Death and Dying Penalty

[Legacy_Eradrain]

               

TSMDude wrote...

Eradrain wrote...
 Nothing is going to make me quit a server faster than spending 2 hours in a dungeon only to die, and lose all/most of the XP I just farmed up due to a stupid death. 

No offense but if you just sat around farming experince then I think the type of server you are talking about is different than the ones many of the Role Playing Servers are talking about here.

I think you seriously misunderstood the tenor of my entire post. 

I'll start my responses here - Last I checked, the most expedient way to level up on TSM as well as any other RP server was dungeon running, not roleplaying.  I do enjoy RP, but I also enjoy RPing on powerful characters, because epic-level RP is the most fun for me and closest to what I enjoy.

Just because it's an RP server doesn't mean the rules need to somehow be more brutal when it comes to dying.  Especially since all/almost all RP servers assume that you're going to get the majority of your XP from dungeons/scripted quests.  If a server is based on that assumption, it seems strange to denigrate people who play by those rules, and call them Action-Lovers or, Poor-RPers, or something.  A pure RP server would give zero XP when you kill a monster (And indeed, my server is going to do that.  All XP comes from scripted and DM quests, you can dungeonhunt if you want, but it will net you no XP at all).

Eradrain wrote...
  The idea of actually experiencing permadeath due to some similarly ridiculous scenario is grounds for me giving a server a 1.0 out of 10 on the vault.  My character is a significant investment of my time - if a DM or admin decides that they can flush that time investment down the toilet because of some love of realism or whatever, they don't deserve my patronage.

Giving it a 1 because the server has bugs, no trans, is poorly made I understand.

Giving it a 1 because you disagree with the policies that a server puts into place is kinda as you said, asinine and insulting.

When the server in question has a rule that states, in effect, "If certain things happen to your character, we will take him away from you forever," I don't consider that a policy.  I consider that downright nasty.

I've permakilled some of my characters before, but it was always my decision.  If I found a server admin or DM trying to make that decision for me, I'd tell them precisely where to stick it.

I'm the kind of person who usually focuses his entire creative energy on a server into one particular character.  I build up that character's personality, I get into his mind, I develop his relationships and motivations, I make him powerful because my character concepts are almost always powerful ones.  If I feel that his story is concluded, I will have him die.  But it can't be anyone else's choice but mine.

If someone makes that decision for me, they've removed me from their community both figuratively and literally.  Figuratively in the sense that this one character was my anchor to said community, that he was my link to the IC world.  Literally in the sense that I will, yes, actually quit.

Permadeath is and should be a creative tool, never a punishment.  Never, ever a punishment.

Eradrain wrote...
No penalties, no punishments. The player feels like they're having fun and experiencing new game content even while dead. They're not robbed of XP or money, and yet there's still the possibility of extended quasi-permadeath scenarios if their friends aren't quick to fetch them from the underworld.

Yet they are forced to do another quest system everytime they die? After the first time around it is no longer "new" content and therefore might even been seen as a more worse penalty to go and fed ex quest things as a blob.

This is where you misunderstood my point the most.  Nobody is forced to do anything once they die.  The quests and dialog and stuff in Sheol is purely optional.  It's there for the player to see if they want to, if they enjoy experiencing that kind of content (And my server won't be public, it will be invite-only as far as I've decided at this time, so I doubt there'll be many people playing there who don't share my enthusiasm for exploration).

If a player is inclined to get right back into the gameworld, all they need to do is go directly to the tower and bargain with the guy.  Takes all of 2 minutes, once you know your way around.

And even if a player dislikes my death system, at least it makes sense in the game world.  At least it is grounded in the lore - when you die, you go to the afterlife.  You're talking about RP servers, right?  How it is more RP-relevant and immersive to, instead, just dock 10% of XP when you die?

Eradrain wrote...
I don't believe that dying constitutes some kind of failure, that needs to be punished.  The people in this thread that do strike me as, to be quite honest, a little masochistic.  It's a game.  There's nothing fun about losing the character you've been building (by farming?) and the relationships you've been forging with other characters because the spawn trigger created one too many goblins for you to kill in time.  There's nothing fun about being faced with monumental XP/GP taxes on respawning.  It's just not what I want to deal with at the end of a long, hard day, when I log on to enjoy a little game time.

Which is fine but insulting others for thier views who enjoy just as you do, gaming thier way is not wrong. It is why if you are deciding to HOST a world and Admin it you need to elarn that your view is not the right one.

