Well for one thing exp loss needs to hurt... if you die a lot without res then you should delevel and not make any advancement that day.
This helps the cream rise to the top and the first players at max level will have earned it in good groups.
Soloing should take 3-4 times as long or more to level than a good group risking it all in a deep dungeon.
Corpse recovery needs to be in the game but having a very expensive or limited in some ways corpse summon is ok... this has to really sting tho.(like sacrificing a rare weapon at an altar to your god)
Summon corpse and other powerful spells need to expend a consumable that is also somewhat spendy.
At low levels all you should really expect is the ability to locate your corpse if you have a ranger or rogue buddy to help you find it.
The problem with corpse summoning is that is can be used to skip content... that's why it has to be expensive and it should blow out a ton of mana to use it.
In the immortal words of the great Jello Biafra... "give me convenience or give me death"...this is just too much the sentiment these days and it saddens an old schooler such as myself to read all the posts crying about it.
Please Brad and Team, stick to your vision... I have faith that you will...
Kiz~
Aradune said:Here's the good news, twofold:
1. We will tweak and alter the severity of the death penalty during beta, in an attempt to dial in on what is best for the game and our target audience.
2. If our target audiences remains split after this testing, we have the option of making alternate ruleset servers, where, amongst other things, the death penalty could vary in severity.
Something like this would be attractive if the more sever death penalty server (or other more hardcore rules) having a 5 or 10% (or more) experience bonus.
I joined after the thread veered toward death penalties, but here is my thought on devs reacting to gamer feelings. I absolutely think the devs should listen to the players' emotions however the communities' thoughts are not represented by a handful of forum post. Under all scenarios, accurate feedback should be compared to the games' underlying premise and adjusted to be more enjoyable while still honoring the game's original views.
To gather accurate feedback, how would an in-game voting system work? A randomly generated pool of players are sent a question popup with a 1-10 scale answer or yes/no buttons. Get a more accurate picture from the community. Some people don't like questionnaires, so you have to opt-in or have the option to opt-out through a game setting.
Now, if I can chime into the death penalty subject, I love everything about EQ's death penalty system except for permanent equipment loss, as is the general consensus. The time and player interaction sometimes required to retrieve corpses adds a ton of risk to yield a sense of accomplishment. You can either narrowly evade death or outsmart the environment to successfully rescue your body. That reward is missing from games now, as previously stated.
An alternative is to have a summoner in a select few large towns that can summon one of your corpses each cast, maybe with a substantial cooldown like once per day or once per week. Edit: Or it takes the summoner 1 hour to 'locate the player's corpse'. The idea is that this corpse summoning be a healthy run (time investment) to activate, either from your bind spot or to your hunting spot. It should be a "long enough" time investment and/or "high enough" cost that it is advantageous to use this only on an unretrievable death, not simply a normal death. Perhaps instead of an individual player cooldown, the summoning is on a timer similar to Luclin spires. Every few hours, maybe?
At first I thought about also requiring a sizeable monetary fee, but that disproportionately taxes newbies who don't have wealthy mains while twinks/alts basically see no cost. *for the record, I am all about treating everybody indiscriminately as exact equals, in game as well as real life!*
But, this does have the tradeoff of being an individual task, promoting exactly the opposite of the player interaction everyone wants to see revived with this game. I want the time investment high enough that finding party members to assist with retrieval to be a lower time investment.
In general I think they should (and do) care how their designs affect players emotions... BUT at the same time they should not be afraid to do things because people have a reaction either. Im sure that explaination is fairly ambigious so I am sure people will interpret it a lot of different ways. In essence what I mean is that they should be aware of what they do and how it will affect people, but if they want to make something tricky or harsh sometimes they should just roll with that if they have good reason to do so and not bend too easily under the pressures of player emotions.
I personally thought the only thing that was unreasonable with Everquest corpse runs (Aside from the permanent gear loss originally) was being bound halfway across the world.
If every zone had a graveyard somewhere that would be much more reasonable and much less micro-managerial when you died. I still wouldn't be opposed to having a permanent bind location where a specific class could teleport you to, however.
Raidan said:My final thoughts: I am one of the one's today that fall squarely into the "2 hour chunk" (on a great day); however, I want Pantheon to have all the challenge of EQ1 and I'd be ok with more. However, there's a reason that I'm ok with this - I have a difference of expectations. I won't be the first to max level, first to complete all the major quests, first grandmaster blacksmith, best gear, etc. It may take me a year+ to achieve max level; however, I'd be ok with that, and, that's where I would argue that most people's troubles are today. They want the "challenge" of old school within their own time constraints - it's "not" going to happen. What can happen though is people enjoying a challenging game reaching max level at a much slower pace. However, just because you won't be a server first, still doesn't mean you can't be the most skilled player.And.. I could go on with many more points, but you get the idea, it's obviously a passionate topic of mine and sorry for not staying on topic Wandidar. I don't think the Devs should appeal to our emotions - we should be in their world - Pantheon.
