RPG

Spoiler

I definitely agree with you, the game has to be responsive enough to feel like your death is based on your own skill.

 

Actually, having a skill based combat system would be perfect for a game where the penalty for death is designed to put you on edge, since it contributes to your already intense combat. I'd think a combat system like Monster Hunter would be ideal, where you stats are based on things like equipment, abilities, and buffs rather than exp and level and where you have to get a feel for the pace of combat while reacting quickly to new threats and deadly attacks.

 

As for lagging and dropped connections, I'd think that game designers would simply have to do a better job handling them and designing around them, as game design has been lacking in almost all departments nowadays. Lag is inevitable, as every individual player will have problems with their personal connection, and while you can't just remove the penalty since some players may disconnect to avoid it, you could do something like completing your combat offline with players replaced with npcs of similar ability. Also, it might be a good idea to toy with different subscription fees to find a sweet spot to get the lowest server population density, since the higher you go, the more server power you'll have but the less players you'll have.

 

Also, pking has the potential to get really obnoxious. However, that's just because most games aren't designed to handle obnoxious pvp, they simply expect damage control systems to remove those people from the system, which always takes too long, and design combat around a community of players with great sportsmanship. Instead, they could create skills specifically for handling pvp, especially for fighting defensively and preventing sneak attacks, and not just sneak skills but rather attacks from off camera.

 

Lastly, while a death penalty seems like a great idea, there should obviously be exceptions, especially if it's the lockout penalty. Beginners, safe zones around major basic cities, and victims of pking are some obvious ones, though it should probably be adjusted as the game grows.

Spoiler

I think the harshness of the penalty needs to reflect the capacity to avoid it. If the game is mindlessly difficult, you'll just think the game is being purposefully annoying.
You have no idea how many times I stopped playing Demon / Dark souls because I practically lost everything. And most of the times that happened, was because the controls were so unfriendly that I couldn't even say it was due to my own inaptitude(aiming with a bow at those bloody flying sting rays in Demon's Souls which push you off the ledge, ffs..). Dark souls is a bit more balanced, but Demon Souls? H-o-l-y s-h-i-t, until I found that game-quit exploit...I didn't get annoyed for the lost resources, it was because I had to start the entire level all over again because the camera was shitty or some surprise trap fucked up my game. And at least in 'Souls games, I do not compete against anyone. If I get fucked around like that in an online game, I'd lose a lot more than just losing a few points, other people will be way ahead of me. I'll effectively lose a lot of progress just because "the game is being annoying."

For these penalties to work, the player has to feel like one was completely responsible for the result, and it was due to one's own inaptitude, not because the game has unfriendly controls or the devs are just being a bunch of dicks. Otherwise, It's like saying "you're not trying hard enough" to someone who's no idea what you want from him. A punishing game has to be very clever about how it plays, rather how it punishes you (like, say, making it really easy to start the game again (like in dark-souls u: )). And the problem with MMORPGs, is that you can easily die for reasons which are not your fault, like PVP.

Also, everyone understands that Appetizer is probably definitely this horned lady who's name I don't feel like double checking the spelling of, right? Or at least her sister or something.

 

Not a spoiler except by way of my psychic story predictions. No one else can see this coming, right? <3

Eh?  I thought Nibelungen (the horned one) was Merry Merry, the crazy stalker girl.  Appetizer had clearly never met Raquia before; I'm pretty sure she's said so herself.  And Raquia would have recognized her too.

Also, everyone understands that Appetizer is probably definitely this horned lady who's name I don't feel like double checking the spelling of, right? Or at least her sister or something.

 

Not a spoiler except by way of my psychic story predictions. No one else can see this coming, right? <3

That was my first thought, The second one was that there's similar avatars in the game.

Also, everyone understands that Appetizer is probably definitely this horned lady who's name I don't feel like double checking the spelling of, right? Or at least her sister or something.

Not a spoiler except by way of my psychic story predictions. No one else can see this coming, right? <3

Seriously, Raiquia, you're just not you when you're hungry. Have a snickers.