Your Player Base idea is.

Ben pretty much summed up my points right on the money, with regard to this.

I'd rather have a server with me and 4 close friends than a server with 30+ people on all the time.  That brings drama, that brings reduced quality to the overall roleplaying atmosphere, it forces the admin to compromise (Which is fine on a Forgotten Realms server where everyone can know the lore equally well, but my server is a home-brewed setting, I'm inventing it from the ground up) and ultimately, it can either lead to favoritism or the illusion of favoritism, as the DMs are accused of serving some people more than others (Which always seems to happen).

If I had me, and 4 other players, all of whom were also DMs and we just ran stories for eachother, I think I'd have a lot of fun.

And I didn't mean to insult you, or anybody else, by using the word Masochistic.  I just really don't understand the point of view that holds that there's something good about losing demonstrable progress on your character.  It feels frustrating because it's basically real-life time taken away from you, erased, undone.
               
               

               

                     Modifié par Eradrain, 09 septembre 2010 - 10:31 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_Eradrain]

               

olivier leroux wrote...

In single player mods I never
respawn unless death and resurrection is deeply embedded in the module,
offering new insights and experiences. Or when it's a Monty Haul module
and I don't care about losing gold and xp but I'm eager to continue
playing. Generally though I assume my PC has died - which would be the
end of it all - and therefor I choose to just ignore this tragic event
and reload a savegame to change the course of the story. As a sidenote,
even though I usually don't use the Respawn button, I don't like it when
I notice respawning just means your PCs will stand up again and
continue fighting as if nothing happened and there's no penalty or death
temple whatsoever. That takes the challenge out of combats and I'll
start to wonder why there are combats in the mod anyway.

On PWs, I
can live with reasonable xp and gold penalties. If you can regain the
xp by defeating, let's say 5-10 creatures of your level, that's fine. If
you have to defeat 20-50, that's a very hard punishment that might
quench a player's thirst for adventures. What I'm very sceptical of are
systems that punish players by stealing their time. Having to retrace a
long way to get back where you died or having to wait for other players'
help (unless the server is full of people who will rush to your aid in
no time) are good reasons for me to leave a server and spend my time
elsewhere.

I like the idea that the penalty for dying is also
connected with some kind of reward or consolation, even if it's just the
opportunity to see different areas, talk to different people etc. What
Eradrain described could work for me if it's well done. Another idea
(probably more on the Action side) would be the chance to gain something
special as a recompensation, or at least win back what you lost through
death - with the risk of drawing a blank or something even worse.
Anyway, for me it all depends on how it's done and how much creativity
was at work. Something utterly horrible for my PC could turn out
something pretty cool for my playing experience. If you blend death and
penalties with stories, quests, intrigueing or funny conversations,
spectacular effects etc. I will even praise you for 'punishing' my PC.
If it just feels like bland OOC punishment I won't. Taking away a point
of CON, for example, would only be okay if there was more to it than
just a degradation of my stats and a worsening of my chances to be
successful. And there should be a way to regain it, something exciting
that doesn't feel like a chore.

BTW, I acknowledge if respawning
is embedded in a PW's setting. There should be a good IC explanation as
to why it is possible and what it actually means. In the D&D
universe, at least as far as CRPGs are concerned, resurrections are a
much too common occurence for my taste. I don't like permadeath though.
Permadeath is not for me. But treating death as unconciousness or
similar approaches would get the thumbs up from this player.
[smilie]../../../images/forum/emoticons/smile.png[/smilie]

Where I'm coming from:

I'm hesitant to use the common labels to define my preferences. Terms
like "Action" and "(Hardcore) Roleplay" are often conceived as
diametrically opposed and used by one side to express their dislike of
the other. I refuse to take sides because I cherish both aspects of the
game when they're not overdone. But if you insist, perhaps you could say
I'm a casual and curious Action player with a dislike for grinding and a
strong love for unrestricted Roleplay and well thought-out settings.

Experiencing
the world is more important to me than my character builds, as long as
I'm able to survive and continue exploring. But I care about my
characters' personality. I also like things that are frowned upon on
some servers, like running through towns occasionally. And I love to
roleplay should the occasion arise (actually you can always find a
roleplay explanation for the supposedly OOC things you just did [smilie]../../../images/forum/emoticons/tongue.png[/smilie]
). My interest is more in atmosphere than in stats and equipment but
that doesn't mean I want powerful stuff taken away from me when I need
it for surviving my expeditions deeper into the PW. I want to be able to
see more of it than just the local inn...