Raidan sums it up for me with the above quote. I too want the EQ1 challenge, if not more, in Pantheon. I will never have a world first, be in the top tier uber raid guild, or any of the powergaming stuff. Like Raidan, a ton of my most enduring memories of EQ1 do not come from max level raids, but from the 1-60 leveling game. Too many awesome stories to recount, but no other game has ever stuck with me like EQ1. It wasn't the prettiest, nor was it the first MMO or big D&D type of game I had played. It was just....correct. I can't explain why, but no toher game comes close, even now, to being as "correct" as EQ1 where MMO PVE is concerned.
I will be ok if getting 5 more points in Tailoring takes an entire evening, or getting from the current 15-20 leveling spot I am in to a new 15-20 leveling spot takes a few hours, or there is a door/gate/drawbridge to a zone I never see because I never beat the content and/or quest that opens that door. That's how it should be. Until I cam back in the post-PoP EQ1, I had never been to Plane of Mischief. It was like the holy grail to me, because before it got EZ-moded to the waterfall in Great Divide, the only way to get there was a small door in a hallway behind the boss dragon of the hardest raid zone in the game. To even lay eyes on that door meant you were in a top tier (server #1 or #2) guild, and had NToV on farm or close to. That was awesome. The epic weapon quests were awesome. Being a max level tradeskiller (before AAXP) and having a base 5% to fail any combine and lose all your expensive mats...that was awesome. Even mundane tasks in EQ1 could make you cr@p_your_pants scared. Good. Great. How it should be.
I want VR to make the world they think is awesome, cool, fun, challenging, tough, scary...the whole nine yards. I'll sort out my own emotions once I jump in and start running around that world. I don't need VR to protect my fragile sensibilities. FROM Software, CCP, and plenty other devs and indie gamers are making tough, we_don't_care_how_you_feel games, and they are all selling plenty of boxes. No reason we cannot return to proper 1999 MMO PVE the way it is supposed to be and sell a bunch of boxes.
The question itself is a little troubling, partly because there are two answers. Let me use another genre to see the danger in the question itself. Suppose I asked the question:
How much should horror movie writers worry about our emotions.
Well, the danger is that you could get a lot of people who really don't like horror movies saying dumb things like: who likes to be scared. Nobody likes to be scared, and nobody likes to be grossed out, so they should really tone it down and add a bunch of romance to the movie. I mean who doesn't like a good romance. In some sense, the answer seems perfectly logical, but ultimately anyone saying that either doesn't like horror movies or probabely wouldn't like one that would be made following their own advice because they don't understand what they really do like about horror movies.
The second answer is simply that at some level game play is really all about emotion. All entertainment is. All entertainment is intangible. There is no forumla for what is the best death penalty. At the end of the day nobody who hasn't played the game can really say what the best death penalty is. All they can do is set up the parameters they think they would use to judge the death penalty. For me, I want to fear death, but even though I want to fear death there's a point where it becomes frustrating if you can't ever make progress because you die before you recover. So it's kind of a trade off. Too harsh and it could be too frustrating. To leanient and it could work against creating a challenge. It kind of has to be done by feel.
When I first started playing EQ the long runs to recover my corpse was a pain and it teached me to die fighting or to run if I had a chance because death hurt. When I was higher level the running to my coprse was easy because with the newer expansions you could bind closer. At higher levels it didn't bother me so much because their was more options on binding closer and I thought this was an improvement over the earlier zones. In the years that I started playing better computers and internet also came out which made running to your corpse easier because you didn't get as many disconnections while zoning. This might also play a small factor that running to receive your corpse across multiple zones was in no way difficult just annoying to be honest.
What really SCARED me about death in EQ at higher levels was losing XP. I remember getting into some groups and after a death losing an hours worth of XP and other nights barely coming out of a group with more then I could have got by myself solo. I do admit that sometimes these groups weren't built the best because I lived in Japan at the time and it was very difficult to find a group because of the odd hours.
I don't mind running to receive my corpse but I want the ability to bind in my current zone that I'm playing in. You still have to run to the other side of the zone or fight your way back to the area of the dungeon you died in. If I forget to bind at the zone in or choose to stay bound in a city then that's my option. For some classes in EQ this is exactly the option that they had. But for a Ranger like myself I always had to get a bind at the nearest zone that allowed them or I had a long run in front of me.
I prefer a harsh XP penalty that hits you in the gut this IMHO forces players to think about their actions and make them into better players.
bigdogchris said:Aradune said:Here's the good news, twofold:
1. We will tweak and alter the severity of the death penalty during beta, in an attempt to dial in on what is best for the game and our target audience.
2. If our target audiences remains split after this testing, we have the option of making alternate ruleset servers, where, amongst other things, the death penalty could vary in severity.
Something like this would be attractive if the more sever death penalty server (or other more hardcore rules) having a 5 or 10% (or more) experience bonus.
