPVP game. You don't. You make a choice to what degree you want in your game and go for it.

Whenever I think of these game design choices I can't help but think of Venn diagrams. You put all the people that like death penalties in one circle and all the people that like games with no death penalties in another circle. You can cater 100% to one or the other or you can slowly try to merge those where you'll get some overlap, but knowing good and well not everyone from either side is going to fit into that overlap.

True. 
But you can slide those circles closer together or farther apart, and that makes some drastic changes to the inclusive number count. 

Yes, but you are still making an active choice to exclude someone from the design which is why I've always stated that games shouldn't be designed to cater to more people and instead be designed around what the developer actually wants to play. You end up with a lot more possible outcomes where more gamers having something they truly enjoy.
Not to mention that when developers create something they like they will typically create a better game, I would assume

Oh boy, do I disagree with that one. 
It's a product, and it's a lot of money, and I think Devs need to look at it in a more professional way. 
There's a lot to look at in the MMORPG market to decide what to make. 

For one thing, in my mind anyways, is the wide open end of customers who are not satisfied. WoW kept only about 30% of their players who tried it. And that was WoW. 

Making another clone is getting riskier every day. 

I think you want to look at it all and figure out, to the best of your ability:
- where there's a market (that's not saturated already)
- what works and what doesn't, but consider it all. 
--- You have class based that gamers seem to really like
--- You have skills based that seem to also be attractive
--- You can draw a conclusion there and mix them

--- You want to avoid the clone syndrome 

--- Things like perma-death, rampant PKing, FtP, etc., are all in negative territory

--- There are many gamers who like PvE
--- There are many gamers who like PvP
--- Draw a conclusion there? Remember to consider that open market thingy.

That's just a little sample. 

WoW is the epitome of trying to cater to as many as possible and that’s why we’ve been stuck with them for the last decade, because others too were trying to reach as many as possible. 

It hasn’t been until recently that niche games have been gaining interest again because the market is so saturated with the same junk. 

Scorchien

Iselin said:

AlBQuirky said:

Iselin said:

AlBQuirky said:

Iselin said:

How can the main hero demigod who's going to save the world die? Film over... roll the credits And what's this resurrection bit all about? Go permadeath or go home... sheesh.

Death penalties in MMOs? They are just contrived punishments to make you fear death because presumably that makes not dying feel like an accomplishment. That's great if you're playing in order to accomplish not dying, I guess. But then you get up, jump through whatever death penalty hoops they've devised and eventually get back to playing where you want to play... some accomplishment that lol.

For the rest of us who play for the journey those penalties are just annoying disruptions to what we enjoy. I'd much rather get the dying bit over with as quickly as possible so I can go back and tackle the thing I was trying to do when I died - which presumably is the thing I enjoy doing in the game - immediately.

I don't need to be punished with obnoxious time sinks. I'm not a masochist. I know I failed and what motivates me is to do it all over again until I don't fail. The quicker I get back to trying to succeed the better.

 

Am I to take it that you don't want a challenge? Something hard?

If dying is "just a terrible time sink", than what makes a game hard for you? Sounds like dying is not one of them.

Then again, one players "punishment" is another "opportunity."

Not trying to say good or bad, just curious how you view "challenging."

No, I definitely want hard and the harder the better. But that's irrelevant to death punishment. I don't mind dying over and over if I'm trying to do something tough. It's the artificial wait imposed by the death penalties between the dying over and over part to the content I enjoy that I have no use for.

Interesting. It seems "fear of Death" is a component here. I get what you're saying, and to a point, I agree.

EQ had me quitting after I just hit level 38, ran through East Commonlands on my way to Freeport for some banking, and died because I beat a "Special Event" (Halloween thingie, I think) but had only a few hit points. As I sat to recover, a level 2 Orc Pawn decided I was easy prey and killed me. I lost my new level and the songs that went with it. I quit and never looked back.

The fear of death can be a boon or bane, depending on the player. Too much fear and they won't "try" anything just to see what happens. Too little and they don't care what happens. Each player has a different "point of no return."

I think the key is what Aeander alluded to: "progression in that game is so fun." If the progression is fun, I don't mind. I'm in no hurry to reach the "end of the game", aka endgame. If the progression is fun, lost time means very little. If progression is a pain the ass, lost time hurts tenfold.

You mentioned in a later post about "always playing my best." How do you do this when a new skill, ability, or spell is learned for the first time? Most games give very little "mechanical info" on these and the learning comes through trial and error. Or at least it used to

I know that a very harsh death penalty could make this learning extremely tedious and may even make players shy about experimenting. EQ's ended up pushing me away, after all.

I guess this came about because you state often how you like challenging gameplay and your comments about death penalties struck me as odd. I guess I see it as if there is zero fear of death and it is "just a bump in the road", how challenging can it be, if a player really cares not one whit about failure?

Again, not any judgement. It just struck me strangely

When I get a new skill or when I'm in a new game I don't yet know how to play well, like everyone else I learn by trying on the rats and grunts and not the orc king That would be foolish. Playing my best also means knowing what I can and can't do at any given point in time. I will push the envelope to find my limits but how often I do that totally depends on my comfort level and my familiarity with the skills and game in general.

I just see no relationship between difficulty of the content I'm playing and "time-outs" after every death. I just want to get back to the difficult content where I died and keep working on overcoming its challenges. A copse run is not the challenging content I want to be doing. You may consider those as other separate challenges and hell, you may even enjoy corpse runs lol... not judging. I don't. I want to get back to my difficult content and spend my game time doing that rather than try to mitigate the death penalty for the next 15 minutes or 2 days.

Adding annoyances does not make it more difficult. Just more annoying.

There are challenging and adventurous opportunities to be missed tho ..

  For ex .. You are hunting a Paragon Lich Lord in UO , in the rapid heated battle you slip up and die ..