I agree with this entire post.

Especially the bits on being wary of respawn systems that steal a player's time, and the fact that people draw this hard distinction between action and RP (The two aren't mutually exclusive, and I always resent it when people on RP servers categorize me as an action-oriented player, when I'm not).
               
               

               

                     Modifié par Eradrain, 09 septembre 2010 - 06:48 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_Darkfire_Avlis]

               http://wiki.avlis.org/Death_and_Dying

Dying in Avlis is different than dying in single-player NWN.

Dying on Avlis is a hindrance. It is meant to be so, to make Avlis both challenging and engaging. There is no reason to fear death in single-player NWN, but plenty of reason to fear death in Avlis.

When a character in Avlis takes enough damage to reduce his hitpoints below zero, he falls down and begins to bleed to death. There is slight chance that he will begin to recover – if that happens he will begin to gain hit points slowly until he reaches a positive number, and he will stand up again (and be temporarily Slowed, to represent the disorientation that can come with a brush with death). But more often than not the character continues to bleed until he reaches -10 hit points, at which time he dies and his soul leaves his body. Any PC with more than two character levels loses 50 XP for each level he has. This will sometimes cause characters to lose a level.

The character's soul travels to one of the Outer Planes, which on Avlis are sometimes merely called the Death Planes. The plane to which the character travels is dependent upon that character's alignment; for example, a purely Chaotic Neutral character will find that his soul travels to Limbo, the Outer Plane of pure Chaos.

Death Planes are based on numerical alignment; every character has two alignment axes (Law/Chaos and Good/Evil) and numbers associated therewith on their character sheet. Thus if your numerical Good rating is high and your numerical Chaotic rating is high, your character sheet will read "Chaotic Good"; however, if you look further you will see the actual numbers. There are 17 Death Planes, and only 9 alignment titles (e.g. Lawful Good, Chaotic Good, Neutral Good, etc.). That means that you can be completely Chaotic and completely Good and go to Arborea, or be a bit less Good (but still CG on your character sheet) and go to Ysgard... or a bit less Chaotic (but still CG on your character sheet) and go to the Beastlands, etc.

Once he has reached the death the plane the character must undertake a short quest before being able to exit. Characters who successfully complete this death quest will regain the XP that they lost upon dying. When a character leaves the death plane in this manner he does not return to the place where he died, but instead to a set location. For example, in Mikona people who die will return from death to find themselves in that city's temple to Mikon. They must then make what is called the dreaded naked run back to their body.

Body? Yes – when a character dies in Avlis, his soul goes to the death plane with none of his possessions except for his gold, and certain special items. All of his items are left behind on a corpse that appears on the spot where he died. This is perhaps the biggest hindrance of death, because if he died in a dangerous place it might be very difficult for him to return to his corpse and reclaim his items. Also, while he is on the death plane or is returning to his corpse that corpse can be seen and examined by other characters – they can even take items from his corpse. Indeed, a character may return to his corpse to find some or even all of his items looted.

Alternatively, a character can be returned to life via the Raise Dead spell. This spell has the advantage of returning the character to the spot where he died, but he will not gain the XP he lost upon dying. Resurrection also has the same benefit, but players brought back with resurrection will regain their lost XP from dying.

It is important to make certain all items have been recovered from the corpse, and that the corpse disappears (sometimes this requires clicking on a empty corpse a second time to make it disappear). If the corpse is left there, and the character dies a second time before a server reset, it is possible that the belongings may be put on the old corpse.

I actually prefer harsher death systems than what Avlis uses, but unfortunately there's no way to take into consideration lag deaths, etc. so I prefer a system in an PW setting that takes into consideration unknown variables and an absence of constant DM supervision, which in the end boils down to what Avlis uses. It's what I am most familiar and comfortable with.

I just like there to be consequences to death, and I like a challenge. If the biggest thing I have to fear about death is clicking respawn, I don't really care if I die (too lenient) and if I face being permakilled I'm likely not even going to bother risking it (too harsh). Balance is where it's at!
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Karvon]

               I'm a firm believer in significant death penalties and/or permadeath, both as a player and DM.



I've played too many times with too many people who saw death as only a minor inconvenience, and failed to see little, or any, relationship between poor choices and getting smoked.