More than an exp bonus. I think it would call for a slight increase to the rare spawn and rare drop rates, as well as more coin. The need to gain experience is often temporary, while the added risk would be permanent. I can tell you for certain that less mobs will be killed and less items will be looted on a server with corpse runs so it all balances out.
Risk vs reward.
Aradune said:Here's the good news, twofold:
1. We will tweak and alter the severity of the death penalty during beta, in an attempt to dial in on what is best for the game and our target audience.
2. If our target audiences remains split after this testing, we have the option of making alternate ruleset servers, where, amongst other things, the death penalty could vary in severity.
1. I like number 1, I am sure that you are aware that testers may be a more resilient lot than you average gamer.
2. I would like to caution against seperate ruleset servers in this case because it complicates the issue of server transfers and mergers as it pertains to equality in economy and character progression.
I am assuming that on a harsher death penalty server there is less gold because harder mobs are being killed less frequently in a set amount of time versus an easier server. If Sally has been playing on the softer death penalty server, should she be able to transfer her character and her wealth to a harsher server? I would be against that. If server mergers would to take place, wouldn't the people on the hardcore server be at a disadvantage financially and maybe even in progression?
I would try to keep the death penalty the same on all servers. You want Pantheon to be known for its seperation from other games - One of the seperating factors is a Corpse Run. I wouldn't water that down for some people or make it harsher for others. Rather find a balance, just like there is balance for all other parts of the game (ie grind, travel time, leveling rate etc)
Again I like #1. You did it with EQ and Vanguard, and I am confident that you will find a death penalty that is appropriate for your game. You have a good eye for putting out content that is fun and engaging for us. :)
To Liav's point; it is the death mechanic in question. The forced learning/capability that is associated with the old mechanic is what I recall, but the forced learning/capability may not be the same result accross all players. Server Rulesets may be the answer to the question "Which Niche?"
Manouk said:To Liav's point; it is the death mechanic in question. The forced learning/capability that is associated with the old mechanic is what I recall, but the forced learning/capability may not be the same result accross all players. Server Rulesets may be the answer to the question "Which Niche?"
I like the idea of server rulesets, but I'm also worried about splintering the population into too many groups. MMOs inevitably have a population dropoff after some duration of time, and having 150-200 players on, say, 5 servers with different rulesets is a lot unhealthier for a game than 750-1000 all on a single server, or split 50/50.
I can't really begin to speculate about the number of people Pantheon is going to draw in, how good of a game it's going to be, or its longevity. Dividing up your population too much early on can lead to a lot of fairly obvious problems, though.
Liav said:I like the idea of server rulesets, but I'm also worried about splintering the population into too many groups. MMOs inevitably have a population dropoff after some duration of time, and having 150-200 players on, say, 5 servers with different rulesets is a lot unhealthier for a game than 750-1000 all on a single server, or split 50/50.
I can't really begin to speculate about the number of people Pantheon is going to draw in, how good of a game it's going to be, or its longevity. Diving up your population too much early on can lead to a lot of fairly obvious problems, though.
Hey, I knew we'd agree on something sooner or later! c(: I don't mind having different server rulesets, but only if it was proven that there was going to be enough people to keep each server's population high. I have no idea what the expectations are even going to be going in...just hoping for enough for one server? Five? Nothing depresses me and makes me want to give up on a game faster than a ghosttown server.
Zarriya said:Aradune said:Here's the good news, twofold:
1. We will tweak and alter the severity of the death penalty during beta, in an attempt to dial in on what is best for the game and our target audience.
2. If our target audiences remains split after this testing, we have the option of making alternate ruleset servers, where, amongst other things, the death penalty could vary in severity.
2. I would like to caution against seperate ruleset servers in this case because it complicates the issue of server transfers and mergers as it pertains to equality in economy and character progression.
I am assuming that on a harsher death penalty server there is less gold because harder mobs are being killed less frequently in a set amount of time versus an easier server. If Sally has been playing on the softer death penalty server, should she be able to transfer her character and her wealth to a harsher server? I would be against that. If server mergers would to take place, wouldn't the people on the hardcore server be at a disadvantage financially and maybe even in progression?
I would try to keep the death penalty the same on all servers. You want Pantheon to be known for its seperation from other games - One of the seperating factors is a Corpse Run. I wouldn't water that down for some people or make it harsher for others. Rather find a balance, just like there is balance for all other parts of the game (ie grind, travel time, leveling rate etc)
Again I like #1. You did it with EQ and Vanguard, and I am confident that you will find a death penalty that is appropriate for your game. You have a good eye for putting out content that is fun and engaging for us. :)
Theres a simple solution to that problem. Don't allow players to transfer from an easier server to a harder server.
VR should not be bound by such trivial matters when it comes to determining important things like server rulesets and game mechanics.
Simple fix. Different servers with different rulesets and mechanics. You could have an easier server with less of a harsh death, and another with the classic-as-**** death penalty of taking a bite out of your exp bar and making you walk your sorry ass back to your carcass(the way it SHOULD be! :D )