 The Lich Lord laughs while you see

  * A Lich Lord rummages thru your corpse and takes a .........*

   Now you must get rezzed ,  you now have 5 minutes  , to decide .. recall to bank and grab a backup gear bag(losing precious time ) , and then (or without the gear saving time race back navigating the dangerous area to get to your corpse and loot the rest , then Hunt down The Lich Lord that looted your corpse before another player finds and kills it ..

   Makes for some breath taking runs and puts a very real danger and excitement in every encounter , something i enjoy a lot and really get bored in other games, As you die and just with no care or caution needed throw yourself at a wall of swords with little concern or any real risk .. Boring imo ..

  And ill add that scenario becomes even more exciting if you are in Fel and there could be a red around at any second

  The Risk is higher in Fel but so are the Rewards ..

Iselin

Scorchien said:

Iselin said:

AlBQuirky said:

Iselin said:

AlBQuirky said:

Iselin said:

How can the main hero demigod who's going to save the world die? Film over... roll the credits And what's this resurrection bit all about? Go permadeath or go home... sheesh.

Death penalties in MMOs? They are just contrived punishments to make you fear death because presumably that makes not dying feel like an accomplishment. That's great if you're playing in order to accomplish not dying, I guess. But then you get up, jump through whatever death penalty hoops they've devised and eventually get back to playing where you want to play... some accomplishment that lol.

For the rest of us who play for the journey those penalties are just annoying disruptions to what we enjoy. I'd much rather get the dying bit over with as quickly as possible so I can go back and tackle the thing I was trying to do when I died - which presumably is the thing I enjoy doing in the game - immediately.

I don't need to be punished with obnoxious time sinks. I'm not a masochist. I know I failed and what motivates me is to do it all over again until I don't fail. The quicker I get back to trying to succeed the better.

 

Am I to take it that you don't want a challenge? Something hard?

If dying is "just a terrible time sink", than what makes a game hard for you? Sounds like dying is not one of them.

Then again, one players "punishment" is another "opportunity."

Not trying to say good or bad, just curious how you view "challenging."

No, I definitely want hard and the harder the better. But that's irrelevant to death punishment. I don't mind dying over and over if I'm trying to do something tough. It's the artificial wait imposed by the death penalties between the dying over and over part to the content I enjoy that I have no use for.

Interesting. It seems "fear of Death" is a component here. I get what you're saying, and to a point, I agree.

EQ had me quitting after I just hit level 38, ran through East Commonlands on my way to Freeport for some banking, and died because I beat a "Special Event" (Halloween thingie, I think) but had only a few hit points. As I sat to recover, a level 2 Orc Pawn decided I was easy prey and killed me. I lost my new level and the songs that went with it. I quit and never looked back.

The fear of death can be a boon or bane, depending on the player. Too much fear and they won't "try" anything just to see what happens. Too little and they don't care what happens. Each player has a different "point of no return."

I think the key is what Aeander alluded to: "progression in that game is so fun." If the progression is fun, I don't mind. I'm in no hurry to reach the "end of the game", aka endgame. If the progression is fun, lost time means very little. If progression is a pain the ass, lost time hurts tenfold.

You mentioned in a later post about "always playing my best." How do you do this when a new skill, ability, or spell is learned for the first time? Most games give very little "mechanical info" on these and the learning comes through trial and error. Or at least it used to

I know that a very harsh death penalty could make this learning extremely tedious and may even make players shy about experimenting. EQ's ended up pushing me away, after all.

I guess this came about because you state often how you like challenging gameplay and your comments about death penalties struck me as odd. I guess I see it as if there is zero fear of death and it is "just a bump in the road", how challenging can it be, if a player really cares not one whit about failure?

Again, not any judgement. It just struck me strangely

When I get a new skill or when I'm in a new game I don't yet know how to play well, like everyone else I learn by trying on the rats and grunts and not the orc king That would be foolish. Playing my best also means knowing what I can and can't do at any given point in time. I will push the envelope to find my limits but how often I do that totally depends on my comfort level and my familiarity with the skills and game in general.

I just see no relationship between difficulty of the content I'm playing and "time-outs" after every death. I just want to get back to the difficult content where I died and keep working on overcoming its challenges. A copse run is not the challenging content I want to be doing. You may consider those as other separate challenges and hell, you may even enjoy corpse runs lol... not judging. I don't. I want to get back to my difficult content and spend my game time doing that rather than try to mitigate the death penalty for the next 15 minutes or 2 days.

Adding annoyances does not make it more difficult. Just more annoying.

There are challenging and adventerous oppurtunities to be missed tho ..

  For ex .. You are hunting a Paragon Lich Lord in UO , in the rapid heated battle you slip up and die ..

 The Lich Lord laughs while you see

  * A Lich Lord rummages thru your corpse and takes a .........*

   Now you must get rezzed ,  you now have 5 minutes to , to decide .. recall to bank and grab a backup gear bag(losing precious time ) , and then (or without the gear saving time race back navigating the dangerous area to get to your corpse and loot the rest , then Hunt down The Lich Lord that looted your corpse before another player finds and kills it ..

   Makes for some breath taking runs and puts a very real danger and excitement in every encounter , something i enjoy a lot and really get bored in other games, As you die and just with no care or caution needed throw yourself at a wall of swords with little concern or any real risk .. Boring imo ..

  And ill add that scenario becomes even more exciting if you are in Fel and there could a red around at any second

I get it. I didn't play UO but I did play AC. You could easily lose stuff there too. But all of you are talking about adding some extra spice that is neither here nor there with respect to the encounter's difficulty. That Lich Lord is still that same Lich Lord with or without all the other things whose possibility of happening give you a thrill. 

