Dead - does it mean something ?

Hey there, my first post to kind of game lore / game play....

as I am new here, what happens if you die in game? I always had th eimpression, that dying should mean something ...

Most popular MMO games handle death way to soft: you don't lose anything, you are back in action after a few seconds. Worst case youll have some repair cost or a slight debuff...

I think that death should be something that should hurt. To all of those old UO guys, remember pre trammel times ? Remember farming Lich Lords for 2 hours and the pks getting in or being killed by a silver serpent ? Running around in search of a healer coming back in the hope of getting your stuff back ? "...A lich lord is rummagiong your corpse and tales an item..." all the way back to your corpse you fear what is lost ? Will I find the LL having it ?

But now imagine how rewarding surviving felt !!! Or simpy getting back your stuff after dying The penalty for death s nont as much about a penalty for deth, but as a reward for not dying ... If it does not hurt, why let players die ? Take death out of the game....

What do you guys think ?

cheers, SK

 

I guess this will be something that will need to be balanced. On the one hand, if the death penalty is too harsh it could cause some people to either not take risks or when people do get killed they are so angry at loosing stuff and xp due to a silly mistake, that they rage quit (like I eventually did with a NWN PW). On the other hand, if there is little or no death penalty (e.g. fable 2 & 3) you don't bother preparing before an adventure and it makes your battles feel meaningless.

What could be an option would be ability to create an additional hardcore character, someone not hailing from earth who cannot resurrect and when they get killed they stay dead (although this would go against the 1 char per account thinking).

 

You should take a look at the PvP and Death Megapost. It documents the current thinking of how Death will be handled in SotA. Hopefully it answers some of your questions.

Swords High!

 

I'm more interested in the lore of death.

If we become ghosts as players, does that happen for NPCs in the world (at least from a story perspective even if it isn't a game mechanic)?

Is there an afterlife? Can people cross between the land of the living and the dead?

How is society impacted by the ability to come back from the dead?

 

All good questions. My assumption was the ability to return to life was an exclusive ability of Avatars, but that's just a guess.

 

It always struck a chord with me in past games that I could take a companion to a healer and they could just cast a ressurection spell. Lord British also seemed to have the ability to resurrect our entire party as he saw fit.

But in the story of the games, when other people died, it was permanent.

Wouldn't people in a society resent that immortality exists, but only the rich or special get resurrection spells?

What if there is a story mechanic to explain it?

What if Avatars have a special property or magical item that allows us to pass between worlds (travelling to NB in the first place) and that in turn allows us to cross over as a ghost and re-enter our bodies?

 

In Ultima7 NPC's could be resurrected, in fact I remember killing the Mint worker in order to steal the mint keys, then after emptying the place, resurrecting her so that she could convert my stolen gold bars to coins (and no one suspected a thing )

Also in U6 I remember having a conversation with a guard (I think) who was mourning because his fellow guards got jumped and killed by some monsters who then burned the bodies preventing their resurrection.

This was my understanding also, but as an afterthought, if NPC's can resurrect, it could explain why a town full of people who previously got killed by some event or player, were all back to life as it nothing happened.