A redressing of the Death Penalty and Cleric Raises

[Mr.Moloch]

@Zool Very good point, and I'd suggest that once we find a way to make death fun or interesting or compelling to roleplay using one idea, or options of ideas -- the issue then is to implement a "side affect" (i'm avoiding the word "consequence" purposefully). So there is a trade off.

Heck, you can balance these trade offs against the status quo by letting players pick. If everyone picks Option A over Status Quo, one or the other needs adjustment. Give players Option A, B, C, D and Status Quo -- now players have choices, DMs have tools for new stories, and you can track what option is maybe too harsh or too appealing by looking at data.

[O-louth]

@Mr-Moloch

Personally I like the idea of death not sucking as much. And trying to make it more fun. But! I think in order to achieve it, there needs to be “more” than one way back. Options are fun. Options means not just the alternative method is used. Options give choices. And it makes a city of dead come alive (pun intended).

Imagine “The city of Judgement / the dead”, where you can find more than one way back.

• There could be demons and devils offering a TR in exchange for your soul (but you can only do it once, you get shifted to CE, and now have to roll with that)
• you can “earn your keep” in a demons attacking the city quest, where you fight waves of nasties, and sort of “earn your xp”
• A Dante quest where you try and find your way back
• Options where the XP penalty is not there but you are not entirely whole (- to dex or str or something)
• You buy your xp from a broker, but now have to pay it back with interest ;)
• Time served in the House of Ash. Make this a perk of the faction. You become a conscript for X weeks until they release you.

That said all of the above would need serious time investment to build and balance. Until then I’d suggest

• perhaps lowering the death penalty a bit as a sign of good will (we hear you)
• make NPC raises cheaper
• Sell raise dead scrolls from major temples
• Make PC raises a flat 500 diamond or so, because waiting until a pc cleric at lvl 9 has time to help you should be its own reward!!!

[Latoksinned]

@O-louth

Someone suggested an XP debt instead of penalty as a death consequence. I would argue this is a good idea.... in conjunction with the penalty. I suggest the following:

• A flat respawn XP percentage
• You can choose to just raise and pay the full percentage
• You can also choose to split it in half. Only lose half the XP but you have an XP debt before you start earning XP again.

I think this way you can either take the full hit or take a partial hit and "owe" XP before you start earning. This gives death a real consequence and makes it mean something but also greatly reduces the SMACK IN THE FACE of being much lower level for one mistake.

At level 10, I have almost always respawned at 8, at level 9 I have almost always respawned at 7. Instead of losing a level, I'm losing 2 months sometimes of play time and investment in the game. If I could instead lost like a level or half a level, and then have to "pay back" the rest of the XP, it still has a consequence, and makes death slightly less punishing.

At high levels this would be preferable to having to replay a slogging grind to get back to a level that can compete, but it would also prevent you from advancing further in that power goal.

In my opinion it is a win win. We keep death as a real consequence to be avoided and we slightly reduce how infuriating it is at times.

[lunatichigh]

@Latoksinned

I know we want death to be meaningful. I get it. I really, really do. But this game is a huge time investment. It shouldn't be a full time job getting back lost levels, especially when one unlucky crit can kill or one unlucky nat 1 roll on a will save can also kill. I agree that I hate losing time spent playing.

We can also argue that levels don't matter... but they do, to a degree. Why else do we have levels then if only rp matters?

I'd like death to represent consequences of course, but there has to be a way that doesn't kill all the time spent leveling. Maybe when you die you have an xp debt. Or maybe consumables are destroyed. Coins lost. Hell, even armor and weapon durability loss or breakage would be cool. Temporary ability score decrease? Could be annoying, but sure. Better than losing levels and time.

[Cojak81]

Fear of death is what puts people off doing things on the server. They grind the same easy quests then complain they are bored of grinding the same easy quests.I should know, I've done it myself.

