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Star Trek Online: In Need of a "Meaningful" Death Penalty
MikeB
Community ManagerAdministrator RarePosts: 6,555
Star Trek Online Executive Producer Craig Zinkievich believes that Star Trek Online needs a more "meaningful" death penalty, according to a recent comment made to IncGamers.
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Mr. Zinkievich explains Cryptic Studios' stance on death penalties:
I get that people want to feel a sense of risk when they’re fighting in battles, but if the only emotion you feel when you’re playing a game is fear that you’re going to lose some time due to an arbitrary gameplay mechanic, we’re probably not doing something right.
However, Mr. Zinkievich does agree that Star Trek Online could use a more meaningful death penalty, adding:
We are looking into finding a meaningful way to give players a deeper sense of loss when something bad happens. But we want it to feel right, rather than just like an arbitrary penalty.
via IncGamers.
So there you have it! What kind of death penalty do you think would be appropriate for Star Trek Online? Let us know in the comments below.
Comments
Shuttle for an hour.
I'm not a fan of "death penalty", for me simply losing the encounter is enough. I find one can detract from a sense of "lets see if this works".
Meaningful death penalty? How about A death penalty.
I'm not calling for anything too extreme, but there's got to be something.
Agreed, besides isn't this the sort of thing you decide, before, i dunno, you go LIVE
there is one, you crew is dammaged and that effects your shield and hull repair rate
there is one, you crew is dammaged and that effects your shield and hull repair rate
I never noticed, lol
If STO wishes to keep true to the episode-style of gameplay, why not make losing a ship similar? Perhaps sitting in an escape pod until they are rescued, or landing on the surface of a nearby planet and setting up a beacon until another ship shows up? I understand a player would want to get right back in to the game, so these don't need to last as long as you'd see in a typical Star Trek episode, but it is a thought. Since the game revolves around instancing every mission, it shouldn't be too much to have one of these scenarios randomly occur after your ship is toast. Also, in regards to how much of an encumbrance on a fleet this would be, give other players the ability to rescue the pods with their own ships in order to hasten the process.
Just my 0.02 on the subject.
I play in a sandbox.
it's bad and shallow but not that shallow.
Tribble breeding. geting rair BO skills to train, collecting 32 ships and outfitting them. Theirs depth alright but the main meat, the missions are all pretty blah
Right now it's mostly just a respawn delay. Not a big deterrent. I like the "stranded in an escape pod until rescued" idea. Seems to fit with the IP. And also a longer wait to get back in the fray. Or maybe have to restart the mission from a checkpoint or something, lose some progress.
Klingon are playable, just heavily PvP. Which is exactly how I would imagine the Klingon. In the IP they weren't really known for being great explorers or diplomats.
They should of made STO a sandbox and maybe something simliar to WW2 online where player controlled space affects the boarders of the federation and klingon empire.
I kinda felt it was weird when I just had 15 seconds of downtime when I died the first time but the more I get into the game the less I seem to care about the death penalty. Plus when they drag you into those sector space battles and spawn you next to 10 ships where every other time you get the option to warp out... I don't really want anything harsh for such a casual game.
I play in a cruiser with shields almost always set to main, so I rarely tend to die in the first place and it would be nice to reward surviving instances as opposed to a death penalty on each death.
Make games you want to play.
http://www.youtube.com/user/RavikAztar
My friends and I proposals when your ship explodes:
Proposal one (I dont like this one):
One of your bridge officers is randomly out of commision until a trip to starfleet medical or 15 minutes
Any items you picked up in the last 15 minutes is lost
Pros: Does hurt you enough to feel it.
Cons: Probably not severe enough to prevent destroying yourself on purpose
Proposal two (my favorite of the three):
Some crew permenant killed (dont regenerate), so you die enough you have to travel to a starbase to get more crew
Pros: Gives you a good reason to not die, you have to travel to starbase on occasion, if you dont you must proceed slower.
Cons: newbs will whine, so perhaps this should scale base on rank, Lt. crew regens as now, Lt. Com 5% loss of crew per death scaling up to 20% per death at Rear Admiral.
Proposal Three ( I dont care for this one):
One of your starship items is damaged beyond use without a visit to a starbase
Pros: Defintely will make people not want to die, imagine loosing your photon torpedos or impulse drive
Exceptions:
Fleet Actions: Penalty cut in half
Use of skills that purposely destroy your ship (ramming speed, abandon ship), they should require special consequences when used.
Ramming speed for example pretty much is abused, so a severe penalty should happen from using it when your shields/hull arent damaged to the point it makes sense (how many times have you seen someone us ramming speed on the crystalline entity to get the highest dmg).
Abandon Ship would let you respawn as normal except bridge officer skill timers would be slower recharging for a set time.
Anyway, there is no easy answer and Cryptics decision may determine if I renew (right now it isnt likely)
Cith of Heroes/Villians
--------------------------
Heroes:
Xenomorph 50 scrapper - Virtue
Polar Force 50 Blaster - Virtue
Villians:
Rhino Hulk 50 Brute - Virtue
Destructor 48 Corruptor - Virtue
Doesn't EVE already offer that?
neither are the Federation in STO...but they were Klingon scientists and doctors, their NEEDED by the empire and the High Council reconized this but most of the warrior cast looked down on them
Somone had to design and buildthose Birds of Prey.....