OTOH, I've played places where easy rez/respawns are simply a cover for poor/lazy design of the builder(s)/DM. I dislike that just as much, or more.



Karvon
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_B_Harrison]

               

Shia Luck wrote...

I also really like Ben's suggestions of unconciousness, captured etc, tho it can be a lot of work for a builder and it sounds like it would work better SP more so than MP. In MP you have your friends to raise you, unless it's TPK.

Just wanted to respond to this, as I was re-skimming the thread. In the system I'm using, the scripted sequences only occur if players die without at least one surviving party member in the area, or it's assumed that they're brought around/rescued one way or another by their companions and there's no injury roll. So essentially, it is single player or TPK only, but within a multiplayer environment.

Come to think of it, I could make it configurable...

In any case, I agree with Eradrain et al, overall, in making death/recovery systems that are rewarding for players (if not directly for characters); fun gameplay features that support roleplay without seeking to replace or enforce it. But I can understand why some prefer permadeath environments, and why they would be just as supported by scripting & module design.
               
               

               

                     Modifié par B_Harrison, 09 septembre 2010 - 09:56 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_Perramas]

               One reason I would never play a permadeath server. I am not creative nor am I a very good writer. I have to spend a lot of out of game hours coming up with a character background and developing their story. I also play to have fun and to me losing hours of time represented by experience points, items or my character is not even remotely fun to me.

               
               

               
            

[Legacy_TSMDude]

               Just a quick nudge to everyone on this;

We use Axe Murderer's Killer Death System and I highly recommond it as it allows for some neat bits and pieces that on moved to the Fugue where you can leave the Fugue one of four ways.

1/ You pay some life force aka XP to go back.

2/ You pay gold as in hard earned cash to pay your way out.

3/ You give up a random item...bwhahahahahaha! (Game chooses so it is a crap shoot.)

4/ You wait till someone lugs your sorry carcass to a Cleric to be raised.

There is a way to permadeath your PC as well but that is YOUR choice. Not ours.

Eradrain wrote...


I'll start my responses here - Last I checked, the most expedient way to level up on TSM as well as any other RP server was dungeon running, not roleplaying.  I do enjoy RP, but I also enjoy RPing on powerful characters, because epic-level RP is the most fun for me and closest to what I enjoy.

Just FYI it is not on our Server. Combat XP is very low and scripted quest, Role Playing XP given by players and Staff, Exploration XP, Crafting all are about the same in shares.

Timed XP drops account for the highest pay out in all honesty that are given by mesuring emotes/checking location of the player to see if they are active and RPing and not just logged in.
               
               

               

                     Modifié par TSMDude, 09 septembre 2010 - 11:01 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_Xovian]

               

TSMDude wrote...

Just a quick nudge to everyone on this;

We use Axe Murderer's Killer Death System and I highly recommond it as it allows for some neat bits and pieces that on moved to the Fugue where you can leave the Fugue one of four ways.

1/ You pay some life force aka XP to go back.

2/ You pay gold as in hard earned cash to pay your way out.

3/ You give up a random item...bwhahahahahaha! (Game chooses so it is a crap shoot.)

4/ You wait till someone lugs your sorry carcass to a Cleric to be raised.

There is a way to permadeath your PC as well but that is YOUR choice. Not ours.

Choices, now that's what the game is (or should be) all about, the more the better.
I also concur with the notion that RP and Action are not end all be all of the game, and that you can only have one but not the other. It's a little silly to think so IMO. I would think for many people it really depends on their mood.

-Sometimes you want to play the game and just kill stuff... (maybe you had a bad day at work?)
-Sometimes you want to chat and explore the world with a group, or just sit by the fire and tell stories of old times and adventures.
-Sometimes while your fighting, you tell the tales of how you fought such and such and how your whole party almost got beaten down to the furthest reaches of the abyss, only to be saved by some hapenstance or the like.
(In other words, for this latter, sometimes you do both at the same time).

As to death, in the game, I am not a fan of harsh penatlies.... reason being, death in real life is harsh enough, I don't need those experiences relived in my games. If I wanted reality, I wouldn't be playing a fantasy game to start with.
               
               

               

                     Modifié par Xovian, 09 septembre 2010 - 11:10 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_Shia Luck]

               

Genisys wrote...

Shia Luck wrote...

I think it's reasonable and normal to find another person's server rules annoying or without enough justification, taking into account your own beliefs.

