Death penalty.
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@Swifty:
The exception are really important and amazing characters who make up the very fabric of the game world, bending and twisting the stories of the landscape as legends are created by their every action.
No.
There is no exception.those who come back have RaiseDead cast… and are messed up afterwards.
or
resserection cast, and are not messed up.... but they can only have that done once per Con point.Its very simple.
CoA is lenient in that it has respawn in addition.Iono, apperently Moloch makes exceptions for these types of people.
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45% of total XP for a respawn and 18% for a raise don-t seem to me a high price to pay to return to life.
But they are a good deterrent to chainquesting or to walk in the wilds carefree (and that-s why I avoid the Underdark if I can!!!)
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It's also a big deterrent for new players if you look around at those servers that have alot higher number of players than CoA the death system on them is less harsh.
Not saying thats the only reason they choose them over coa but it is a factor,would reducing the penalty make death less meaningfull?
I do agree death should hurt but i just feel a system that can remove just under half the xp a character has earned is to harsh and is a big factor in character abandonment players just get fed up of spending weeks rping and gaining strength to have it all removed due to bad luck.Thats my view of it im sure others think it's a prefect system.
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Echoing Harin, in all of the events I've run since coming back, only once (that I can recall) has anybody decided to wait for a raise instead of respawning and moving on. It's not that the death penalty is too harsh, it's that the playerbase is not willing to allow death to be meaningful at the expense of questing/loot/etc… Waiting can allow for deeper character development in addition to saving you assloads of XP. It's a matter of choice- speed and convenience over XP. If you choose speed and convenience, don't complain too much about the trade-off.
We could always turn off respawning for characters over level 4 or so.
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I do have to agree with Amy's post above. There was many times when I seen a new player on, then later see there corpse on one of the newb quests and never see them on Arabel again.
While I still agree the penelty for death is fair, maybe something should be done so that the lower level 1-3 dont loose XP or something? It sure would be nice to get more new players to come in and stick around and I gotta say, I think the death penelty is one big reason they dont.
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Acually I think the death penalty is a bit tame now.. it used to be upwards of 60% of your xp, and raise dead dropped you to half the xp of your previous level. Tell me the new ones sucks now :p
I know!
"Back in my day, the average level was 3!"
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I'm at least willing to consider a less severe penalty for the death system on players below level 6. That would, in my mind though, require a more severe penalty for people over level 9.
There's two possible ways to view a death penalty:
1). It is a tool to make death meaningful and feared. (But honestly, that isn't exactly fun.)
2). It is a tool to help ensure players don't get too powerful for the setting, in which case, it makes sense to lessen it for people below the average level and increase it for people over the average level.
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I like the current system.
I even think the average level is still too high as it is (though I can't really say anything, because my current main character is a high level Cleric).
Sometimes respawning is a breath of fresh air anyways.
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I would say, if anything was to be changed, lower the death penelty to people 3 and below, sence those are the newbie levels. I'd personally keep everything after that as is. That would ensure that newbs could get a good start and be semi-useful in helping the higher levels.
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The penalty is hardly what I call harsh at 3 and under. You can get to level 4 in a few hours even if you die a couple times.
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My rule of thumb is always respawn at level 7 and below. Once you hit level 8, its time to start getting raises. Gold is more valuable than xp below level 8. These days, I may consider level 9 instead.
If you don't believe me, realize you can hit level 8 in a single reset, in under 24 hours. You people need to learn how to powergame.
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@Bolthor:
My rule of thumb is always respawn at level 7 and below. Once you hit level 8, its time to start getting raises. Gold is more valuable than xp below level 8. These days, I may consider level 9 instead.
If you don't believe me, realize you can hit level 8 in a single reset, in under 24 hours. You people need to learn how to powergame.
While i certainly cant do that lvl 8 in 24 hrs….
I have similar guideline.
respan at 1-6. raise at 8. lvl 7 is either way. -
@Bolthor:
My rule of thumb is always respawn at level 7 and below. Once you hit level 8, its time to start getting raises. Gold is more valuable than xp below level 8. These days, I may consider level 9 instead.
If you don't believe me, realize you can hit level 8 in a single reset, in under 24 hours. You people need to learn how to powergame.
o.O
Jeez. Guess I do. -
@Amy:
It's also a big deterrent for new players if you look around at those servers that have alot higher number of players than CoA the death system on them is less harsh.
Not saying thats the only reason they choose them over coa but it is a factor,would reducing the penalty make death less meaningfull?
I do agree death should hurt but i just feel a system that can remove just under half the xp a character has earned is to harsh and is a big factor in character abandonment players just get fed up of spending weeks rping and gaining strength to have it all removed due to bad luck.Thats my view of it im sure others think it's a prefect system.