I had a friend tell me the other day that he misses weed being illegal because it was a bigger thrill to sneak around and smoke it when it was. I don't miss that at all. The possibility of being arrested and at the very least having your weed taken away never made that better. It was always just about the weed for me

Scorchien

Well not for nothing , but one Lich Lord can be very different encounter than the next Lich Lordjust as one Greater Dragon can be very different than the next GD  etc etc .. and so on is the way of the beast in UO .. Mobs encounter and spawns can be quite surprising ..

   Some mobs can be far nastier than another exact same mob , also adds to the excirement as you really dont know till the fight starts , unlike most games that basically tel you the dificulty of the encounter ( really hate that )

  ANd AC was quickly figured out to carry 2 drop items in your inventory at all times .. Negated the risk there

Amaranthar

ChildoftheShadows said:

Amaranthar said:

ChildoftheShadows said:

Amaranthar said:

ChildoftheShadows said:

Kyleran said:

Now, if you a developer,  how do you create a death penalty which libertarian minded Iselin, (I have a right to my fun, nothing must disturb it) carebear EQ1 players, (give us tough death penalties, err but not really too tough) or sturdier gamers (if it didnt really hurt to obtain it, what is the point) such as I will enjoy?

Just like getting "carebear" PVE players to enjoy and stick around your OWPVP game. You don't. You make a choice to what degree you want in your game and go for it.

Whenever I think of these game design choices I can't help but think of Venn diagrams. You put all the people that like death penalties in one circle and all the people that like games with no death penalties in another circle. You can cater 100% to one or the other or you can slowly try to merge those where you'll get some overlap, but knowing good and well not everyone from either side is going to fit into that overlap.

True. 
But you can slide those circles closer together or farther apart, and that makes some drastic changes to the inclusive number count. 

Yes, but you are still making an active choice to exclude someone from the design which is why I've always stated that games shouldn't be designed to cater to more people and instead be designed around what the developer actually wants to play. You end up with a lot more possible outcomes where more gamers having something they truly enjoy.
Not to mention that when developers create something they like they will typically create a better game, I would assume

Oh boy, do I disagree with that one. 
It's a product, and it's a lot of money, and I think Devs need to look at it in a more professional way. 
There's a lot to look at in the MMORPG market to decide what to make. 

For one thing, in my mind anyways, is the wide open end of customers who are not satisfied. WoW kept only about 30% of their players who tried it. And that was WoW. 

Making another clone is getting riskier every day. 

I think you want to look at it all and figure out, to the best of your ability:
- where there's a market (that's not saturated already)
- what works and what doesn't, but consider it all. 
--- You have class based that gamers seem to really like
--- You have skills based that seem to also be attractive
--- You can draw a conclusion there and mix them

--- You want to avoid the clone syndrome 

--- Things like perma-death, rampant PKing, FtP, etc., are all in negative territory

--- There are many gamers who like PvE
--- There are many gamers who like PvP
--- Draw a conclusion there? Remember to consider that open market thingy.

That's just a little sample. 

WoW is the epitome of trying to cater to as many as possible and that’s why we’ve been stuck with them for the last decade, because others too were trying to reach as many as possible. 

It hasn’t been until recently that niche games have been gaining interest again because the market is so saturated with the same junk. 

No argument there.

But I think something has gone wrong.
Because WoW was by far the #1 game, and now bleeding numbers, and those "niche games" are still "niche." Or worse. 

There's something(s) missing. 
It's not the good things they have, it's what's missing that's causing this, IMO. 

Theocritus

Amaranthar said:

Utinni said:

Inconvenience isn't challenge.

Avoiding it is. 
That is, if you label losing as "inconvenience." 

Makes me wonder, are these no lose MMORPGs even games? 

Most of them are just go through the scripted motions that the game wants you to do. To me that isn't playing. MMOs on rails absolutely drive me nuts.

Mylan12

Iselin said:

AlBQuirky said:

Iselin said:

AlBQuirky said:

Iselin said:

How can the main hero demigod who's going to save the world die? Film over... roll the credits And what's this resurrection bit all about? Go permadeath or go home... sheesh.

Death penalties in MMOs? They are just contrived punishments to make you fear death because presumably that makes not dying feel like an accomplishment. That's great if you're playing in order to accomplish not dying, I guess. But then you get up, jump through whatever death penalty hoops they've devised and eventually get back to playing where you want to play... some accomplishment that lol.

For the rest of us who play for the journey those penalties are just annoying disruptions to what we enjoy. I'd much rather get the dying bit over with as quickly as possible so I can go back and tackle the thing I was trying to do when I died - which presumably is the thing I enjoy doing in the game - immediately.

I don't need to be punished with obnoxious time sinks. I'm not a masochist. I know I failed and what motivates me is to do it all over again until I don't fail. The quicker I get back to trying to succeed the better.

 

Am I to take it that you don't want a challenge? Something hard?

If dying is "just a terrible time sink", than what makes a game hard for you? Sounds like dying is not one of them.

Then again, one players "punishment" is another "opportunity."

Not trying to say good or bad, just curious how you view "challenging."

No, I definitely want hard and the harder the better. But that's irrelevant to death punishment. I don't mind dying over and over if I'm trying to do something tough. It's the artificial wait imposed by the death penalties between the dying over and over part to the content I enjoy that I have no use for.

Interesting. It seems "fear of Death" is a component here. I get what you're saying, and to a point, I agree.

EQ had me quitting after I just hit level 38, ran through East Commonlands on my way to Freeport for some banking, and died because I beat a "Special Event" (Halloween thingie, I think) but had only a few hit points. As I sat to recover, a level 2 Orc Pawn decided I was easy prey and killed me. I lost my new level and the songs that went with it. I quit and never looked back.

The fear of death can be a boon or bane, depending on the player. Too much fear and they won't "try" anything just to see what happens. Too little and they don't care what happens. Each player has a different "point of no return."

I think the key is what Aeander alluded to: "progression in that game is so fun." If the progression is fun, I don't mind. I'm in no hurry to reach the "end of the game", aka endgame. If the progression is fun, lost time means very little. If progression is a pain the ass, lost time hurts tenfold.