Since when did the penalty of death become a rule?

Since the moment you logged into a server. Servers have rules.

Don't take it out of context. The point about the bit you quoted (and the bit you didn't quote), is that you can express an opinion without calling someone, or someone's decisions, "stOOpid".

I find it incredibly prejudicial to start saying decisions are "asinine" or "stOOpid" if you disagree with losing your XP or gear. To then vote 1 on NWVault is the height of egotestical arrogance. I know Genisys used to vote that way.

Your talking about 2 entirely different things here, one which applies to this thread, and one which is about something that happened on the nwvault.ign.com, um, how long ago?   If you got something against me that's fine, but that doesn't mean your right here either...

Less than 2 years ago. According to a recent post you made you were 11 in 1981 (Did I remember that correctly?) ..  2 years is not that long ago in terms of maturity if you are now about 40. TBH I used to think you were a petulant egotestical 13 year old and so never bothered to argue with you. Obviously I was wrong, and in hindsight I apologise for assuming things about you. Now I am trying to debate with you as if you are a mature person. Can we do that? Because I am afraid you will have to live with your past for as long as people remember how badly you acted. That does not mean you will never be forgiven. I personally think you are no worse now on BSN than any number of other highly opinionated posters, which is another reason I risked responding to what I view as poor arguments and pedantisism in this thread. Are you serious about being a better person or is this all PR? Are you able to debate and receive criticism these days?  

The judgement of whether I am right or not is decided individually by anyone who reads this thread/my posts and will likely only apply to them. Two perfectly reasonable people might disagree about how right or wrong I am. Few people have the detailed knowledge you & I have about your previous NWVault existence... or the circumstances of your disappearance from NWVault. And it can remain that way if you like. (If you don't remember who I am, send me a Pm and I'll prove to you exactly how nice I am being by not talking about everything I know in public.) As I said, you are acting normally, mostly, on BSN. I have no vendetta against you. I mentioned quite a few people in my post, you were but one of them. If you look back you'll see it was someone else who talked about giving a 1. You were just another example. Don't assume everything revolves around you and your opinion. I quoted a fact about the way you used to vote, that's all.

Let's get back to the point shall we?

Yet my opinion is death has to carry some penalty else there is no challenge in the fight.

The challenge isn't found in failure, the challenge is found in trying, regaurdless if you fail or succeed.

The level of challenge is not judged by someone's success or failure. Level of challenge is determined by the difficulty of the problem and the consequences of getting it wrong. When you risk losing something the challenge is greater than if life is constantly easy and nothing is at stake, no? Assuming a failure of facing the challenge is not a counter argument to my point.

(And if you don't want to party with anyhone else ever, there is no reason to be playing MP.)

Many players I've met are not very sociable, that doesn't mean they can't play in a world without being penalized for not having a party member with them, nor should Multi-Player be 100% about partying either...

??  ...OK, you need an argument to support your position or help me understand that. MP IS about playing with other people. If all someone does is solo, then why why risk the lag monster? Why not play SP?

Half your arguments concern the way you have to please all players,
which is not actually going to be possible, and yet often you're
assuming all players are like you, no?

I didn't say you have to please them, but I did say you need to consider them, if nobody like a setting (like hard core for example) it is not kissing the player's behind to turn off hardcore, though, if you like it and leave it on, but your the only person on the server and you can't understand why nobody is playing on your server, then that's not any player's fault.

Do you realise that the point I was making is your argument depends on everyone acting the same way or no? The point of my argument is that people are different and so you never will get a everyone/no-one situation. Repeating the argument to me doesn't change that. My point is your argument, although logical, has no relevance, because the situation will never arise. Someone will like it, someone will hate it, and some people will play anywhere no matter what the rules are 'cos they are playing with their friends.

I was trying to be factual, and though I may have said asinine & stOOpid about a few "ideas" they were not directed at any one person in particular, I just don't like the ideas...

As I said: Don't assume it is all about you. Someone else used the word asinine. You both appeared to be examples of a position I argue against, nothing more.

I assumed nothing, I have observed players as a Server Admin / DM & listened to countless players say things about different aspects of the game, therefore a person can come to learn what many & in some cases most players do not like and more importantly what they do like.  I definitely do not think all players are like me, nor do I think they are all the same, but I do know what many players do not like, and that helps me to understand many fellow players.