The only way to get to level 9 is to not die when you're level 8 and the same with 9 to 10 and given how long the 9-10 grind is, you are statistically unlikely to manage this. I've said it before and ill say it again, Risk vs Reward needs to be addressed. 450gp and 200xp gain vs a loss of months worth of XP on a lot of the harder quests is rubbish. That's why people don't do them. I offered a 2,500 gold kitty for people to come to Deadwell and had 2 volunteers. People don't want to go because it's "not worth it". I am pretty sure there's nothing decent down there loot wise, the gold I offered was a lot to me but split between 4 or 5 PCs you would get more each doing ants and ogres, it would be quicker and less deadly also. If you don't want to bump up the rewards then you're going to have to make death less punishing.

What's the point of having 41 average and hard quests if the same 10-15 are only ever done? Looking at the quest list there's a lot I still haven't done, presumably because they have been deemed "not worth it" by previous players and therefore no one ever does them. What's stopping me getting a group together and doing them? Fear of death! I've not done them before and neither have a lot of players so no meta knowledge and presumably they are harder! If we all die I will also feel bad for causing a TPK instead of just doing ants.

If you removed the death penalty for a week you would see a lot more exploration. People would do different quests and I would finally be able to get people to come to Deadwell with me! It has more impact than I think you realise. People also wouldn't be wanting a reset every 24 hours because there would be enough to safely do in-between resets.

I have a lot of suggestions on how death could be changed.

1. Fixed XP loss for each level, around 50% of the XP gain needed go get to that level. E.g 9,000 XP is needed to go from 9-10 so you lose 4,500 XP if you respawn at level 10. Reduce this to 25% for raise dead. It's still going to hurt a level 10 PC losing 4.5k, it's rare they will have built up enough of a buffer to not delevel but it could happen and why shouldn't it?

This means you can sometimes die in between levels and and still get there eventually. Currently I think even if you're 100xp away from level 10 you're still gonna get bumped back to level 8 on a respawn. But with this new system, if you're over halfway to level 10 you won't lose a level by respawning. Happy days!

2. Lower cost of raises a lot, especially from PC clerics. This whole "raising to grief thing is BS because you just put your fugue robe on and it stops you being raised.

3. Have resurrection not give any XP loss. It's better but it will cost a lot!! No idea how much it costs now but assume it's a lot so leave as is?

4. Love the reincarnation option idea. Have a druid or nature cleric somewhere who will put your soul back into another body. No XP loss but a race and gender would randomly be chosen, could lead to megalolz. Due to the big implications you would need to "opt in" to accept this by equipping something while in Fugue.

5. Final stand. The PC gets to respawn back to their corpse and is essentially in God mode, mega buffed and mega DR with all spell slots/ability use restored. After a minute they die and its permanant. Would not be allowed for PvP. A fine way for a PC to have a heroic end.

6. Second chance. Keep the current penalties but everyone gets an XP loss free respawn once every 10 RL days. Gives everyone a chance to do something crazy risk free. They don't stack however so you can only ever have one at a time and they can't be horded as a resource. Also can't be used for PvP.

[Zolm]

@Latoksinned I would like first of all LESS consequences for dying not MORE thank you very much.

[Mr.Moloch]

@O-louth It would take time and knowledge to build in options. @Cojak81 puts up some other cool options too.

That said, I could script and build all these. I never suggest stuff I couldn't help do myself because I get the work involved.

I also like that if there are a bunch of options, there may be limits on how often you can take them.

[O-louth]

@Mr-Moloch

The last part was my idea as well. The more options, the less likelihood of abuse.

[Mr.Moloch]

@O-louth And just less repetition. I've always been sad that the module has had so many things to do, especially quests, and everyone tends to favor the same small subset. It'd be a shame to have cool possibilities after a death and everyone just takes one.

But that's why Strife's data makes me happy, with data tracking you can figure out what's not being done and put effort into making it more likely to get done.