"Thanks man. Nearly disbanded the guild and never came back to the game locking you and everyone else out of the Eastern continent forever."

Wut?

"Nothing. What? Who said that? What a silly idea. Who would even do that?"

>____>;;;;

*Alternate RPG short one-shot universe*

Spoiler

Actually, that's once again confirmation bias, as you're confirming your existing opinion with facts that are circumstantial, since it isn't a controlled study where the only factor is the difference of penalties and there's a control group. My personal opinion, considering this anecdote of yours where players left because of the death penalty, is that it's not a matter of how harsh the penalty is but how it's applied.

 

For this penalty to work, it has to create a sense of tension for the player by risking something that they value and can't get back by doing what they already do. You can do this by locking them out, which is time they've set aside to play and can't get back, changing their ingame storyline so that npcs treat them differently and quest opportunities are lost or change, since they can't just reload an old save file, etc. You can't do it by forcing them to grind more to regain their lost exp, repair their equipment, or recover lost items, respawning them elsewhere so they have to walk, using microtransactions to sell them extra revives, etc.

You can do this by locking them out, which is time they've set aside to play and can't get back,

This is exactly why it would never work.

So you want me to produce data that literally cannot exist, and because I cannot produce this non existant data my argument is invalid?

 

How about this. Everquest had a significant death penalty, hours worth of XP lost when you died. WoW shows up with it's minor durability cost on death. Everquest's playerbase evaporated while WoW's playerbase skyrocketed. Death penalty is hardly the only reason for that, but it IS a factor. The supervast majority are not interested in harsh death penalties, tedious gameplay, or overly difficult PvE. This IS a fact. I don't need 'data' to say that, because simply paying attention proves it as true.

 Actual data, using a polished MMO with 24 hours forced logout vs one without

So you want me to produce data that literally cannot exist, and because I cannot produce this non existant data my argument is invalid?

How about this. Everquest had a significant death penalty, hours worth of XP lost when you died. WoW shows up with it's minor durability cost on death. Everquest's playerbase evaporated while WoW's playerbase skyrocketed. Death penalty is hardly the only reason for that, but it IS a factor. The supervast majority are not interested in harsh death penalties, tedious gameplay, or overly difficult PvE. This IS a fact. I don't need 'data' to say that, because simply paying attention proves it as true.

People always say they prefer their coffee black, but when you open up their actual coffee cup that shit's milky as fuck and sugered to the sky. In MMO terms, they always say they want things harder and more tedious, but when the chips are counted, WoW, even after a decade and 3 poor expansions (with heavy player loss), is the MMO that still dominates all others. It dominates all of them with a very light death penalty, and, ignoring hard mode/herioc/mythic dungeons and raids, very easy PvE content.

 

The number of people legitimately interested in arbitrarily heavy death penalties or overly difficult PvE content are an incredibly tiny minority.

Please don't try to talk for everybody at large unless you have hard statistics and meaningful data to back it up because your opinion is certainly not equally the opinion of everybody else. Actual data, using a polished MMO with 24 hours forced logout vs one without - not just presenting WoW subscriber numbers and trivializing them by saying "This can only mean people like lenient death mechanics!" or anything like that, until you can do that please don't try to misrepresent your opinions and assumptions as 'facts'.

I'll generally agree with that, the only thing I'll add is that people will whine and look for flaws no matter what and no matter how good or bad you treat them or the quality of their situation. Maybe not too much in real life but especially so on the internet, leechers for translations are a perfect example of what I mean for this; if people who are getting free content decide they're not getting that free content fast enough or good enough or don't like some quality about how it's presented to them then they complain until the translator gets bored and quits - seen that happen one too many times. About the only way I can think around that is LMS style, where the starting territory & class choice is small but all the content is in the game already and players have to explore and do quests to find and unlock everything themselves with a strict policy of non interference on the part of the company if you get what I mean.