This is pretty much why i left, yeah, the server is great, but the impossibility of staying alive, even with a party and healers, and the massive lose of xp just make it more stress than its worth i felt. (though amusingly i went to a place with perma death) I agree death should hurt, but its very frustrating and thankless, as well as damaging to alot of rp when my power is so wildly fluctuating that one day i can push someone around and the next im lvl 1 and hes lvl 7, or spend multiple weeks struggling to hold on to lvl 3 as a barb (Welcome to tell me im not mechanically gifted, or a bad player, or whatever, since thats the usual response, and ill direct you to my middle finger, but thats beside the point, and gets us nowhere. :) ) I have alot of other things going on, and when i play a video game im looking to have fun, not be trapped in another eternal grind to maintain half of average player level just to be involved in the server doing more than collecting chickens or looking for a girls dog, yes, server isnt about levels and stuff, but without said levels, you really cant be very involved in events, and parties rarely feel like babysitting low lvls, i tried alot of times, pwned by fireballs or sword to the face, unavoidable, and lose a pile of xp, resulting in ending basically all quests or events i go on with less xp than when i started, and often less gold than i started with due to my amazing ability to have my things stolen. Sorry, getting off topic. Anyway, yeah, Death should be feared, and should have a penalty, but its very frustrating and disheartening to newer players to lose huge piles of work to the roll of a die. So maybe adjust for low levels, since, atleast for my part, ive pretty much never had the money to afford a raise, all my gold goes into more potions, which i end up running out of and needing healed by other people over the course of the mission, eventually ending in previously mentioned unavoidable death by stray fireball or mob of AoO.
Sorry for huge rant, ill go back to lurking the forum in silence while i debate trying again. Just thought this seemed like a thread i could theoretically offer a newb perspective on.
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I usually sat at level five. I was above level five a handful of times, never for more than a day or two. I think I hit level seven once. You can ask a handful of players about how much shit I was mechanically, but I can assure you that I still had fun, was still involved in events, and played with characters who were much higher and lower levels than I was.
I quit CoA two or three times because the death penalty was so harsh and the world so dangerous. I came back each time because it offered enough to make that death penalty not seem so bad. I never got good mechanically, but I did get better at approaching danger, finding IC friends, and having fun despite my relative low level.
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I'm at least willing to consider a less severe penalty for the death system on players below level 6. That would, in my mind though, require a more severe penalty for people over level 9.
Bad idea! Dying is already much more severe for a higher level than a lower level. Also, and because I know you are not fond of cowards, Moloch, that would just make them more common, I do sincerely believe.
I don't know what's the point actually, if it's to keep the player base lower in levels, might as well reduce the rate at which higher levels gain xp or just introduce a new level cap…
EDIT: People don't die because they are new to the server, they die because they don't take dangerous quests seriously...
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@HarryMcScary:
I usually sat at level five. I was above level five a handful of times, never for more than a day or two. I think I hit level seven once. You can ask a handful of players about how much shit I was mechanically, but I can assure you that I still had fun, was still involved in events, and played with characters who were much higher and lower levels than I was.
I quit CoA two or three times because the death penalty was so harsh and the world so dangerous. I came back each time because it offered enough to make that death penalty not seem so bad. I never got good mechanically, but I did get better at approaching danger, finding IC friends, and having fun despite my relative low level.
Ive found IC friends, they eventually have to stop interacting with me because i stay lvl 2-3 and they end up lvl 7-8 or so, so we cant quest, or go anywhere together, as their spawns instantly kill me, so the most we can do is sit in town, then a mission comes up, and they go adventure, and i chase more chickens again.
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EDIT: People don't die because they are new to the server, they die because they don't take dangerous quests seriously…
I find the first death is due to crits, all the archers deciding they want to shoot ME, or poison followed by crits/archers.
The the next two deaths are due to not being more careful on the same quests - while you might have been able to frontline it at lvl 6 with the other 6's, 7's, 8's nowthat you are lvl 4, you better let somene else do it.
Hard to remember that the same guys you beat yesterday now kills you quickly -
This is pretty much why i left, yeah, the server is great, but the impossibility of staying alive, even with a party and healers, and the massive lose of xp just make it more stress than its worth i felt.
I don't feel it's impossible to stay alive at all. All it takes is watching what you do and not to take silly risks - eg, charging straight at that Half-Orc bandit and expecting to cleave his head right off without taking a massive crit in return.
I have a very low death rate and I'm kind of proud of that. Going off the top of my head, the following characters had the following number of deaths:
Kyra - 2. One was a DM misjudging a DM quest spawn and got a DM TR (along with three or four others). The other was a lag jump onto an epic trap on a DM quest (got a TR from that as well since a DM was watching at the time).
Morich - 1. Lag jump into the middle of Bugbear heroes on Alchemist Cave quest when he was a complete n00b.
Selsal - 0. So far, so good. Some close calls but no deaths.I played both Kyra and Morich for a very long time (too long in Morich's case) and went through some massively dangerous stuff. If you use your head then chances are that you'll come out of it alive.
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This is pretty much why i left, yeah, the server is great, but the impossibility of staying alive, even with a party and healers, and the massive lose of xp just make it more stress than its worth i felt.
I don't feel it's impossible to stay alive at all. All it takes is watching what you do and not to take silly risks - eg, charging straight at that Half-Orc bandit and expecting to cleave his head right off without taking a massive crit in return.
I have a very low death rate and I'm kind of proud of that. Going off the top of my head, the following characters had the following number of deaths:
Kyra - 2. One was a DM misjudging a DM quest spawn and got a DM TR (along with three or four others). The other was a lag jump onto an epic trap on a DM quest (got a TR from that as well since a DM was watching at the time).
Morich - 1. Lag jump into the middle of Bugbear heroes on Alchemist Cave quest when he was a complete n00b.
Selsal - 0. So far, so good. Some close calls but no deaths.I played both Kyra and Morich for a very long time (too long in Morich's case) and went through some massively dangerous stuff. If you use your head then chances are that you'll come out of it alive.
I dont charge very often, i generally go in once monster is going for a tower shield guy. Frei is greatsword barb I guess im just really unlucky, i die constantly.