You mentioned in a later post about "always playing my best." How do you do this when a new skill, ability, or spell is learned for the first time? Most games give very little "mechanical info" on these and the learning comes through trial and error. Or at least it used to

I know that a very harsh death penalty could make this learning extremely tedious and may even make players shy about experimenting. EQ's ended up pushing me away, after all.

I guess this came about because you state often how you like challenging gameplay and your comments about death penalties struck me as odd. I guess I see it as if there is zero fear of death and it is "just a bump in the road", how challenging can it be, if a player really cares not one whit about failure?

Again, not any judgement. It just struck me strangely

When I get a new skill or when I'm in a new game I don't yet know how to play well, like everyone else I learn by trying on the rats and grunts and not the orc king That would be foolish. Playing my best also means knowing what I can and can't do at any given point in time. I will push the envelope to find my limits but how often I do that totally depends on my comfort level and my familiarity with the skills and game in general.

I just see no relationship between difficulty of the content I'm playing and "time-outs" after every death. I just want to get back to the difficult content where I died and keep working on overcoming its challenges. A copse run is not the challenging content I want to be doing. You may consider those as other separate challenges and hell, you may even enjoy corpse runs lol... not judging. I don't. I want to get back to my difficult content and spend my game time doing that rather than try to mitigate the death penalty for the next 15 minutes or 2 days.

Adding annoyances does not make it more difficult. Just more annoying.

Can't remember the name but I played a game long ago that had little or really close to no death penalty.  You could start on a real hard mob and keep dying and running back in till it was dead. As long as at least one person stayed alive in range of the encounter, it would not reset.  Yeah the NPC was hard to kill but challenging, well no just boring as heck. I didn't play it long.

Now I guess in these solo style MMORPG, I guess you couldn't do such as you be well alone.  But you could spend the time recovering from the death penalty, figuring out what you can do differently next time to be successful or I guess with no death penalty, you could keep zerging the mob until you got lucky and it died.

Iselin

Mylan12 said:

Iselin said:

AlBQuirky said:

Iselin said:

AlBQuirky said:

Iselin said:

How can the main hero demigod who's going to save the world die? Film over... roll the credits And what's this resurrection bit all about? Go permadeath or go home... sheesh.

Death penalties in MMOs? They are just contrived punishments to make you fear death because presumably that makes not dying feel like an accomplishment. That's great if you're playing in order to accomplish not dying, I guess. But then you get up, jump through whatever death penalty hoops they've devised and eventually get back to playing where you want to play... some accomplishment that lol.

For the rest of us who play for the journey those penalties are just annoying disruptions to what we enjoy. I'd much rather get the dying bit over with as quickly as possible so I can go back and tackle the thing I was trying to do when I died - which presumably is the thing I enjoy doing in the game - immediately.

I don't need to be punished with obnoxious time sinks. I'm not a masochist. I know I failed and what motivates me is to do it all over again until I don't fail. The quicker I get back to trying to succeed the better.

 

Am I to take it that you don't want a challenge? Something hard?

If dying is "just a terrible time sink", than what makes a game hard for you? Sounds like dying is not one of them.

Then again, one players "punishment" is another "opportunity."

Not trying to say good or bad, just curious how you view "challenging."

No, I definitely want hard and the harder the better. But that's irrelevant to death punishment. I don't mind dying over and over if I'm trying to do something tough. It's the artificial wait imposed by the death penalties between the dying over and over part to the content I enjoy that I have no use for.

Interesting. It seems "fear of Death" is a component here. I get what you're saying, and to a point, I agree.

EQ had me quitting after I just hit level 38, ran through East Commonlands on my way to Freeport for some banking, and died because I beat a "Special Event" (Halloween thingie, I think) but had only a few hit points. As I sat to recover, a level 2 Orc Pawn decided I was easy prey and killed me. I lost my new level and the songs that went with it. I quit and never looked back.

The fear of death can be a boon or bane, depending on the player. Too much fear and they won't "try" anything just to see what happens. Too little and they don't care what happens. Each player has a different "point of no return."

I think the key is what Aeander alluded to: "progression in that game is so fun." If the progression is fun, I don't mind. I'm in no hurry to reach the "end of the game", aka endgame. If the progression is fun, lost time means very little. If progression is a pain the ass, lost time hurts tenfold.

You mentioned in a later post about "always playing my best." How do you do this when a new skill, ability, or spell is learned for the first time? Most games give very little "mechanical info" on these and the learning comes through trial and error. Or at least it used to

I know that a very harsh death penalty could make this learning extremely tedious and may even make players shy about experimenting. EQ's ended up pushing me away, after all.

I guess this came about because you state often how you like challenging gameplay and your comments about death penalties struck me as odd. I guess I see it as if there is zero fear of death and it is "just a bump in the road", how challenging can it be, if a player really cares not one whit about failure?

Again, not any judgement. It just struck me strangely

When I get a new skill or when I'm in a new game I don't yet know how to play well, like everyone else I learn by trying on the rats and grunts and not the orc king That would be foolish. Playing my best also means knowing what I can and can't do at any given point in time. I will push the envelope to find my limits but how often I do that totally depends on my comfort level and my familiarity with the skills and game in general.

I just see no relationship between difficulty of the content I'm playing and "time-outs" after every death. I just want to get back to the difficult content where I died and keep working on overcoming its challenges. A copse run is not the challenging content I want to be doing. You may consider those as other separate challenges and hell, you may even enjoy corpse runs lol... not judging. I don't. I want to get back to my difficult content and spend my game time doing that rather than try to mitigate the death penalty for the next 15 minutes or 2 days.

Adding annoyances does not make it more difficult. Just more annoying.

