The World of Layonara
The Layonara Community => General Discussion => Topic started by: ozziewolf on May 12, 2006, 09:00:28 AM
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This isn't a rant as I love this server and the best I've ever found. I tend to ramble so I'll try to keep this brief.
I've played here off and on for a long time but usually have friends drag me away after a lot of frustration with death.
Now don't get me wrong there have been great strides with the death system. Such as the reduction in cost and change to the soul crystals. The ghost mode for the first death rather than losing weeks worth of exp and many other changes.
My primary concern with the current system is when a group wipes every one logs off and isn't willing to do anything else. So I have almost no way of getting my corpse that along with the fact that I become heavily encumbered due to my plate armor.
I wouldn't mind this except that the ghost mode lasts so long my numbers may be off here but if I'm write its 5 minutes per passing and I have to wait 17 times thats almost 2 hours before I can do anything. I could be wrong on that but I'm sure its still at least an hour.
I'm not saying there should be no penalty I love the death token system and I think the ghost system with the grave is a good one I was just hoping there was some way we might be able to shorten the max duration to something like 30 minutes.
Right now if I'm in a party that wipes often times that means I'm done for the night as I won't be able to get my stone back. It was one of the original reasons I stopped playing last time and it happened again the last time I played.
I don't have a lot of play time as my schedule is very crazy right now due to an upcomming wedding so when I log on RP with some people to go some where and we all wipe it wastes my entire evening and almost all hope of RP. After about 30 minutes of milling around Hlint I logged off.
A couple ideas that might help is to change the stat reduced from strength to something else such as constitution so I'm not heavily encumbered.
Preferably I would like to see a max time that I'm stuck in ghost mode of 30minutes or so as if I'm on for 2 hours and I die I can wait 30 minutes and still get in a reasonable amount of RP even if every one I'm grouped with logs off because they died.
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I think not being able to do anything for 2 hours is not that bad a penalty compared to a months worth of xp. You have to look on the bright side, you said your happy for the no xp loss....The time I think is well worth...Its only 2 hours which you can't go out hunting, big deal? You can still rp. That doesn't take strength...only of mind, that I know of at least.
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Trust me, compared with loosing upwards of 500,000xp a death, I gleefully welcome and love the new death system. My character, Llunieninque Artuie'rosse should rightfully be level 40 by now from how much I lost in Xp from deaths in beta 4 with her.
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Eloyn would have made 15 I'm sure :P
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I lost hundreds of thousands of xp as well back before the change. If I can play maybe once a week (twice right now if I'm lucky) I die that means I'm screwed until next week and it is a big deal.
You may enjoy spending 2 hours RPing in Hlint I don't. While its ok from time to time I consider Hlint to be a starting ground. I'll RP there for a while try to find some people to go some where else as I don't fancy RPing in the same 2 area's the rest of my RP career. At least with the XP loss it never hindered my RP just my level progression.
2 hours is fine if you can play 4 hours a night after night but when you can only play for 2 hours here or there its not.
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ozziewolf - 5/12/2006 12:24 PM I lost hundreds of thousands of xp as well back before the change. If I can play maybe once a week (twice right now if I'm lucky) I die that means I'm screwed until next week and it is a big deal. You may enjoy spending 2 hours RPing in Hlint I don't. While its ok from time to time I consider Hlint to be a starting ground. I'll RP there for a while try to find some people to go some where else as I don't fancy RPing in the same 2 area's the rest of my RP career. At least with the XP loss it never hindered my RP just my level progression. 2 hours is fine if you can play 4 hours a night after night but when you can only play for 2 hours here or there its not.
I don't like speaking for people when I don't have to, but I think this falls down upon the players who are here night after night, and do die on a more common basis than you simply because they are on longer and more frequently. If the death penalties were lightened, I can only see a rise in stupid adventures and actions, simply because the fear of penalty has been removed a little. The more people doing stupid things because of a weaker penalty, the further we drift what what I feel is Layonara's spirit of the game.
It is one of the 'tough-luck' situations in many ways, and the best advice I can really offer you is to try not to die. :)
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With the risk of getting closer to perma death how can you even say people are going to act stupid.
Even if there was no other penalty than the risk of dying that lone should be a major fear. (Not that I'm suggesting there should be no penalty other than perma death.)
Thats a bad attitude of to bad don't die. The only way some one can guarantee to almost never die would be to never leave hlint and that would make for some very repetative boring RP.
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Just a few random thoughts and ramblings.
1. Although it can be annoying at times I would wager 90%+ of the server population (especially those here before the current system) would take the current penalties over xp loss any day.
2. I understand you are saying if everyone in your group dies they tend to log off and/or not want to go for the graves. I guess here I have to ask, really, how often does this happen? I mean if you are routinely getting into situations where your entire group is dying then maybe you are attempting things you aren't really ready for.
3. Even if you did find yourself alone and under death effects in Hlint after your whole group logged off, I don't see any reason why you can't find another group of people to help you. And if losing the strength is stopping you from getting to other places, then I'd suggest purchasing some strength potions or convincing a friendly caster who may not want to go out with you to at least cast a spell.
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*points to what Eight-Bit said*
Look at what happened while the Soul Mother was away....character deaths shot through the roof because while there is that normal death penalty, there was absolutely zero chance of losing a Soul Strand (formerly Death Token). So really the greatest consequence of death was a temporary inconvenience. And when I say "through the roof" I mean that there are characters right now whose death counts actually exceed the counts of people who perma-died before the Soul Mother went away for a while.
