Death Mechanic Changes – Feedback Thread

[RedRider]

Originally Posted by Hasium

Fair enough.

No we are NOT "WoWifying" the game. Sadly it's gotten the point that if any change is made thats the first thing we hear. Vanguard, like many MMO's, will have some things that are similar to WOW in addition to many other games just like every other MMO on the market. If an idea works, then it works. But ultimately Vanguard needs to able to stand on it's own with it's own identity.

We want Vanguard to be more challenging than WoW. I hate the fact that in WoW i don't really care if I die. I'm one of the few it would seem that actually enjoy a corpse run. I like fearing death. It makes the game much more exciting for me. And that's the key, we need to fear death in Vanguard without frustrating the player to the point of giving up. We have put in several mechanics to work around those various issues. But at some some point it just gets too cluttered and confusing for the player.

TwilightSea asked the question "Why do you feel a change is needed?" What are the likely suspects?

While leaving items on the corpse in one way to make death mean something, it's also a customer service nightmare.
- Items get lost.
- Players think items got lost.
- Players cant get their corpse / items back and they don't want to summon their corpse because they will lose exp.
- the corpse / items are just plain lost due to a unforeseen bug.
- the player accidentally lost some items while looting.
- the player thinks is crazy that they can get their first set of gear back while wearing their second set of gear when clearly the first set wasn't good enough.

All that equates to CS getting clogged with petitions therefore making legitimate petitions take much longer.

So we are experimenting with ways to make death feared / mean something without over complicating it on the test server. This is by no means final, it's one small tweak. And I'm open to suggestions as long as it's productive and not lost in a sea of "WoWifying" the game. If we were going to do that, we should have started 4 years ago, not 2 months after we shipped. That's madness.

If the main reason for the changes are CS related, then make sure that the new Death Penalty is equivalent to the old. As it is now you have elimanated naked corpse runs and lowered the xp penalty so you are making the penalty have less bite and gives the gloom people reasons to gripe. The XP penalty should actually go up if you remove the corpse runs to keep the death penalty at the same level.

I agree that the present system is too complicated for many players and many times I have found that the players complaining just didn't understand all the options. Either they had no idea about soulbinding and saddlebags, didn't know they could opt to use an altar or thought they had to use the altar and didn't know they could retrieve their corpse and eliminate most of the penalty. So I agree on eliminating the altars and items on the corpse, but the xp penalty should be RAISED a small amount to keep things at the same difficulty level.

Well this thread put Vanguard Spheres on the map ..)

[Farseeker]

Originally Posted by Moru

laughable... this must be a troll...

[EDITED for language] This is the first warning, Farseeker. Cut out the insults or steps will be taken. That kind of language is not tolerated here.

[Denidil Taureran]

my impression from Hasium's statement is that this is more a player's failure to have a brain issue than a problem with the death penatly or occasional items-get-etten bug.

I have two words for those players:
And a few more: learn to play the game.

[Florinda]

Originally Posted by RedRider

Well this thread put Vanguard Spheres on the map ..)

And it certainly defeated the purpose of the thread.

Elrar wants feedback from the Test community on how this is working. Bugs, how it's working, how we're experiencing it.

What we're getting instead is a huge argument, with name calling, mud-slinging, and general kerfluffle, by people from Live with post counts lower than 10. Pretty useless to the current purpose.

(And before someone points at it and tries to discredit me, don't let my low post count fool you. I'm co-leader of one of the largest, if not the largest, guilds on Test.)

Let us just get to the business of testing, eh? Don't get your knickers in a twist over a change that may not even make it off Test. Sheesh.

[bloodystump]

Originally Posted by RedRider

I agree that the present system is too complicated for many players and many times I have found that the players complaining just didn't understand all the options. Either they had no idea about soulbinding and saddlebags, didn't know they could opt to use an altar or thought they had to use the altar and didn't know they could retrieve their corpse and eliminate most of the penalty. So I agree on eliminating the altars and items on the corpse, but the xp penalty should be RAISED a small amount to keep things at the same difficulty level.

This is solved by the game makers documenting the mechanics correctly and the player reading it, or by asking in game. The answer is not to change the system.

Could we get clarification on essence expiration...is the xp lost when it expires, or regained EQ2 style?

Originally Posted by Florinda

And it certainly defeated the purpose of the thread.

Elrar wants feedback from the Test community on how this is working. Bugs, how it's working, how we're experiencing it.

Originally Posted by Elrar

We welcome you to discuss your feedback, experiences, and concerns in this thread as we work together to make Vanguard even better!

I'm expressing my concerns. Test player or not, this is the place to talk about this as the devs are obviously going to be reading it.

[Farseeker]

Originally Posted by Denidil Taureran

I have two words for those players: tough shit.
And a few more: learn to play the game.

And these people are what makes test so great to play in.

You + change =

WoW forums are rofl @ this thread.

[Nocte]

Have to add to the voices of discontent here. Not much else to say that hasn't already been said other than my own opinions.

A real death penalty has to be the one area of Vanguard that made it stand above the other cliches of MMO evolution. I'm disappointed this current iteration its even being considered. Over the last year and a half I've seen the death penalty decay into "Insert 2 more tokens to continue!" First is was everybody recall... then the first 6 levels are free... then altars (which initially ****ed me off, but I accepted it for the sake of the casual player)... now we get a slap on the wrist for being a dumbass biting off more than we can chew. I've watched and played as it has eroded to this

This change has no redeeming value to the "core" player. I'm a casual player and I can't fathom this making the game any more entertaining. And I'm not the type to wail against the machine for every rinky dink change in game mechanic. This one hurts, however and I need to chime in. I don't want to keep pumping quarters into the machine until I can get the boss mob. What's next, a three character high score posting at log off?

[Isobel]

Originally Posted by Darkmoore

Well two things.
1) They did ask. That's why this thread is here.
2) Read the entire thread. The reasons are listed on page 2 I believe. Nothing to do with increasing subs.

Obviously it does. Come on. The problem with the "CS related" excuse is that changing the death penalty ad lowering the amount of XP debt you get hit with when you die won't actually solve the primary death related CS issue, which is: Death to a bug or CTD and no corpse on re-log. NOw it will just be a missing essence instead of a missing tombestone. That's happening already, as can be seen by reading the thread.

[Babaji]

Originally Posted by Farseeker

And these people are what makes test so great to play in.

You + change =

WoW forums are rofl @ this thread.

This is impressive Farseeker. For someone who "doesnt have time to group or go find his tombstone" you sure do have the time to spend 8 hours on a forum non stop making an ass of yourself. Perhaps you should've taken that time to level instead of crying here about how you don't have time to level. See...time management, i was right all this time. You can mash your stubby little fingers against the refresh button all you want and quote every single persons post on here and call all the names you want, but the point still remains that your in a huge minority in thinking this change is a good thing. Funny that you think your the elected spokesperson of the casual crowd though, sounds to me like its not the casual's problem at all as much as it is you being horrible at this game. Perhaps The Sims were be more your speed.

[Ysharros]

Whether this change ends up being good or bad is irrelevant in terms of Farseeker's posting. All he's concerned with is insulting this community. This thread would probably have stayed much more civil without his trolling.

Now, where's my ignore function? If I wasn't convinced the man has nothing useful to say before, his last two posts have clinched the deal.

Sheesh.