Can't remember the name but I played a game long ago that had little or really close to no death penalty.  You could start on a real hard mob and keep dying and running back in till it was dead. As long as at least one person stayed alive in range of the encounter, it would not reset.  Yeah the NPC was hard to kill but challenging, well no just boring as heck. I didn't play it long.

Now I guess in these solo style MMORPG, I guess you couldn't do such as you be well alone.  But you could spend the time recovering from the death penalty, figuring out what you can do differently next time to be successful or I guess with no death penalty, you could keep zerging the mob until you got lucky and it died.

Yesiree Bob. That there death penalty is what real MMO men play 'cause you can stop and think and shit.

Zerging a mob. LMFAO.

ChildoftheShadows

Amaranthar said:

ChildoftheShadows said:

WoW is the epitome of trying to cater to as many as possible and that’s why we’ve been stuck with them for the last decade, because others too were trying to reach as many as possible. 

It hasn’t been until recently that niche games have been gaining interest again because the market is so saturated with the same junk. 

No argument there.

But I think something has gone wrong.
Because WoW was by far the #1 game, and now bleeding numbers, and those "niche games" are still "niche." Or worse. 

There's something(s) missing. 
It's not the good things they have, it's what's missing that's causing this, IMO. 

I'm not sure where this conversation is going or I'm missing something. I'll just go back to my original statement and say that I feel developers should be making games they want to play and not trying to cater to larger crowds. If they want a pvp mmo they should make a pvp mmo and not sacrifice they stuff they want just to get more people. This will lead to more unique games and less clones like WOW. More options for everyone.

Ancient_Exile

Iselin said:

Kyleran said:

Why? Death penalties aren't contrived, players lose their ships or bases which represents very real amounts of time and effort, so protecting them is very much an accomplishment, moreso than any ther "contrived" player goal, at least IMO.

It is ALWAYS nothing but a time sink. The length of time varies but that's it. Apparently you are motivated by fear of time sinks... time sinks that take you away from the enjoyable part of the game sucks. But you be you and have fun with that

And a big lol at the DAoC ffa servers where the death penalty was 100% identical to that in the core servers. The only thing different was that anyone of any faction could kill you anywhere so factions had zero meaning there. It was a gang wars and mugging simulator whereas the core DAoC was the "nations at war" simulator. But you're right, different strokes.

In the Grand Scheme of Things, all video games and, yes, even MMORPGs, are nothing more than Time Sinks.

Well, some video games can help you improve real-life skills such as hand-eye coordination.  And other games (video/board/pencil&paper/table-top) which actually require thinking can help improve certain cognitive abilities. 

Sports/athletic competitions, of course, can help improve a lot of different physical as well as mental attributes. 

Some MMORPGs, at least the older ones, might help improve social skills somewhat.  But they may or may not help improve face-to-face social skills in the real (or non-virtual world).

EDIT:  Let's not forget that many of these games are also Money Sinks.  And, of course, money usually requires time to be acquired, so there's another Time Sink.

Some types games can challenge us mentally, emotionally, socially, and physically.  Other types of games might only challenge us mentally, emotionally, and socially. 

Personally, I would like an MMORPG to challenge me mentally above all.  Though my ability to deal with things emotionally and socially will most likely also be challenged. 

Action games can challenge us physically somewhat (Hand-eye coordination, reaction time).  Perhaps those who have developed fast-twitch muscles might be better at them than those with slow-twitch muscles?  I'm not sure. 

Having played both traditional MMORPGs (tab-target & hotbar) as well as MMO-ARPGs, I believe I prefer the traditional/old-school type of combat.  I would rather challenge my mind in an MMORPG.  Not that I didn't enjoy AMMORPGs for awhile.  But, if I want to play an action game, I can play an action game.  I don't require action combat in an MMORPG in order to enjoy them.  Actually, I believe that action combat greatly inhibits an MMORPG from ever being a true RPG.  Less skills are able to be used at one time or in one battle.  And, moreover, MMO-ARPGs make it much more difficult to incorporate non-combat skills/proficiencies into a game.

Ancient_Exile

cameltosis said:

I read the article, it was very well written with some compelling thoughts.

However, for me personally, "loss" is just something to be avoided and heavy death penalties will simply make me avoid the game completely. So, I can't really agree with the main thrust of the article, because it is already proven wrong for me personally and therefore likely to be wrong for many others too. Given the way the market went, I'd guess we're in the majority.

Why is the article wrong for me personally?

Because I play for FUN. And, on a psychological level, fun happens when the challenge is matched to my skill level. This means that, as a player, I seek out the most challenging content in the game and "test" myself against it. The best fights are the ones where success or failure balances on a knife edge (i.e. my skill equals, but doesn't exceed, the challenge), which means that death is common place for my playstyle.

So, if there was a harsh death penelty, it would directly prevent me from playing the game for maximum amounts of fun. I would be forced to lower the challenge level, in order to survive and not lose anything, which means lowering the amount of fun I would have.

Now, a harsh death penalty may mean I gain in other areas (such as socially, as the author points out, I would naturally seek more allies to reduce risk), but those other gains do not outweigh the loss of fun. Additionally, fear is not an emotion I welcome. Why the fuck do I want to be afraid when playing a game?!?!?! That's a concept I cannot understand one bit.

Finally, I'm of the opinion that all of the benefits the author is hoping to get through harsh death penalties can be achieved by a multitude of better gameplay mechanics.

Please allow me to share my experience with significant death penalties and the lack thereof in MMORPGs.

The first MMORPG in which I played to max level was Runes of Magic (2008).  It was basically a WoW clone, but it was F2P with a Cash Shop.  It did differ from WoW in certain ways.  Such as that characters could dual-class (I think I read they started to allow triple-class at some point after I stopped playing).  This meant that players had to level two different classes while being able to use certain skills of the primary class after switching to the secondary class (and vice-versa). 

