Permanent Item Damage and Death Penalty changes

[binnsr]

I can think of three things that I won't do post-Mod6 if we have 10% damage on death ..

1) dragon - no way i'm going in there unless my guildies drag me there kicking and screaming.. and especially not in a 'level-appropriate' group!
2) experimenting with various strategies solo in the explorer areas - these end in my capped character dying a horrible death about 50% of the time now .. from here on out, I'll just stick to the tried and true stuff since I really don't feel like destroying all my equipment just to see how a new tactic or strategy works..
3) pug - now hear me out .. I know there are good pugs .. and then there are pugs. About half of pugs that I run in, someone dies several times .. and every so often, the whole bloody party dies a couple of times (percentages pulled out of my ... ). I'll be veeery selective in what pugs I join, and also about filling guild groups with pugs if my gear is going to get clobbered for their stupidity.

[binnsr]

So Eladrin the whole point of binding items is to remove them from use in the game by multiple characters? Is this right or wrong. please explain if I am wrong.

All the evidence points to the damage upon death and the ability to bind items and then bounded items not taking damage. So is this to remove the proliferation of items that are available in game? If so just say that.

I've seen this misperception a couple of times now .. (not singling out Serpent.. yours was just a convenient one to quote )

Bound Items will still take damage. Its just that they won't take permanent damage. You still have to repair your dragon armor - which still means farming relics* - and you still have to repair all that uber raid gear you have.

* and you'll be farming them more often than previously .. My cleric's dragon armor has had about 15% total damage in the 2 months she's been wearing it .. and we're talking about the black armor getting chewed on by those uber-hasted rats in the orchard every couple of seconds! So 10% each time you die is a huge increase in damage - even if its not permanent, its still more time you'll spend farming relics for repairs.

[Impaqt]

I'd like to briefly point out that a "mitigation after the fact" system might actually help prevent the "OMG h8 teh clericz!!" attitude people seem afraid of. If the cleric was able to help reduce the effects of death after it'd happened, there'd be a bit (if not a lot) less blaming clerics for everything.



It'd be a lot easier to make up counter-reasons for why Item Defense should work if someone could tell me what the reason is that your items are actually taking damage in the first place.

I mean aside from "It's good game design to give people ways to (at least partially) mitigate penalties."

If someone ever gets beligerant because "I let them die" their going to be finishing the quest without me.

Anyone who blames the cleric for death simply isnt prepared to take care of themselves. I heal people all the time.... but when someone dies, its usually not my fault. and if it was my fault. It was intentional.

[KoboldKiller]

I think all this dicussion is of course good. One point I would like to make though is until this goeas live or Risia it is all speculation as to how it is going to affect things. I will reserve judgement until such time. Keep in mind those of you that have the Risia client please be vocal in your opinions of the new systems as you are the ones that can bring concerns to mind before it goes live. I don not have the time to download the Risia client however I have been considering doing so. Question concerning the Risia client 1) Where do I get it, and if it's obvious please excuse the question but as stated earlier I have not had an interest until now? 2) Is the file the same size as the DDO file thus taking the better part of the day to download?

[Hence]

Well, I cannot say this for everyone, but I can for myself. I only have four items equiped that are not bound already.
I suspect most capped toons have a plethora of bound gear from raids too.

My concern is when death is not in our own hands, but someone elses. Take the Reaver Raid for example... have you ever been in a group that needs the East lever pulled, only to spawn us on top of 100 air elementals and we die again. Then we are sent back, and die, again and again and again. The person pulling the lever is directly responsible for our death, and if he wants to be funny he can just keep sending us to our death until we release.

10% item wear should only happen if you need to release. If you get raised in a quest (by shrine, cleric, or lever) you should not take item damage but keep the other effects. I can see some grieving in some situations like above.

[Hendrik]

I've seen this misperception a couple of times now .. (not singling out Serpent.. yours was just a convenient one to quote )

Bound Items will still take damage. Its just that they won't take permanent damage. You still have to repair your dragon armor - which still means farming relics* - and you still have to repair all that uber raid gear you have.

