Related Podcast: Episode 1: Factional Family

Why is the death penalty such a hot topic whenever a new MMORPG announcement surfaces to the public? What is it about dying that fascinates people to the point of threatening to not play a game unless it has the version they deem reasonable? It is one of the many topics that I feel I may be on the losing end of the fight. Why do I say this? Because games these days seem to leave out many elements of the death penalty that gave them some depth. Unfortunately many people don't even realize they are gone, because they have never had the opportunity to experience the depth that is involved in the systems that many of us have been a part of. What are these elements? I will tell you some!

There is something to be said about a group of people running back to their death site together. Working towards a common goal of returning to their prized possessions as well as a little revenge on the side. The feeling you get when you make it back to your corpses and slaughter the culprit that put down your group, is sometimes unmatched to the original goal to why your group was there in the first place!

People will commonly bring up that they don't want to lose xp when they die, because it would take up too much of their time and is unnecessary. Unfortunately without it, games lose more than just a death penalty element, it loses what I like to call the Danger Factor. This Danger Factor is virtually eliminated when a games death penalty does not involve any loss of xp whatsoever. For example, I see a dragon in game, I think "that's pretty cool" I decide "what the hey" and start attacking it. I die, and don't lose much but a bit of coin for the repairs. With some xp loss, I would look at the dragon and be awe inspired. I know that if I get too close, he would attack and kill me. I remember that moment and vow that one day I will return to take him down.

This also leads directly into my next point. Because when death has some form of xp penalty, you quickly learn the ins and outs of how to stay out of sight from a mob. It becomes more of a strategy, and you learn to do it well because you have to.

Here's a common misconception from people that haven't played a game with a death penalty that includes xp loss. Let's say you lose 100 xp when you die (this is just a made up number!). You don't just lose the 100 xp, run back to your corpse, try to kill the mob again, die and lose another 100 xp, you actually have options with what to do when you die to earn that xp back. Usually to earn xp back it involves participating with the community. For example in EverQuest the most common method of earning your xp back was to ask for assistance from a Cleric, who could "rez" 96% of your xp back to you with one of their spells. Taking this away, takes away interacting with the community that you are a part of.

Now in all of this, I am not saying that newer games today should look at Everquest and adopt their death penalty system. What I am saying is to use it as a guideline. Realize that what it did was bring people together, and isn't that what MMORPG games are all about? Without community what do we have? We have nothing but a shallow single player experience. Maybe, before I lose this debate, I should just go and play some Oblivion...

While I agree that the death penalty in EQ1 did bring the community together, I must also point out that dying was a most disagreeable experience. It was usually most disagreeable because I knew that it would take the rest of my night to try to convince some poor cleric to take a half hour out of their time to run with me to some out of the way zone just for a rez. Most of the time I would bribe them, and I'm in a more depressed mood because I just had to fork over 20 plat. Seriously, this is a game! I want to log on and have fun playing a game. I like to kill stuff and I like to be able to feel like I will be successful at killing stuff, and that if, on the off chance i bit off more than I can chew, that I won't have to be penalized in time consuming manner. Look, take xp from me, I don't care. As long as I can be pretty certain that I can make that xp back while having fun! But don't make me sit there naked at the top of a dungeon praying that the next cleric that I send a tell to will be kind enough to really go out of their way to correct my stupidity.

I'm with Bones on this one. Although the EQ system did set up to make it a community effort, we forget that a system like this only works well in theory. As great as a community EQ had, there wasn't always someone around to help or willing to help. I remember asking an epic'd cleric to rez my corpse which was sitting at his feet. He refused to do so. There were also times when there was just no one around at all. This kind of left you in limbo, as you couldn't continue anything until you got your rez. I know that it's a multiplayer game but you should also be able to play the game, not just wait for help.

Which is one big advantage to exp loss, you can gain that back over multiple play sessions of different things (quests, grouping, etc) where a corpse run normally needs to be done before anything else can happen. And it even seems like this is going to be the way of the future, as the corpse run is all but eliminated.

I must agree to the fact that you shouldn't be waiting around in order to be able to do a corpse run in this modern day of gaming, but eliminating it altogether would definitely be a wrong idea. A better idea would be to figure out a way to modernize the corpse run experience, while leaving the community aspect intact. This is where I find that Vanguard definitely had the right idea when they created their system.

In Vanguard you still lose experience, and leave your tombstone where you died, but the amount of options you have to retrieve your tombstone is vast enough that you never have to wait around in order to get back on your feet.

At the same time, you could die deep in a dungeon with a group of people, and with a bit of strategy, you could find a way to make it back to all your corpses and continue your journey through the dungeon rather quickly.

In the end, I am not saying that they need to take the EverQuest death penalty and implement it in a modern game. I am saying that newer games should use its system as a guideline, take what works, and build from it... wait I'm pretty sure I already said this in my blog.

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