Still though, my original idea is / would be based upon a polished VRMMO with benefits and stuff, with death and forced logout basically getting people to be a little more sedate in how they play unless they're confident enough in their skills to risk punching above their weight class and actually dying basically being a forced break and telling them to go do something else for a bit (no alts) instead of playing 24/7 to the point of exhaustion. An existing MMO with a notable death penalty would still attract players done right, it's just not really what my original idea was based on.

Anyways, the reason why real world gaming don't use a "meaningful" death penalty is because it isn't good for business. 

Amplify & Solipsist, forgive me if I missed something as I'm kinda jumping into this conversation without reading the entire thing, but you both have some valid points and miss some others.

tl;dr version

Oh cool I see you're a super expert on the subject and well versed on the matter of why people do / don't play games.

I polled all of my friends and guild mates earlier just for fun after your previous post, the result was completely unanimous: As long as the 24 hours of forced downtime is not counted as part of your subscription (Example: If you've subscribed for 30 days and die during that period, the subscription pauses until you're no longer dead so you still get 30 days instead of 29 days worth.) then they would jump at it and all loved the idea of playing an MMO where death is meaningful and something they would have to be truly cautious of.

 

Additionally, please show me where I stated that "death penalty isn't arbitrarily punishing enough" is why people quit, rather than what I did say: that the game has reached the point of triviality with no meaning or challenge left to it (not limited to just death, to point it out for your tunnel vision.)

 

Mate, not many people want everything to be easily handed to them on a silver platter, there is no meaning to achieving something with a difficulty of 1/10 or 0/10. Why wouldn't you want to earn your achievements?

People always say they prefer their coffee black, but when you open up their actual coffee cup that shit's milky as fuck and sugered to the sky. In MMO terms, they always say they want things harder and more tedious, but when the chips are counted, WoW, even after a decade and 3 poor expansions (with heavy player loss), is the MMO that still dominates all others. It dominates all of them with a very light death penalty, and, ignoring hard mode/herioc/mythic dungeons and raids, very easy PvE content.

The number of people legitimately interested in arbitrarily heavy death penalties or overly difficult PvE content are an incredibly tiny minority.

Amplify, I'll pitch in my opinion regarding the matter.
It's quite simple, me thinks: The more demanding something becomes, the more people people center on its shortcomings.
The more "high class" pretentious a movie attempts to be, the more people will look for flaws in it.

That essentially means, that the harder a game sets itself to be, the more polished it is required to be.
If a game is harsh with its audience, the game must be robust enough to withstand their retorting harshness.
And such a game, is something not a lot of companies are willing, or can afford, to make. Especially not the Korean industry which bombards infinite number of the same bloody MMO, which only exist to tank on the "whales", the P2W folks who buy big merchandise, and then drop the game after a year or so.

People don't quit a game because it's death penalty isn't arbitrarily punishing enough, and to put that idea forth as a serious claim is the most ridiculous of nonsense.

 

People quit games for inter-class balance reasons, for poor gameplay mechanics, and for running out of content, not because dying in game doesn't peg out the TediuMeter.

Oh cool I see you're a super expert on the subject and well versed on the matter of why people do / don't play games.

I polled all of my friends and guild mates earlier just for fun after your previous post, the result was completely unanimous: As long as the 24 hours of forced downtime is not counted as part of your subscription (Example: If you've subscribed for 30 days and die during that period, the subscription pauses until you're no longer dead so you still get 30 days instead of 29 days worth.) then they would jump at it and all loved the idea of playing an MMO where death is meaningful and something they would have to be truly cautious of.

Additionally, please show me where I stated that "death penalty isn't arbitrarily punishing enough" is why people quit, rather than what I did say: that the game has reached the point of triviality with no meaning or challenge left to it (not limited to just death, to point it out for your tunnel vision.)

Mate, not many people want everything to be easily handed to them on a silver platter, there is no meaning to achieving something with a difficulty of 1/10 or 0/10. Why wouldn't you want to earn your achievements?

 

 

Death is supposed to be more than just a minor inconvenience, whether it's a game or not is irrelevant to that and if you reach a point in a game where death doesn't matter to you then you're probably just going to get bored and quit anyway since there's no risk , no challenge and thus nothing to do.