* and you'll be farming them more often than previously .. My cleric's dragon armor has had about 15% total damage in the 2 months she's been wearing it .. and we're talking about the black armor getting chewed on by those uber-hasted rats in the orchard every couple of seconds! So 10% each time you die is a huge increase in damage - even if its not permanent, its still more time you'll spend farming relics for repairs.

Totally incorrect!

You can run just ONE of the Relic quests to gain enough to repair your armor.


Ok, maybe two if your unlucky.

[Eladrin]

Insight into the evolution of a death penalty change...

Ya that's been asked a couple times in this thread and E keeps ignoring that question. Makes me think that really is the hidden agenda. And oddly enough, its the one that would probably get more support than "honest its to make it more fun for you".

The option to bind objects was added significantly later in the development process than our initial changes to the death penalty, it's not the "hidden agenda".

The process went much closer to:

1) The XP death penalty needs to be changed, it's been broken for far too long. It needs to be replaced by something that scales properly from lowest to highest levels, doesn't cripple characters for incidental or accidental deaths, yet is noticeable enough to make people not want to die.
2) Item wear as a death penalty seems to work well in several other games, and the repair systems can be overhauled to accommodate it in DDO.
3) Items will be taking more damage. Better cut repair rates, since we don't really want this to be a huge money sink. Items will also be taking more permanent damage. Better cut the permanent damage rates.
4) Wait a second... Permanent damage is intended to remove objects from the economy. If someone binds something, it's already removed. Therefore, wouldn't it make sense to remove permanent damage from bound objects? This is good anyway, since it resolves one of the complaints I frequently see in feedback compilations.
5) If my bound objects don't take permanent damage, I want the ability to be able to bind anything I want and grant that permanence to my favored items.

In the middle, there was also:
2a) We should have some sort of lingering debuff after death as well. Maybe 1 point of Con damage per death that lasts until you have a chance to rest?
3a) Con damage doesn't work out well, since it ended up frequently killing you immediately after you get Raised, since you got back at 10% hit points and then lost a bunch of HP due to Con loss. That's bad. How about stacking negative levels that go away when you rest?
4a) I don't like this "until rest" mechanic, since it seems to be encouraging everyone to recall out if they die. The resurrection sickness has to be a lot lighter than that, so people will "stick it out" rather than leave dungeons. Unyielding Sovereignty is a good target for a buff here.

There was also one short period when Codog misread my spec and had all items taking permanent damage each death. That was bad... Very bad.

Temporary negative levels that last for a short period of time were chosen because they're a nod to the level loss in PnP D&D. The penalties to saves vs. fear are clearly for flavor, considering how easy it is to become immune to fear.

We're not trying to force people to bind objects as a hidden agenda. It was added as an option if you wanted to forever be safe from permanent damage. We cut permanent damage rates in half to compensate for the increased item wear, but thought it'd be nice to give you a way around permanent damage entirely. Would I be upset if nobody bound any items? Not at all, it's their choice. I'll be rendering some of my favorite items permanent though.

If you're looking for a hidden agenda, it's "Make DDO more palatable to new players, try to bring back those that left after ending a night at a lower XP total than they started at, and prevent people in the future from having similar experiences."

Death has a (monetary) cost when capped now, true, but essentially having no death penalty at cap really wasn't healthy for the game.

[Hendrik]

Well, I cannot say this for everyone, but I can for myself. I only have four items equiped that are not bound already.
I suspect most capped toons have a plethora of bound gear from raids too.

My concern is when death is not in our own hands, but someone elses. Take the Reaver Raid for example... have you ever been in a group that needs the East lever pulled, only to spawn us on top of 100 air elementals and we die again. Then we are sent back, and die, again and again and again. The person pulling the lever is directly responsible for our death, and if he wants to be funny he can just keep sending us to our death until we release.

10% item wear should only happen if you need to release. If you get raised in a quest (by shrine, cleric, or lever) you should not take item damage but keep the other effects. I can see some grieving in some situations like above.

Eladrin will address this very issue with the Reaver.

