Death and the value of life.

[Drake]

It is becoming apparent that this discussion needs to be had once more.

The discussion about the penalty of death, and wether it's harsh enough or not.

It has recently become very apparent that not everyone considers the loss of vitality enough of a deterrent to avoid compounding death on top of death in short periods of time, in some cases, just minutes apart.

Resurrecting a few suggestions from Abharsair's ideas on the topic, modified slightly to cover all deaths rather than just PvP deaths, and adding some of my own ideas.

1) We increase the penalty for being killed.

Makes death have more severe consequences and makes it less attractive to die repeatedly. But it would also increase frustration about being killed by those who actually do find the current death penalty severe enough.

2) We increase the penalty for death after being killed a certain amount of times in a row.

As an example, if someone dies 4 times in 4 days and his vitality is rock-bottom, but he still plays the death-defiant hero and he dies again, he not only loses vitality, but also skills.

3) We increase the penalty for death after reaching a minimum of vitality.

Once reaching the minimum level of vitality, a character is either penalized with XP or skill losses on top of the vitality loss.

4) Introduce perma-death for characters who reach minimum vitality.

Effective and permanent end to a character that is an eternal hero despite the harshness, and frequency of their deaths.

Drake

[krelji]

It has recently become very apparent that not everyone considers the loss of vitality enough of a deterrent to avoid compounding death on top of death in short periods of time, in some cases, just minutes apart.

Generally I would prefer a more significant penalty for recovering after a death.
My suggestion would be to make it impossible to improve skills after death. Training
should still help to prevent them from dropping, but you should focus on recovering
and not improving skills.

[Herst]

Well, there are those of us (like myself) who die a few times in a row due to things like where our guild is located and trying to enter there after just dying.
Ice trolls when you are naked can be deadly themselves. Or we simply die to unexpected circumstances soon after.

I believe perma death is too extreme for that. Especially if someone is not being the death-defiant hero.

I suggest a decrease in 10 percent of skills upon reaching minimum vitality and unable to improve any skills while at bottom vitality.

I think that would be enough to make people fear death a bit more.....maybe not though.

[ganandorf]

I vote for options 1 AND 2 combined.
I think that number 3 and 2 are very similar so no need in doing them both.
But increasing the penalty for dying, as well as decreasing skills when someone has died so much and does not really care. Should cover it nicely.

The reason i do not like permadeath is that under some conditions dying many times happens. For example i know that when i first went up north, it wasnt even the fact that i was a headstrong hero it was just that i was hunted by many people, i died about 5 times in a row and DID reach minimum vitality. So under certain circumstances things like that happen, but number 1 and 2 would definitely make people more wary of waht is going on, and not try to prove themselves over and over again by dying against somebody, instantly getting resurrected and walking back into the room to get some more.

[Delmon]

It has recently become very apparent that not everyone considers the loss of vitality enough of a deterrent to avoid compounding death on top of death in short periods of time, in some cases, just minutes apart

Give those specific people the threat of perma death ect... How big is our playerbase again? How many people consider deaths meaningless. Ive never, but I think if you change the system you would just promote more catious action, less pvp, less conflict solving with harsh action, probably less rp, and more players that cry and sulk ooc about deaths, which may lead to quiting the game. .

[ganandorf]

From what ive seen, its not one person its like 5 or 6 of them.
by changing the system not only will these persons stop others will be less inclined to follow suit

[tessa]

Maybe harsher vitality loss if you die in quick succession, followed by xp and skill loss once someone hits the bottom.

I do think there are some situations that are excusable (being hunted by the world, arguably due to dying a few times trying to get possessions back if you have no one to help you), but yea, the "if I die I can just get a new body and return to picking suicidal fights" thing is a pain for those that actually try to roleplay death or try to avoid creating an entire graveyard for themselves only.

[Herst]

I disagree with XP loss.

Just wanted to throw that out there.

[tessa]

I'm fine as long as it's combat xp that can be eventually regained.