 

People don't quit a game because it's death penalty isn't arbitrarily punishing enough, and to put that idea forth as a serious claim is the most ridiculous of nonsense.

People quit games for inter-class balance reasons, for poor gameplay mechanics, and for running out of content, not because dying in game doesn't peg out the TediuMeter.

I'd say that actually Zhan Long has the right approach to how death should be handled in MMO. The level loss is big enough to matter, players can drop items, and they need to run to the corpse. But it's not something that prevents you from playing.

Don't forget, it's a game, not an actual fantasy world. Dying in a MMOPRG is a common thing.

Imagine a 24h death penalty in any current MMO. That kind of game would never be popular, and only hardcore players would play it.

The only reason for huge death penalty - in VR games - could be so that people don't stop fearing death IRL.

But then you'd get people doing what Ark did at the start of Ark - people with nothing to lose (no items of importance and no levels they care about) just constantly zerg rushing as a distraction or meat shield or ghost spies or other stupid things like that, if you have a system like that in place then people will exploit it. You're only going to care about losing a level and an item if you're the #1 level in the entire game or you drop some super rare important item that you can't get back.

Death is supposed to be more than just a minor inconvenience, whether it's a game or not is irrelevant to that and if you reach a point in a game where death doesn't matter to you then you're probably just going to get bored and quit anyway since there's no risk , no challenge and thus nothing to do. Take a VRMMO and have death be a 24 hour forced logout with a 5 minute window in darkness after death. Give high skilled priests a resurrection spell that can be used once per day in that 5 minute but gives a small penalty for use for both sides of some sort or the player can either choose to wait 24 hours with no other penalty or force resurrect at a safe point with a harsh penalty. Something like that would be about right.

"Imagine a 24h death penalty in any current MMO. That kind of game would never be popular, and only hardcore players would play it."

I'm imagining it and incredibly casual people who just want everything handed to them on a silver platter with no effort involved would probably whine about it but if you're catering to the P2W crowd then you're probably doing something wrong. I'd play the fuck out of a game with a proper death penalty like LMS has, Zhan Long's version however I'd try it as a novelty for the VR part but with how death is not a threat but only a minor annoyance I wouldn't stay long at all.

What's wrong with a big death penalty in a VRMMO like LMS's 24 hours forced logout?

If the penalty was minimal you'd just get people keep resurrecting and rejoining the fight almost infinitely like in Zhan Long which is just dumb. When death means something like "You won't get to play again for 24 hours" then people treasure their lives and do their best instead of just running face first into the meat grinder.

 

Whatever, I think you should understand what I'm driving at, at least.

I'd say that actually Zhan Long has the right approach to how death should be handled in MMO. The level loss is big enough to matter, players can drop items, and they need to run to the corpse. But it's not something that prevents you from playing.

Don't forget, it's a game, not an actual fantasy world. Dying in a MMOPRG is a common thing.

Imagine a 24h death penalty in any current MMO. That kind of game would never be popular, and only hardcore players would play it.

The only reason for huge death penalty - in VR games - could be so that people don't stop fearing death IRL.

Why do all RPG-fantasy authors like to introduce insane death penalties?..

Well, at least it's not as bad as Ark with losing stats forever, or LMS with a whole day to rez...

What's wrong with a big death penalty in a VRMMO like LMS's 24 hours forced logout?

If the penalty was minimal you'd just get people keep resurrecting and rejoining the fight almost infinitely like in Zhan Long which is just dumb. When death means something like "You won't get to play again for 24 hours" then people treasure their lives and do their best instead of just running face first into the meat grinder.

Whatever, I think you should understand what I'm driving at, at least.

Why do all RPG-fantasy authors like to introduce insane death penalties?..

Well, at least it's not as bad as Ark with losing stats forever, or LMS with a whole day to rez...

Seems like we began to tread upon the uncomfortable territory of "Needless drama". Hopefully it won't plague the story too much to generate cheap ass plot.
Although, tbh, I feel like the author is beginning to lose his angle at this point (chapter 13-12).