DDO has always have a very good stance on grief play and this situation will not be allowed to happen.

[Hendrik]

Insight into the evolution of a death penalty change...


The option to bind objects was added significantly later in the development process than our initial changes to the death penalty, it's not the "hidden agenda".

The process went much closer to:

1) The XP death penalty needs to be changed, it's been broken for far too long. It needs to be replaced by something that scales properly from lowest to highest levels, doesn't cripple characters for incidental or accidental deaths, yet is noticeable enough to make people not want to die.
2) Item wear as a death penalty seems to work well in several other games, and the repair systems can be overhauled to accommodate it in DDO.
3) Items will be taking more damage. Better cut repair rates, since we don't really want this to be a huge money sink. Items will also be taking more permanent damage. Better cut the permanent damage rates.
4) Wait a second... Permanent damage is intended to remove objects from the economy. If someone binds something, it's already removed. Therefore, wouldn't it make sense to remove permanent damage from bound objects? This is good anyway, since it resolves one of the complaints I frequently see in feedback compilations.
5) If my bound objects don't take permanent damage, I want the ability to be able to bind anything I want and grant that permanence to my favored items.

In the middle, there was also:
2a) We should have some sort of lingering debuff after death as well. Maybe 1 point of Con damage per death that lasts until you have a chance to rest?
3a) Con damage doesn't work out well, since it ended up frequently killing you immediately after you get Raised, since you got back at 10% hit points and then lost a bunch of HP due to Con loss. That's bad. How about stacking negative levels that go away when you rest?
4a) I don't like this "until rest" mechanic, since it seems to be encouraging everyone to recall out if they die. The resurrection sickness has to be a lot lighter than that, so people will "stick it out" rather than leave dungeons. Unyielding Sovereignty is a good target for a buff here.

There was also one short period when Codog misread my spec and had all items taking permanent damage each death. That was bad... Very bad.

Temporary negative levels that last for a short period of time were chosen because they're a nod to the level loss in PnP D&D. The penalties to saves vs. fear are clearly for flavor, considering how easy it is to become immune to fear.

We're not trying to force people to bind objects as a hidden agenda. It was added as an option if you wanted to forever be safe from permanent damage. We cut permanent damage rates in half to compensate for the increased item wear, but thought it'd be nice to give you a way around permanent damage entirely. Would I be upset if nobody bound any items? Not at all, it's their choice. I'll be rendering some of my favorite items permanent though.

If you're looking for a hidden agenda, it's "Make DDO more palatable to new players, try to bring back those that left after ending a night at a lower XP total than they started at, and prevent people in the future from having similar experiences."

Death has a (monetary) cost when capped now, true, but essentially having no death penalty at cap really wasn't healthy for the game.

WOW!

Props to you Eladrin for showing us a little insight to the actual design and feedback process. I appreciate you showing me/us how you came to the DP system.

Thank you very much.

/respect

[Mad_Bombardier]

WOW!

Props to you Eladrin for showing us a little insight to the actual design and feedback process. I appreciate you showing me/us how you came to the DP system.

Thank you very much.

/respect

/Boba Fett nod.

[DasLurch]

I have to say that I am not all that bothered with the current death penalty system we have currently. I read some of the newbie feedback you posted as some of the reasoning for this change, and it does seem to have some merit. The new propsed death penalty system has some good and some very bad in it from my eyes though. I don't mind the bit proposed about the negative debuff. I can only imagine the party slowing down if it happens to the party's healer though. I AM very worried about his whole item damage bit though. This seems like a way that the dev team is trying to add in another plat and time sink for the game. It has already started on my other worry. The just bind it responses. I think I am fortunate enough to have several of the items that many other people want in the game, but not enough of these types of items to not pass them around and back and forth amung my characters. Only a few of these have I been fortunate enough to pull. The majority of them have come from the shops and AH. The idea of binding items to certain builds does not sit well with me UNLESS there will be a way to UNBIND items as well. If there is no way added to "remove" the binding effect, I believe that this will eventually drive DOWN stock in the stores/AH while driving UP prices for those same items. Thus making the rich, richer and taking even more pp out of our char's pockets. And now if I decide to bind a nice item to a chacter, and "outgrow it", I can no longer sell it at the AH to get that last bit of benefit from it. I'm suprised that some of the other older players haven't raised these issues at all. I think that the binding of dragon armor, and thus protecting it, has a good many of them just smiling with glee. Please look into the other effects of this change beyond actual gameplay. I really don't like this idea at all. As of right now, I can't say that enough.