[Delia]

I think if you just die once, it could stay as it is but if you die during the process of recovery the effects should be harsher. There should be some percentage where the harsher effects do not no longer kick in i.e. dying while 99.9% recovered(you have no way of knowing if you have recovered or not...)

There could be some other stuff as well. Like forced wimpy or something similar if you've died two times(you just are too scared for your life, death hurts!). Extra fighting penalties like that of fearing the killer applied to all combats. Also for non-combat stuff, trying to do crafts like parchments, cut gems but your hands shake so damn much you only end up ruining the materials and hurt yourself. Gods frowning on the dying clerics and sometimes refusing miracles. Mages are already hit by even a single death quite harshly...which is kinda nice, makes you avoid it even more(many things are INT related and when INT drops all kinds of nifty things decrease also, annoying). Skalds accidentally breaking their instruments with their numbed fingers. The list could go on and on.

But yeah, some extra penalty of some sort is in order. I'd introduce xp and skill loss as a final measure though. You can end up dead repeatedly for various reasons. Lack of communication is for one and guilds do not necessarily communicate THAT much with each other. Guild 1 hunts and kills bad guy. Along comes guild 2 that hunts and kills the bad guy. Then comes guild 3 and kills the bad guy once more...a freak accident could be the fourth time -> after a non-lethal fight the bad guy is tossed outside the border but the tshahark forgots to stop hunting all, after a brief scouting mission in the tundra the two meet -> bad guy ends up with a split skull. And I would not even start about Kyir...

Evils also have the problem of safe hunting grounds for those characters who can only do the stab&hack&slay kind of recovery. Go butcher and eat a silly forest nymph or whatever...crusaders get a whiff of it, should they ignore?

[stilgar]

I did read the proclamation above and can only accept it as I think its already a decision, but let me express a few thoughts on it.

The non PvP scenes barely lead to repeated deaths thus I don't see the point to involve it into the discussion, so let me express thoughts on the PvP side of this matter.

Geas, as you already expressed it, is designed for conflict. You expect characters to take part in it, indeed to act by quite rigorous ideals thus their act of freedom is quite limited (eg:crusaders). What does that mean?

With quite severe consequences and the possibility of losing a char due to repeated deaths, either people who are recently died and waiting for their recovery will:

1, start to limit their PvP combat activity
2, avoid areas that might involve them into PvP conflicts
3, the "side" or "faction" is weaker at the moment either forces its RP or simply avoid playing a char for a while


I don't think that was the original intention. This won't help enhance the conflict based roleplay in GEAS. Yet with some additional options it might turn out as a great opportunity for additional RP possibilities. What do I have in mind?

Currently in my opinion we barely see an example for capturing a dark priest/crusader and carry her/him into a city and let people judge him, then set him free humiliated, but alive. Currently a capture means almost always the same: certain death. What if some elements would be added to the sides that would reward a capture and a certain "deathless" RP event for those completing it? Like crusaders/sathos could get a temporary boost on their abilities for a successful capture(maybe a temporary avaible new ability?). Simply punishing those suffering a death but give no beneficial alternative options for the other side to treat a PvP scene as a non-lethal action won't help things get better and won't end in more fascinating conflict based RP scenes. Nothing much to RP about death, if not deathcries. I would like the idea of adding scars to a char, or brand them as a "reminder" of failure. Punishment is already introduced, use it! Also a capture and a release might turn characters "suspicious" on their own side (what if he is a traitor?) etc.

As I think fun comes first and as an add-on to the above death-consequences, I'd gladly see either encourage alternate options or implement some rewards for contributing non-lethal PvP-RP scenes.

[tessa]

I would fully support taking people alive to torture them and release them rather than kill on the field or capture and then kill. Keeping the person alive often brings more chances to RP things out, and personally I'd rather have that happen than just get pk'd.

However, sometimes it is probably hard to take an opponent alive if he's hard to take down, so overkill might happen sometimes. And I don't know if I can blame people who would rather kill than torture and release if the victim refuses to play the role of a loser or make the situation any fun at all for the captors.