[Latoksinned]

@lunatichigh

I feel like the less fear of death, the more stupid is done to be honest.... no one creates creative work around the red to dead. Death sucks... I know... but if there is absolutely no fear of death then the whole role playing aspect is gone and we might as well be playing diablo.

@Cojak81
That is a completely separate problem. If something is not worth the risk, the reward needs to be upped or the balance tweaked a bit. I'd suggest we keep this thread to just the death penalty issue and we create separate suggestions for each of these quests that no one will do.

[Cojak81]

@Latoksinned it is relevant, the risk is XP loss due to death, the same with exploring. It's not about the quests, it's about being risk averse due to a high death penalty. Addressing the death system will correct much of this then yes any fine tuning with the rewards can be done later on a quest by quest basis. It's the same issue with exploring dangerous areas. I can't do a suggestion post about a quest I've never done.

[lunatichigh]

@Latoksinned

I'm not saying there shouldn't bea fear of death or lack of it, but rather... a different fearful method to induce said fear. A fear that isn't OOC.

Although, it seems that leveling might not take that much anymore, if xp has been increased, so there may not really be much of an issue anymore? I haven't played in a while.

[EyeOfGruumsh]

Introduce different types of death, from shallow to near-perma for PvE. Then link these to rewards and give PCs choices on just how far they want to try to push things.

This could be linked to specific monsters as well as to areas. You die to some silly badger or a skeleton? That would be a shallow death, perhaps in the range of that proverbial scratch. Make it cost a fraction of the current XP to get back from.

Basically, different monsters or areas (with both IC and OOC warnings) can send you to increasingly deeper levels of the fugue; with increasing costs to return from.

So, losing to the end boss of a DM-event? That might send you pretty far into death, perhaps even with a mechanism that only allows one person back, before that gate closes forever? Perhaps you have to compete with another soul in that fugue to even get the chance?

But the point is: Give it several steps in between, and give people a chance to decide just how invested their characters really are. Overcome that dichotomy between meaningless and crushing. Make those PC-choices matter, and bring on that lure to risk “just a little more“ while simultaneously providing also more casual or death-fearing players with ways to get a taste of things that won’t get too bitter.

[Echo]

@EyeOfGruumsh said in A redressing of the Death Penalty and Cleric Raises:

different types of death

[EyeOfGruumsh]

@Echo
Ok, just different layers of the fugue, in a sense. Or „levels of death“

[Zool]

Some really cool ideas in here.

[Echo]

under discussion

[Voss_]

Neverwinter Nights is a classic game with a niche audience, many of whom are fans of older RPGs that weren’t afraid to challenge and inconvenience players through their mechanics. Servers still running today I feel were mostly created by fans of that older era, when overcoming challenging was difficult by satisfying.

In contrast, most modern games have streamlined their mechanics for the sake of convenience. There are no penalties for dying, checkpoints are abundant, inventories are limitless, and progress is often inevitable. While these changes make games more accessible, they also risk making victories feel shallow and unsatisfying.

"There need to be consequences for death," is often repeated—and mostly refers to taking death seriously in-character, something that's encouraged by death penalties but in the end not something that can be enforced. However it's still preferable to no penalties, just look at how people treat death without penalty in Arelith, barely an inconvenience.

But beyond enforcing RP I feel it's important to have milestones like reaching and retaining level 10, getting the best loot or overcoming the hardest content feel meaningful.

If players can sit at max level without risk or effort, those accomplishments lose their significance. Without the possibility of failure or setbacks, the stakes vanish, and the game world begins to feel like a hollow sandbox. Players will throw themselves at the hardest quests or monsters without tension, turning them into exercises of persistence rather than tests of skill or strategy, and any mystery in the game will soon vanish.

Risk is, after all, what gives a sense of achievement for overcoming a challenge.

---

I think there's some great suggestions in this thread and we'll surely consider them. But regardless of anything a failure state will always be necessary for anything you do to feel meaningful.