You hosted a very high magic HnS server. You also constantly made posts about how you were not getting any players. How do you think your experience of your playerbase represents the average NWNer? (if such a creature exists). I claim you are making assumptions and I think I am proving it.

If you read the Dungeons & Dragons advanced books, the quickest thing you learn what is very important about being a good DM, and that is captivating your audiences attention & HOLDING IT...  There is nothing fantastical or fun about dying or death penalties,...

I did not claim there was an intrinsic fun thing about death. Although someone else (Ben maybe?) made a very good argument about how death can be the most rewarding RP experience. Other people have also contributed ways in which death or the death plane can be used for enjoyable player experience. You view death as respawn time and a failure I think. The point of this thread is to debate what death can or could mean. Presupposing it means respawn or is fundamentally a negative experience is to miss the whole debate.

... in fact, it's best to consider the others who don't otherwise your only catering your module to a select handful of players, and that would be a mistake.

NO. It is only a mistake if your purpose in hosting a server is to please everyone or have large numbers of players. The whole point of my previous post is that it is ok to host a server that only a few people like. If they like it and you all have fun, what is the problem?

So, to answer the original poster and the remaks made by SHia, it's not the penalty that matters, nor does death matter, but if players don't like it, and you hear a lot of people complain about it, doesn't that mean something?

Sorry, but that is not answering either me or the OP. It is changing the question. The thread is called "Death and dying penalty", no?

Your argument so far has been "if you don't have players you have got something wrong in your design." (To put it philosophically, in this context you are assuming a connection between a strict death penalty and a lack of players on a server yet presenting no proof of this. 1: you assume the question and move straight onto how to solve the consequences in a circular argument. 2: The point of the thread is to debate the question. 3: The very fact that people on this thread are arguing for different types of death penalty means different people like different things therefore "lack of players=too strict death penalty" is a false assumption.
               
               

               

                     Modifié par Shia Luck, 09 septembre 2010 - 11:14 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_Xovian]

               
               
               

               

                     Modifié par Xovian, 09 septembre 2010 - 11:14 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_Shadooow]

               

TSMDude wrote...
Vagabond XP drops account for the highest pay out in all honesty that are given by mesuring emotes/checking location of the player to see if they are active and RPing and not just logged in.

:innocent:
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_TSMDude]

               

ShaDoOoW wrote...

TSMDude wrote...
Vagabond XP drops account for the highest pay out in all honesty that are given by mesuring emotes/checking location of the player to see if they are active and RPing and not just logged in.

:innocent:

Not sure what that means as it is a system that we did with some help from Kalbern then redid it to have some extras....is there a system out there we could have used belive me I would have as I am a hedge scripter at best.

Edit; I see what you mean...kinda a better name...
               
               

               

                     Modifié par TSMDude, 09 septembre 2010 - 01:03 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_SHOVA]

               

Genisys wrote...


Drop all gear?   *slaps forhead*   this is what's killing nNWN...   (14 XP omg.. don't strain yourself)

Example: Players walk into a server only to get raped, they leave with a bad taste in their mouth...

Will they come back?

The falling player count continues to say:  NO THEY WON'T!

Why yes, My builds, for myself, and my son is what is killing NWN, not the 7 years it has been around, the now 2 questionable sequals, and of course the uber type flood of less than stellar content being uploaded by certain unstable members of the community. The 14 XP may be beneath your level of fun, but We actualy like playing at low levels, without gaining several levels for one kill. We enjoy playing at those low levels for months, and even retire our characters after 10th level, why, because it is what we enjoy, the time spent together, rather than grinding through your style of high end, uber gear and and low brow thought that went into your type of game. Who the blazes are you, to even suggest that we are wrong to enjoy the game as we see fit? To say something as stupid as that, that we are killing NWN. Perhaps if NWN had only been made in your style, without the ability to change it, it would have lasted a year. NWN has lasted because it can be changed, to any playstyle, to suit everyone. No one style is wrong, or killing NWN, only brain dead members of the community who do not think before they post are contributing to NWN's decline. Not agreeing with me is fine. However, try not to be rediculous about it.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_HipMaestro]

               A question and a few comments.

The question -  For you builders and scripters: isn't there some mechanism for the server to recognize when a character has been subject to severe lag and/or disconnect?  It seems in today's environment of customizations that this kind of programming should be able to easily recognize and set a variable of some sort to adjust the penalties accordingly.