Any lightening of the death penalties would surely result in a similar lack of regard and respect for death.
Think of it this way...you're DEAD...brought back through ancient magic, but that can't be good on your system. As a result, you're weaker for a time while you recover, both mentally and physically.
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It is unfortunate that you can only play for a limited time and I empathise with your situation but as 8 bit said it is a tough luck situation. You could always post your ideas on the ideas forum but who knows. But trying not to die is the best policy and is the trick eh heh :)
Good luck with it.
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I'm ok with the death system I think its great. I'm not saying no penalty every time I die I get an adrenaline rush of am I one more token closer to perma death. I'm even ok with ghost mode just not for 2 hours. I stood around for roughly 30 minutes and saw only one or two low level characters who where running off to who knows where.
You can't always help dying such as running to the port and getting ambushed by a bunch of wiggling vines and stuff after entering the area. (That was the most recent cause.) There where 4 or 5 of us and they just ate us up for breakfast.
I would hardly say I'm dying frequently as currently with one death I'm normally done for the night unless I can get some people together to help me get my body. Some times I can frequently when I die I can't.
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hey, man, what time zone do you play in? out of curiosity, since I've never seen you on.
anyway, it really depends on where you died, but I've had some great RP and adventures helping poor blokes retrieve their "soul momma stones" (thanks Pig, I'll never forget that :P ). What I'm trying to say is, look for the adventure in finding the help to get your grave back. Just a thought.
I myself kinda think there should be a limit on how long you have to sit around weakened, though I'm thinking it should be capped at an hour, hour and a half for epics, or something like that. 30 mins isn't that long. But at the same time, I have no qualms with the current death system. It's one of the most ingenious ways of handling death in an online setting, and it actually makes sense in the scheme of the world.
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I normally play during eastern prime time but only about once a week or so for now until after I get married in July. (Well I hope things will slow down then.)
Even an hour wouldn't be as bad as then as long as I was super careful I would still have an hour where I could do some normal RP.
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Plus, it puts a bit of genuine fear of death into players. DTs are a bit dangerous as is, but if you're reasonably low-level, chances of a DT on a death are pretty low. In contrast, the certainty that you'll be paralyzed in-game for about 2 hours is good motivation to be a bit more cautious around things that can kill you. *L* One of the better death systems, I feel.
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You could always just play for the time you can (RPing, crafting, gathering resources if you're fine with leaving your armour in a persistent chest) and then let the rest of the timer go when you log off. It's 5 minutes/level impairment time after death, if you're in-game, or 1 hour/level if you're off. So just let it burn off when you're out-of-game. Go do something else. Beat the single-player game or something.
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ozziewolf - 5/12/2006 11:34 AM
...until after I get married in July.
Congratulations!
Oh, if you're level 9 your reflection time is 90 minutes, its 10min x level. so thats an hour and a half.
heh, mine is 3 hours and 30 min.
The max time it can take to recover while logged off is 10 hours. So you can always play the next day.
I've never had trouble getting back to a grave... but as I think about it I realize every single one of my half-dozen or so characters has a way to sneak or go invisible.
As for being encumbered, get some str potions/extra jewelry/lion bags to stick your armor in when returning.
then grab the nearest wizard, stick him in the lion back, go back near your grave, take him out and demand he cast bulls strength and invisibility on you.
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ozziewolf - 5/12/2006 10:34 AM
I normally play during eastern prime time but only about once a week or so for now until after I get married in July. (Well I hope things will slow down then.)
Hehe, poor guy thinks he'll actually have MORE time to play after getting married....
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Just wait until he has kids -_^
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I was under the impression you couldn't get any kind of crafting exp while ghosted? (I never wanted to waste materials trying.) Although I would still rather be out RPing that is one possible option although I might just give up now before the frustration gets me I haven't actually decided yet.
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No, you don't get crafting XP when recovering. You don't get XP from monster kills either.
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I can empathize with just about every angle of realtime/ playtime inequity, but I have to say that this is the best death system anyone in the NWN community has thought up for a PW. It suffers the least complaints, the least angst, and the most realtime balancing for the inverse of the stated situation (the 10 hours a day player). It's just the best balance of 'fair for everyone' I've seen. In the starting stages of a PW, a dev team, in my experience, will get upwards of 4 pm's a day regarding the problems with death, gold, xp loss, etc. And after you see-saw back and forth a million and one times it really just ends up being what is best for the entire populous' greater interest and longevity.
So who held the pre-change record? Was it still Orth? Didn't he have a signature with x,xxx,xxx some-odd xp lost? I know that figure shut me up right quick, and wide-eyed, when I was whining about losing my 100k xp or whatever it was. ;)
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Yeah I think it is Plen that holds that record...I don't recall the exact number but I bet Orth does hehe. :) It was (I think) around 1,400,000xp of lost xp within 20 or so minutes if I remember correctly.
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Leanthar - 5/12/2006 7:13 PM
Yeah I think it is Plen that holds that record...I don't recall the exact number but I bet Orth does hehe. :) It was (I think) around 1,400,000xp of lost xp within 20 or so minutes if I remember correctly.
Bris was there for that. It was in the rift. as if the XP loss wasn't enough there were three death tokens that night.
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Oh man harsh!
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jut sit around town RPing until you get unghostly, thats what ido
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Or hide yourself in a corner and run off to do some of the awful things that keep you away from us.