[Mr.Moloch]

@Voss_

But can we separate out the issue of - "

@Voss_ said in A redressing of the Death Penalty and Cleric Raises:

If players can sit at max level without risk or effort, those accomplishments lose their significance.

from the issue of death entirely sucks on CoA?

Because I totally agree with what you're saying - but still feel the "niche" of your armor falling off in Ghosts and Goblins and you die with the second point of damage you take, wasn't even a fun niche when I was growing up - it was just designed to get another quarter out of me. :)

Even if death just tossed you back to the beginning of your current level, or to 9th level if you die at 10th level. That's a lot less suck, but still with consequences. But "consequences" honestly suck when you're trying to play a casual game; so what about adding fun or interest?

Beyond that, there are ways to make death "meaningful" that encourage roleplay or a character to stick around as 'marked for dead' in the Fugue rather than a "consequence" of some bad die rolls .

What follows is a some brainstorming, but many of the ideas I think came from a "what if there were things to encourage death, give it meaning, and even encourage folks to hang out in the Fugue a little".

Permanent Consequences: Tie a character's death to irreversible story changes, such as altering the world state or shifting alliances, mourners lament their names, which I know happens already, but can it be built on?

Player Reflection: Include moments where the player encounters reminders of the deceased, like memorials in the cemetery with your name on it, items, or ghostly echoes. These could be more tailored than the very generic ones we have now. This fades the longer from the time your PC entered the Fugue, or when in the Fugue, your "ghost" can wander the graveyard or site of your death.

Memory Preservation: Implement journals, psionic crystals, or flashbacks that keep the memory of the character alive, making players reflect on their choices. The old Tyche challenge.

Shared Pool Consequences: Death depletes a communal resource, like faction prestige or shared energy, making survival a collaborative effort. This would work great in a post-apocalyptic story.

Soul Transfer/Transformation: Upon death, the character’s essence transfers into an artifact or environment, altering its properties. If players die on a quest with undead, an undead them appears occasionally, or their corpse is left behind to be looted.

Fugue Raid: When a player dies, PCs have some ways to raid the Fugue to rescue them for a raise. Maybe angels taking advantage of a demon raid of the Fugue, need players to heist out some saint and in return they get their pal back. Successful raids gives the "respawning player" a greatly or entirely reduced XP loss, or even some "death-touched power" for a short time before it fades.

Respawns Matter: When players use, they must choose an allied psychopomp (angel, demon, devil, chosen of a diety) and give up some of their energy to that to respawn. This opens up a new kind of prestige point; that empowers that force in the Material Plane. Sure it sucks I died, but now there are hell hounds patrolling the Red Wood or a shop opened up in my temple for someone whose sacrificed so much to continue to serve Tempus.

Death Powers The longer you stay in the Fugue, the more attuned you get to the power of death. For each day in the Fugue you return with some new power/reward for a brief period of time that makes the bite of dying a little less, the odds of dying again soon a little less.

The Power of Mourning The longer you stay in the Fugue, the less the cost for respawning. If players "mourn" you or hire mourners, the xp cost is further reduced.

[Latoksinned]

What about a way to have a "Shared XP loss?" This seems like it would suck but hear me out. What if you could (stealing from Moloch) mourn the loss of a player and thus share the cost of raising them. Maybe take on a maximum of 50% of the total XP loss, split between the total members who "pray for their friend."

An example. I lost 7500XP on my last death when I respawned. That knocked me down from a little bit into 8 to all the way down to the start of 7. Lets pretend I had 3 friends who mourned my falling (via some kind of scripted NPC). I could respawn for 3750XP and my friends could split the other half, losing only 1250 each. That is assuming only 3 people would come to mourn my passing. It could also be a selectable script. Like maybe you can choose 10%, 20%, etc up to 50%. For the casual player, this would soften the blow of loss, and if they have friends who are more full time players... 1250 XP or less would have been nothing to them. Made up in less than a day of playtime. Would also encourage more interaction and alliances because if your untimely death comes.... you have people to back you up.