Nah, the klingons just trade gold pressed latinum to the feregi for their ship designs :P
Cith of Heroes/Villians
--------------------------
Heroes:
Xenomorph 50 scrapper - Virtue
Polar Force 50 Blaster - Virtue
Villians:
Rhino Hulk 50 Brute - Virtue
Destructor 48 Corruptor - Virtue
As I recall, In the original interviews that the devs were giving before beta, it was stated that the death penalty would be ship damage and crew loss that would have to be repaired / replaced at spacedock. I believe they intended to use merit as the cost of the repair / replacement. This is actually an acceptable penalty IMO. It could be made even more strict by making power level maximums lower until repair or taking weapons offline until repaired. A combination of merit and energy credits (which are way to easy to accumulate anyway) would give some sort of meaning to the penalty. This could even be implemented as a long term durability issue, and it should be interactive with the bridge officers. Engineer: "Captain, our weapons / shields / engines have suffered too much damage for our crew to repair. We need to head to the nearest spacedock to make repairs." Or the doctor/security: "Sir, we've suffered too many casualties to make continuing our mission feasible. I suggest we head back to Earth and pick up some new recruits." Making you limp back to spacedock at warp 3 might make a captain think twice before bum-rushing 3 Hirogen Battleships......maybe.
I want a mmorpg where people have gone through misery, have gone through school stuff and actually have had sex even. -sagil
Well if you really want game play to be meaningful perhaps they should come to your house and smash your computer when ya die that should do it.
However late'ly I've found myself being more and more attracted to quick fast game action style games.And although these FPS styled games have little death penalty, They seem to bring up plenty of emotions to the point were a lot of folks that can't keep up. Resort to massive ammounts of extra nonauthorized programming to bring up there gaming skill.
So basic'ly what I'm trying to say is. Design good play and folks will play, and bitch of course, but mostly play.
I hate to bring this up but WOW has little to no death penalty and all the world is roses for there team." I know I will regret saying that."
there is one, you crew is dammaged and that effects your shield and hull repair rate
I never noticed, lol
You never noticed because the crew repairs itself at such a rapid pace that it becomes irrelevant.
They're welcome to try. I have a nice 1075 steel saber from Badger Blades and I've put a nice sharp edge on it. Nobody's gonna smash my new M17x without losing some significant HP.
i WOULD SAY FIRST MAKE A MEANINGFULL GROUP AND GRUP FIGHTR AND AGRO SYSTEM´, THEN CARE FOR DEATH PENALTY
as long as all npc shoot at the fist opponent and you are sometimes insteant tost in a group a death panelty means noone will be first
by the way what is the point in a forced group for missions like scan 5 astroids ?
The complete group system need changes .. and the way a group fught works first before you should consider penaltys
By all means, add a death penalty. Punish your players. See how long it takes for subscriber numbers to dip below sustainable levels. Even thinking about adding something like this after release is just begging for trouble. Honestly, I don't think this bunch could design their way out of a paper bag!
"Soloists and those who prefer small groups should never have to feel like they''re the ones getting the proverbial table scraps, as it were." - Scott Hartsman, Senior Producer, Everquest II
"People love groups. Its a fallacy that people want to play solo all the time." - Scott Hartsman, Executive Producer, Rift
Gotta love constructive criticism..
One way in which to incorporate a death penalty would be to completely lose crew members. Either upfront, or over time creating a greater need to search out new crew as "reinforcements" should you need them.
Losing ships would work as well, creating a better economy in the long run IMO. Can players sell ships at present?
Stat decreasing is to arbitrary IMO, if they want meaningful, they need real loss.
The option for perma death klingons? Give them greater stats than normal, yet the risk of dying one to many times could result in permanent death.
A few ideas, though they would probably be viewed as too extreme.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
How about instead of having a death penalty, give bonuses to XP and performance for not getting killed in a mission. That way players who like to just jump right back in the action without facing a penalty can be happy, and the risk vs reward players can have something to strive for.
I also think that STO would be a perfect game to try a mission bonus system similar to Guild Wars. Players who either beat the mission quickly or who did a few difficult side objectives could earn bonus XP and skill points. That would give the hardcore players an extra carrot while not really penalizing casual players.
D&D Home Page - What Class Are You? - Build A Character - D&D Compendium
I like this idea. So far, I've had one mission (that I recall) with an optional objective. I still wonder what, if anything, changes in that mission if you don't complete the optional objective. The mission text leads you to believe that the final battle may be harder if you don't do the optional stuff which would be cool if the reward was better for making the final battle harder.
I want a mmorpg where people have gone through misery, have gone through school stuff and actually have had sex even. -sagil
Why do people gotta bitch and moan cause they dont have a penalty, quit your bitchen, could be like eve and lose your ship and shell out more money for your rare equipped items. Its bad enough you die from level glitches in the game and your constantly spawn killed by overpowered npcs. So STFU!
"Whats That Mr. Death Knocking At Your Door, Who's Gonna Die Tonight?"