Anyway, PCs (player characters) incurred XP debt upon death.  This XP debt could stack if PCs died multiple times in a row, and it increased every time a PC leveled.  The XP debt would have to be paid before normal XP could be earned, though PCs could not de-level.  Now there were daily quests available that could pay this XP debt.  These quests would definitely be enough to pay for the XP debt incurred by one death.  At least at lower levels.  I honestly can't remember if they would pay for XP debt incurred by one death at the highest levels.

The amount of XP debt would definitely become a bit painful at mid to higher levels.  This death penalty in the game eventually made me a bit fearful to die.  This did not, however, prevent me from attempting difficult or dangerous content.  There were types of content, such as dungeons, I would not attempt if I wasn't confident that there was at least a decent chance that my character would survive.  Which might mean playing w/ a partner or a group.  I wasn't annoyed by this.  In fact, I believe this actually increased my enjoyment of the game.  Because I had a certain amount of trepidation in relation to character death, because I cared whether or not my character lived or died, I felt more connected to my character.  I believe this did, in fact, increase my level of immersion in the game.  Made the game more challenging and more fun.  To me anyway.

Oh yeah, there were also items capable of being purchased from the Cash Shop that would purge all XP debt from a character (or at least a good amount, I don't remember now).  Originally, PCs could purchase these items for currency earned in-game.  However, towards the end of my time spent with RoM, this was changed.  PCs could no longer purchase Cash Shop items for currency earned in-game.  This was rather disappointing.  (It may have been other players who were selling these items at the Auction House, but I can't quite recall.)  Anyway, there was an expansion released and I could have gained like 5 more levels (for each of my two classes), but the game started to lag way too much on my computer after that expansion was released.  So, I gave up playing.  Actually didn't seriously try another MMORPG for over two years.  Except for maybe Runescape.  Which I didn't like.  (EDIT:  I don't remember if I tried Runescape before or after I played Runes of Magic.)

Fast-forward to 2014.  I had started playing Everquest 2.  There was a little bit of XP debt incurred upon death, but it was far from enough to be considered significant.  This actually disappointed me.  However, I was then eventually able to solo dungeons and even lower-level raids (because I crafted, bought, or looted Fabled gear for my character).  This was challenging and fun.  However, I've already done that in an MMORPG.  Why would I want to repeat exactly, or almost exactly, the same experience in another MMORPG? 

EDIT#2:  When I played Neverwinter (beginning in August 2014-2019 with several long breaks in-between), the greatest challenge eventually became not dying from boredom due to the endless grinding required by each End Game Campaign.  The Death Penalty in that game was so minuscule as to practically be non-existent.  Use an injury kit or portable altar or sit by the campfire briefly (or use a few injury kits if multiple deaths had occurred consecutively).  Wow.

Ancient_Exile

lahnmir said:

Nice article. What has always bothered me about severe death penalties is that they directly hindered your enjoyment of the game, something that is not equal to loss.

The Dragon Quest games do it nicely I think. Whenever you die you are resurrected and lose 10% of your wealth, no matter if it is 10 or 10.000 gold. It hits you hard, you have to work to get it back but it does not hinder your actual gameplay with silly things like ress sickness delevelling etc. Because those are not loss at all, they are punishment.

/Cheers,
Lahnmir

There can be good, bad, or indifferent consequences for choices and actions in games just like there are in real life.

Good/Positive Consequence = Gain, Reward, Benefit, or Advantage.  Advancement/Improvement/Progression

Bad/Negative Consequence = Loss, Punishment, Hindrance, or Disadvantage.  Demotion/Decline/Regression

Indifferent Consequence = Negligible Effect

EDIT:  Making mistakes, and enduring the consequences thereof, can sometimes help us learn faster than making the correct decisions.

bcbully

They can’t accept death in any form truth be told. They are the hero’s, the best in their mind and death shatters that fallacy. 

I’ll read the rest when my girl stops telling me “loookit!”

KnightFalz

tzervo said:

Iselin said:

I get it. I didn't play UO but I did play AC. You could easily lose stuff there too. But all of you are talking about adding some extra spice that is neither here nor there with respect to the encounter's difficulty. That Lich Lord is still that same Lich Lord with or without all the other things whose possibility of happening give you a thrill. 

It is not about the encounter's difficulty, it is about making interesting decisions with their corresponding consequences and/or rewards.

If the loss mechanics are not paired with interesting decisions, then they are a mere annoyance and the design is bad.

Decisions relating to how to, or even whether to, regain what I already had don't sound all that interesting to me. For me it is simply an annoyance that wastes time that could otherwise be spent productively.

AAAMEOW

How harsh should the penalty be?  in term of time needed to recover your progress?

There are games where you lose everything.  And there are games which you just lost easily replaced gear and inventory.

Ancient_Exile

tzervo said:

KnightFalz said:

tzervo said:

It is not about the encounter's difficulty, it is about making interesting decisions with their corresponding consequences and/or rewards.

If the loss mechanics are not paired with interesting decisions, then they are a mere annoyance and the design is bad.

Decisions relating to how to, or even whether to, regain what I already had don't sound all that interesting to me. For me it is simply an annoyance that wastes time that could otherwise be spent productively.

This is a rationalization.

A quote from a blog that put it succinctly in words with an example:

So the player has a choice to grind X hours to get emblems or to get lucky with a low chance drop to get the upgrade. Or, he can engage in a risky mission that can give him the same upgrade in a single hour if he succeeds but Y hours of grind to get back where he is if he loses.