[Grindel]

The fear of penalty after death might make people act more carefull, but often enough chars get hunted for a quite long time and are killed regularly anyway, even if they try to avoid it. Some chars can hardly go out without being hunted, and would have a really boring time recovering in some safe place.

Raising penalties is not the solution. If something is to be enforced by additional code or rules: Lower the number of playerkills in general, by making the use of other punishment methods much more attractive. Eg.:

- Make every killing by a player (even a crusader) lower his karma, unless an execution is ordered by the judge. But:

- Add a form of outlawship that allows a person to be killed _once_ without negative effect on karma. The killer may bring the head to the court to earn a bounty. (no endless killings/vendettas, someone must "earn" his next punishment first.)

- Enable to add markings to playerbody. A thief might get a cut into the ear, which lasts for many years. Classic medieval stuff.

- Add pillories to the marketplaces. Let offenders be put in there for some time (preferably in times with many players online . Classic medieval stuff, too, and it's good for captured offenders who refuse roleplay.
Let the karma and rep of the shown offender sink, and let the reputation of every citizen rise that spits at the offender.
This adds medieval realism AND more methods of gaining reputation. (someone asked for that).

- for more cruel methods, ask naga.

[tessa]

I like the ideas, but I'm not sure about it being determined by judges. I think that would cause people who probably deserve to get whacked (lethally or not) to go hide in whatever domain they'd have sanctuary in.

[Grindel]

Would they hide more often than they do now? I rather think it would make the people come out of hiding more often if punishments do not continue endlessly.

[tessa]

I can't remember the point I was trying to make with that post.

But anyway, Crusaders suffering karma loss from their gods for hunting down the enemies of their gods seems kind of eh to me. And needless to say, city laws don't always agree with religious laws. Of any gods, really.

But that isn't to say the Crusaders couldn't invent more things to do than 'purify or kill'. Especially if it forces the victims in situations that they can't just shrug off and ignore, such as examples you provided.

[Drake]

I think there is quite an under estimation on exactly what it takes to reach minimum vitality.

Being killed once every 24 hours in PvP won't get you there unless you manage to play a very short time every 24 hours and get killed in each and every one of those short sessions for the greater part of a week.

Walking into an overwhelming situation over half a dozen times in no more than a few hours however will get you there, PvP or otherwise.

And as crazy as that sounds, it does happen.

It is the attitude of "I've reached the lowest vitality I can so more can't make it worse" which needs to be addressed.

I did read the proclamation above and can only accept it as I think its already a decision, but let me express a few thoughts on it.

If that were the case this post would of been a news item, not a discussion thread.

Drake

[Delia]

Most NPC related nastiness should be readily avoidable these days. People talk about the places where NOT to go even with a decent team. You can scout ahead to see what awaits you. I'm not sure about the H&S tendencies of people here but Delia usually goes after some orc at best when alone. Even an orc has the theoretical instakill chance against her so...hmm considering this I really should go and try my luck against the two giants with two-handers or the three trolls? Sure, it might be heroic(even if stupidly so) and stuff and sure is cool if you pull it off but...hard to smile when you are a corpse. Also the fighting habits I usually observe all involve taking hits and/or exhausting the character to the point even a raindrop is enough to do you in. No wonder if people die easily.

[krelji]

It is the attitude of "I've reached the lowest vitality I can so more can't make it worse" which needs to be addressed.

This attitude is also a demonstration of poor RP. While I can understand that it might
sometimes be impossible to avoid a second death - if you die trying to recover your
equipment, it is rather annoying to see people shrugging off their latest death as
if it was only a flesh wound. I've always thought that this is due to the fact that many
chars are only capable of hunting mobs or other chars, and don't know what else to
do if they're in a weakened state.

[Delia]

I've always thought that this is due to the fact that many
chars are only capable of hunting mobs or other chars, and don't know what else to do if they're in a weakened state.

I'd say it is due to the fear of lowered fighting potential if you happen to learn how to read and write or gods forbid, learn to do honest work!

EDIT
Just to clarify, I've been asked a thousand times OOC if learning the scribe skills makes your fighting go bad...so there must be something here.