Death...

[JonnyG]

How do you think health and death will be handled. I did see a healing pack in a vid somewhere that was like a portable defibrillator, which would replace healing spells. But what about death? No rez's in spy movies, although it does seem like the bad guys come back all the time from being killed, and that the good guys can take a whole bunch of damage.

[esion]

Well, I assume that there will be a support (healer) role that one person will need to play in your group. I think this person will be like the medic role in Call of Duty or any of the BattleField series games. He will run around with a defibulator to rez people, and health packs to heal people. He will have a smaller gun, and weaker armor but be able to really help the team survive.

I think the bigger question is death penalty or no? This is always a huge problem between gamers, some people love it, some people hate it.

Will there be corpse runs? (probably not since it will be instanced)

I forgot how death works in the City of Heroes/Villians games, but I assume it will probably work similar to that since the gameplay will probably be similar to that.

[Leoghan]

I think it will partially depend on the theme of the world they give us to play in. I mean if it is strict realism death will be hard to deal with, but if it is more playful then I can see several ways of approaching death.

The easiest way to deal with it is to not have full out death. If during a mission you are knocked unconscious then a rescue mission is mounted by your agency, because after all you are too important to let you die or fall into the hands of an evil power.

[Dekun]

No rez's in spy movies

Bond dies in Casino Royale from a poisoned Martini. Aston Martin's with a portable defibrillator in the glove box for the win!

[DX_Mage]

I think back on all the deaths I have had over the years related to connection problems and I think it adds up to 25-30 over a 8 years or so playing online games. And while that isn't many considering the time I would still be pissed off if a main toon of mine had perma death after a few months.

[Leoghan]

I think perma death only works if you build a game system the revolves around it. SWG was going to make Jedi perma death but that was when the Jedi was an unlockable profession not something you picked at creation.

I wouldn't mind perma death if the reward was worth the risk.

[Moloch]

I wouldn't mind perma death if the reward was worth the risk.

Perma death exists in all games. If you die to something you regard as not being related to connection you delete your toon.

Regardless, rewards might be:

Increased XP gain / faster levelling
better loot drops (like an inherent +MF%)
ability to 'inherit' contents of bank


Alternatively you could have a 'nine lives' type system OR a system that lets you create another toon of the same class (say) @ 75% of the level of the toon that just died.

I remember my 99 LOD2 hardcore druid and my 13 HC javazons that ranged from 50-98 when they died. You want immersion in a game? I went emo each time.

[JonnyG]

I'm not sure that perma death works with one shot kills. Too much risk, the rewards would need to be real good. Not that I'd ever do it, I suck too much at these type of games. :) I'm a true death magnet. :)

[DX_Mage]

I know exactly what you mean. In WoW most of the group gets hit for say 500 from a boss but that same one will magically crit me for 2k or more 3 times in quick succession and kill me. Or I'll get one shot for 7k plus on my mage while the priest takes maybe 1000 tops. I know that for a long while I spent more time running around as a ghost than actually playing the game.

[Reilly]

I like the idea of rescue missions. Say you "died" late one night and didn't have a convenient checkpoint, so the next time you log in, you might be in an enemy cell with some possible methods of escape, or wake up in the med center and be able to watch a security video (dynamic cinema) of your unconscious self being rescued by other members of your faction, who were notified of your capture and completed the rescue mission while you were asleep or at work. Maybe that sort of mission would be available to all members of your faction, but only the first to complete it are in the video you see and get the biggest reward. If you log in during the rescue mission, maybe you're groggy and your aim is off but you can join in the shooting. I could also see some Metal Gear -like interrogation/torture mini-games being cool, but that might be a little too much like current events. The only kind of debt I want to hear about is when my Q branch people complain about my destruction of government property. B-)

[JonnyG]

That's a wonderful idea. Although I'm not sure how to tie it into you actually dying. But it would make for a great cut scene within a mission. You wake up and need to break out of the cell.

Or perhaps you lure the guard with your wiles.

Or maybe you wait for them to take you to the evil genius and hear his evil monologue.

[esion]

I think that reilly's idea is awesome...this would onlu work in a guild setting or if someone in your group died. Just think if ur clan got a message in an inbox that said "xxx has been captured and requires a rescue." If you were not doing anything you could enter into an instance to rescue them, maybe the rescue would give you no penalty and actually give bonus xp for those who perform the mission. Then when you log back in a message says "aaa and bbb went out to rescue you while you were away, you may thank them for coceiling your identity." Or maybe if you are still logged on you would be groggy until a medic helped you...I like it

[Reilly]

Thanks. Glad you liked the idea. I think female agents might have an unfair advantage when trying to distract the more than likely male guard. Although, as we know from Bond's exploits, supervillians employ lovely ladies as well, so maybe you'll get uh... lucky. They could also have you meet an operative by having you wake up at his/her place, as though you were saved by them after being gunned down or poisoned or whatever. Lots of possibilities. B-)

[Reilly]

It occurred to me at work that I took full credit for the rescue mission idea. I actually did think of it sometime last year, but reading Leoghan's post reminded me. Aaahhh... conscience clear. B-)
The easiest way to deal with it is to not have full out death. If during a mission you are knocked unconscious then a rescue mission is mounted by your agency, because after all you are too important to let you die or fall into the hands of an evil power.

[esion]

:) Well I am glad you got that off your chest, a lot of our ideas are all morphed ideas from one another. We like to toss ideas off each other until we have something that could be really useful in a game..

[Reilly]

Those are fun conversations. I worked with a fellow gamer for about three years. Our workstations were side by side, so we critiqued existing games and talked about the games WE would make. Good times. B-)