The time cost of the grinding choice is obviously X hours. For the risky choice, the time cost is: 1+(1-C)*(X+Y) where C is the chance of success. The “1” part is the one hour for the risky mission. The (X+Y) part comes from the assumption that after he failed, he just gives up and grinds. It’s easier to calculate with this than with repeated attempts and the result is the same. The player wants to minimize time to reward, so chooses the shorter one. The risky is shorter if X > 1+(1-C)*(X+Y) which can be solved into C > (1+Y)/(X+Y). Assuming the death penalty is 10 hours and you need to grind 100 hours, you should take the risk if your chance is bigger than 11/110 = 10%.
It’s a straightforward formula. Where is the “interesting decision”? It comes from the fact that your chance cannot be measured, it can only be approximated and it lies on the elusive self-consciousness. The question comes down to “how good I am/the team is in this game”? This is always an interesting thing to think about.

https://greedygoblinblog.wordpress.com/2018/01/09/the-interesting-decision-around-death-penalty/

As far as I am concerned, the rest of the blog post also makes some interesting points, even though they sting.

Thou makest interesting points.  I have bookmarked the blog, and I shall do mine utmost best to read it in the near future. 

KnightFalz

AAAMEOW said:

How harsh should the penalty be?  in term of time needed to recover your progress?

There are games where you lose everything.  And there are games which you just lost easily replaced gear and inventory.

The penalty should be as harsh as the developer feels it need be for his intent and vision for the game to be realized. Anything else sells the game and experience of playing it short. In turn, the player should choose games with death penalties that appeal to him, or that he is at least comfortable with.

KnightFalz

tzervo said:

1) I do not want to be on the edge all the time, it is a game, I want to relax.
2) I am rationalizing to discredit the loss mechanic because I am a baddie and I am unwilling to admit it/don't want people to see it

I find (1) to be perfectly acceptable, I find (2) to be annoying and toxic.

Others are not obliged to see the same value in loss mechanics as you. Annoying as it is,  opinions vary. If you find the variance of opinion toxic I suggest you stock up on anti-venom as such is quite common on discussion boards.

Ancient_Exile

tzervo said:

KnightFalz said:

tzervo said:

It is not about the encounter's difficulty, it is about making interesting decisions with their corresponding consequences and/or rewards.

If the loss mechanics are not paired with interesting decisions, then they are a mere annoyance and the design is bad.

Decisions relating to how to, or even whether to, regain what I already had don't sound all that interesting to me. For me it is simply an annoyance that wastes time that could otherwise be spent productively.

This is a rationalization.

A quote from a blog that put it succinctly in words with an example:

So the player has a choice to grind X hours to get emblems or to get lucky with a low chance drop to get the upgrade. Or, he can engage in a risky mission that can give him the same upgrade in a single hour if he succeeds but Y hours of grind to get back where he is if he loses.

The time cost of the grinding choice is obviously X hours. For the risky choice, the time cost is: 1+(1-C)*(X+Y) where C is the chance of success. The “1” part is the one hour for the risky mission. The (X+Y) part comes from the assumption that after he failed, he just gives up and grinds. It’s easier to calculate with this than with repeated attempts and the result is the same. The player wants to minimize time to reward, so chooses the shorter one. The risky is shorter if X > 1+(1-C)*(X+Y) which can be solved into C > (1+Y)/(X+Y). Assuming the death penalty is 10 hours and you need to grind 100 hours, you should take the risk if your chance is bigger than 11/110 = 10%.
It’s a straightforward formula. Where is the “interesting decision”? It comes from the fact that your chance cannot be measured, it can only be approximated and it lies on the elusive self-consciousness. The question comes down to “how good I am/the team is in this game”? This is always an interesting thing to think about.

https://greedygoblinblog.wordpress.com/2018/01/09/the-interesting-decision-around-death-penalty/

As far as I am concerned, the rest of the blog post also makes some interesting points, even though they sting.

In accordance with my vow, I have read the article which you graciously chose to share with the rest of the class.  I found it to be interesting, intriguing, enlightening, and entertaining all wrapped up and rolled into one.

"...Why did the death penalty diminished, along with the whole MMO scene? Because it’s hard to deny that the MMOs are in horrible shape. The most successful one, WoW is stagnating/losing players for years and there are no serious contenders with even 1/10 of its playerbase.

This is because they made the wrong choice of including entitled punks. Not casuals, not even socials. Casuals, like a middle aged mum who plays while the kids are asleep is aware of her limited skills. She is fine with the grinding. Actually, she likes the easy and interruptible entertainment of being in a magical world. The social is fine being around, being involved with the group instead of being at the tip of the spear. This is crucial: death penalty isn’t a problem to low-skill players as long as they are self-aware and have a grindy alternative path of progression...

...Please realize the catch: by removing death penalty, neither the skilled, nor the casual/social players got help. The entitled punks did, the group that you really don’t want in any group game. By removing death penalty, the devs invited the most toxic people: those who look down on fellow players based on oversized ego and blame and curse them for their own frequent failures..."

AlBQuirky

bcbully said:

They can’t accept death in any form truth be told. They are the hero’s, the best in their mind and death shatters that fallacy. 

I’ll read the rest when my girl stops telling me “loookit!”

My fallacy shatters when I see the other hundreds of heroes doing the same things I am, and probably better

Kyleran

KnightFalz said:

tzervo said:

1) I do not want to be on the edge all the time, it is a game, I want to relax.
2) I am rationalizing to discredit the loss mechanic because I am a baddie and I am unwilling to admit it/don't want people to see it

I find (1) to be perfectly acceptable, I find (2) to be annoying and toxic.

Others are not obliged to see the same value in loss mechanics as you. Annoying as it is,  opinions vary. If you find the variance of opinion toxic I suggest you stock up on anti-venom as such is quite common on discussion boards.

I find people who label other's opinions "toxic" to be annoying. 

But also a whole lot of fun too. 

AlBQuirky

KnightFalz said:

tzervo said:

1) I do not want to be on the edge all the time, it is a game, I want to relax.
2) I am rationalizing to discredit the loss mechanic because I am a baddie and I am unwilling to admit it/don't want people to see it

I find (1) to be perfectly acceptable, I find (2) to be annoying and toxic.