For example, my browser recognizes a slow connection and switches to a boost mode. I am clueless HOW it works but recognize that it is simply a matter of coding to implement the adjustment.  Perhaps they are constantly checking a ping. Dunno. But it DOES work reliably.

The comments -

SHOVA wrote...

I'm going to go out on a limb and say, I think you should get some XP for dying, rather than have some taken away. The reason is simple most players do learn something from their PCs death, even if it is a simple leason like don't do that! But they do learn some kind of tactics. In my builds, I like to give 14 XP for death. I also tend to make PCs drop all gear, and all gold, but allow them to try to get it back, or for someone else to pick it up. The main reason being, If a player wants to RP, then chances are they will RP a death as being a terrible experience. If they do not want to rp, then no ammount of scripting can force them to do so, and can, cause players to not want to play.

This rationale is about as concise as it could be made.  And it expresses the exact type of interaction I enjoy most in combat-oriented games.  The result:  I will be searching out your content, SHOVA.

Now...

I believe the OP's question should really be separated into three parts.

1.  Dying with regards to full RP value and authenticity.
2.  Dying with respect to pure action type environments.
3.  Dying with regards to server limitations (i.e. lag/disconnect death).

No doubt, there are blends of the three categories above but they represent distinctly different issues.

One experience I had recently was playing on an action server without any imposing rules set for death.  A few mutual friends (not my personal friends, but some joiners) kept running back and forth, dying then respawning dying then respawning over and over as if the concept of death really had no meaning whatsoever.  They weren't learning anything at all about gameplay or the aspects of interactive party play (other than recognizing the value of having someone to cover their next mad dash into death), yet they were still having a ball.  I myself would have been bored.  But then again, I lean a bit towards the realistic aspects of the game than just pure action.

The point is: Different strokes for different folks.  However you enjoy the game, go to it.  Just don't berate others for wanting to play their own style.  And, if the capacity exists within you, contemplate the other view.  Community.

I believe any designer of an environment needs to first decide what faction of players their content is targeted to draw and stick to that plan.  One is never going to satisfy the entire community with a single focus, so choose one that makes sense to you and support it.

Just examine the polarization in this single thread.  There are diametrically-opposed views and opinions in this tiny sample in reference to how the act of dying affects their personal enjoyment or frustration playing under stringent or lenient guidelines.  In regards to that aspect of the game experience, I believe NwN excels to a level unsurpassed by any other game.  There is such diverse content available that somewhere in the custom universe our respective preferences are met and often exceeded.

So, as to the original survey question... if it is your goal to set guidelines that will draw the maximum participation, you will need to first identify your target audience and only then begin sculpting an environment that meets their desires.  I don't believe there is any one formula that will assure total success.  Diversity is a phenomenon of the natural order.

An interesting topic.  Good idea, OP.

Carry on, folks! 
               
               

               

                     Modifié par HipMaestro, 09 septembre 2010 - 01:47 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_Eradrain]

               

HipMaestro wrote...

A question and a few comments.

The question -  For you builders and scripters: isn't there some mechanism for the server to recognize when a character has been subject to severe lag and/or disconnect?  It seems in today's environment of customizations that this kind of programming should be able to easily recognize and set a variable of some sort to adjust the penalties accordingly.

For example, my browser recognizes a slow connection and switches to a boost mode. I am clueless HOW it works but recognize that it is simply a matter of coding to implement the adjustment.  Perhaps they are constantly checking a ping. Dunno. But it DOES work reliably.

Nope, there isn't, unless NWNX has that functionality somewhere (Though I doubt it).

The game itself has no such feature and NWScript (Which is basically C++) is an object-based language that relies on a pre-existing list of functions within the game to accomplish what you want to accomplish.

NWScript affects the module only, and the players playing in it are necessarily affected thereby.  What happens when disconnects occur is not in the module, but in the connectivity pipeline.  Two different areas that don't touch eachother.

Someone could theoretically code a brand new program that monitors the players on a server, and when someone experiences high latency followed by a disconnection, tells the server to set an integer or variable on the character to so-and-so, and then in the module, the death script will function such that so-and-so variable/integer being present when the character is dead means they can respawn for free/without penalty.

But that would A) require significant real-world programming knowledge, and be incredibly easy to abuse (If you die, just unplug your internet cable/disable your wireless, wait 5 minutes, then plug it back in.  Boom, free respawn).
               
               

               

                     Modifié par Eradrain, 09 septembre 2010 - 01:56 .