Others are not obliged to see the same value in loss mechanics as you. Annoying as it is,  opinions vary. If you find the variance of opinion toxic I suggest you stock up on anti-venom as such is quite common on discussion boards.

For me, differing opinions are not toxic, but the way they are expressed is. Choice of adjectives is key here

Kyleran

tzervo said:

Ancient_Exile said:

In accordance with my vow, I have read the article which you graciously chose to share with the rest of the class.  I found it to be interesting, intriguing, enlightening, and entertaining all wrapped up and rolled into one.

I'm glad you enjoyed it

Just a clarification: I mostly agree with this blogpost but I also have a couple of disagreements:

This is crucial: death penalty isn’t a problem to low-skill players as long as they are self-aware and have a grindy alternative path of progression...
...Please realize the catch: by removing death penalty, neither the skilled, nor the casual/social players got help. The entitled punks did, the group that you really don’t want in any group game. By removing death penalty, the devs invited the most toxic people: those who look down on fellow players based on oversized ego and blame and curse them for their own frequent failures..."

He is equating the casual player that chooses the no-death-penalty with low skill. Sometimes people just do not want the extra stress, or the extra mental load. They just want a more relaxed experience, or they want to find other, less stressful ways to challenge themselves within these games. This is fine. But usually these people are equally self-aware and adjust their expectations accordingly.

No-death-penalty games are just a better fit for this playstyle. Death penalties do drive the idiots away because it exposes them, but no-death-penalty games does not only help the idiots, it also more fitting for those that look for a less stressful experience. And that does not in principle mean less challenging (though it often does).
W
I do smirk when he bashes the baddies though xD

Both of the linked blogs in these threads make a mistake I think by trying to pin the "blame" for the removal of death penalties on a group of players they identify and  label as punks, baddies what have you.

Really no different than other threads decrying the decline of the genre due to catering to casuals, entrance of millennials, P2W warriors, or any other group they can find to slag on.

This comes from the same place that racism, nationalism, tribalism, or facism originate from, that dark place which says the bad things in this world are caused by people "not like us."

Truth is the rise and decline of the genre can be probably tied to a multitude of factors throughout the last 25 years, but I can't see laying the "blame" on any particular group of players, especially when said labeling is largely made up in the minds of the accusers and have no agreed upon or factual basis.

I mean seriously, you've done it yourself, what exactly is a "baddie?"

Ancient_Exile

tzervo said:

Ancient_Exile said:

In accordance with my vow, I have read the article which you graciously chose to share with the rest of the class.  I found it to be interesting, intriguing, enlightening, and entertaining all wrapped up and rolled into one.

I'm glad you enjoyed it

Just a clarification: I mostly agree with this blogpost but I also have a couple of disagreements:

This is crucial: death penalty isn’t a problem to low-skill players as long as they are self-aware and have a grindy alternative path of progression...
...Please realize the catch: by removing death penalty, neither the skilled, nor the casual/social players got help. The entitled punks did, the group that you really don’t want in any group game. By removing death penalty, the devs invited the most toxic people: those who look down on fellow players based on oversized ego and blame and curse them for their own frequent failures..."

He is equating the casual player that chooses the no-death-penalty with low skill. Sometimes people just do not want the extra stress, or the extra mental load. They just want a more relaxed experience, or they want to find other, less stressful ways to challenge themselves within these games. This is fine. But usually these people are equally self-aware and adjust their expectations accordingly.

No-death-penalty games are just a better fit for this playstyle. Death penalties do drive the idiots away because it exposes them, but no-death-penalty games does not only help the idiots, it also more fitting for those that look for a less stressful experience. And that does not in principle mean less challenging (though it often does).

I do smirk when he bashes the baddies though xD

I believe I am safe in saying that enough MMORPGs now exist which cater to casuals or those who desire a more relaxing and less stressful experience. 

However, even an MMORPG that is generally more tense and stressful can accommodate those who desire a more relaxing and less stressful experience.  For example, there can be viable non-combat roles with a path to progression which would rarely expose players to serious risk of harm or danger of death. 

ChildoftheShadows

Ancient_Exile said:

tzervo said:

Ancient_Exile said:

In accordance with my vow, I have read the article which you graciously chose to share with the rest of the class.  I found it to be interesting, intriguing, enlightening, and entertaining all wrapped up and rolled into one.

I'm glad you enjoyed it

Just a clarification: I mostly agree with this blogpost but I also have a couple of disagreements:

This is crucial: death penalty isn’t a problem to low-skill players as long as they are self-aware and have a grindy alternative path of progression...
...Please realize the catch: by removing death penalty, neither the skilled, nor the casual/social players got help. The entitled punks did, the group that you really don’t want in any group game. By removing death penalty, the devs invited the most toxic people: those who look down on fellow players based on oversized ego and blame and curse them for their own frequent failures..."

He is equating the casual player that chooses the no-death-penalty with low skill. Sometimes people just do not want the extra stress, or the extra mental load. They just want a more relaxed experience, or they want to find other, less stressful ways to challenge themselves within these games. This is fine. But usually these people are equally self-aware and adjust their expectations accordingly.

No-death-penalty games are just a better fit for this playstyle. Death penalties do drive the idiots away because it exposes them, but no-death-penalty games does not only help the idiots, it also more fitting for those that look for a less stressful experience. And that does not in principle mean less challenging (though it often does).

I do smirk when he bashes the baddies though xD

I believe I am safe in saying that enough MMORPGs now exist which cater to casuals or those who desire a more relaxing and less stressful experience. 

However, even an MMORPG that is generally more tense and stressful can accommodate those who desire a more relaxing and less stressful experience.  For example, there can be viable non-combat roles with a path to progression which would rarely expose players to serious risk of harm or danger of death. 

But only for a very specific type of player. Those that enjoy being full time [insert non combat role here].