The negative buff effect I think is an interesting idea, and I also like the nod to the pnp death effects. The thought of binding all of my stuff scares me to no end though. I think that this will have a much larger effect on the game outside of actual playtime, and will need a new look before it is implemented. I can only beg that the dev's can look into this a bit more, or at least give us some more data and explainations of why they think this is a good idea and how they see it effecting the quality of life in some other aspects of the game.

[Yvonne_Blacksword]

ok.
I will try again.
I had many questions and have yet to see anyone answer them
I saw (potentially, I have been wrong before) on the Stone of Change...the binding thingie...
8(eight) spots/slots.
1. Are these slots for binding 8 items?
2. Can more than one type of item (lets say 2 trinkets) be bound at once?
3. Once the item is "Bound" can it be "sold" to say a general vendor?

Please...I know this new bit of info is causing alarm and fights... But some of us (nope...just me...) are finding themselves with questions building up.
Most of the things posted here by staff become reality. Face it. Our only hope is slight adjustment. Not a total scrap (fight or trash, you decide) of the change. They have thought about this. It is not whimsy.

They feel a need for change. And it will happen...eventually.
Our best bet is to find a way that it works, best, hurting as few as possible, and try to make as many happy as possible.

Thank you El...I know you are going through heck right now.

[kengsxr]

Death has a (monetary) cost when capped now, true, but essentially having no death penalty at cap really wasn't healthy for the game.[/QUOTE]

Yeah a HUGE cost.
Have to equip all capped toons with banisher, smiter, disruptor, multiple planer girds, etc because you dont want us trading items between capped toons......
looks to me like you are actually catering to the plat farmers, creating a huge market for them.

The "problem" was not a problem, I think you are fixing what was not broken...again

but that's just my opinion, I could be wrong (and have been before.....once.....I think)

[Impaqt]

OK, SO WoW Does damage your Items when you die..... But it seems to me there is no Permanent damage in Wow now....

Can someone give me an example of a Currently Running mainstream game that Damages your equiptment on death and also has Permanent damage Possibilities.

and by Currenty Runing mainstream I mean

WoW
EQ/II
Vanguard
EVE
SW:Galaxies
Tabula Rasa(May be too new)

I may have missed a couple, but those are what I consider the cream of the crop in MMORPG's (LOTRO Purposly Excluded due to being same developer)

[Symar-FangofLloth]

while I don't think it is a bad idea, I think a use of the repair skill to repair damage while shrining more closely approximates an accurate use of the skill

Heh, when I first started playing, I'd shrine whenever everyone else was even though I usually didn't need to (was playing a rogue). I always hoped against hope that somehow it would repair my items, even though I knew better.

[totmacher]

Ok, so Eladrin considering your argument, I think there's a flip side to it:

If you're "hidden agenda" isn't to (take items out of the economy/switching between people's alts) by binding them, why don't you have an UNBIND for non-raid, non-already bound items?

[Hendrik]

OK, SO WoW Does damage your Items when you die..... But it seems to me there is no Permanent damage in Wow now....

Can someone give me an example of a Currently Running mainstream game that Damages your equiptment on death and also has Permanent damage Possibilities.

and by Currenty Runing mainstream I mean

WoW
EQ/II
Vanguard
EVE
SW:Galaxies
Tabula Rasa(May be too new)

I may have missed a couple, but those are what I consider the cream of the crop in MMORPG's (LOTRO Purposly Excluded due to being same developer)

When I was involved with SWG, we had both. At one point even, when you cloned, release for us, you were back at the Hospital, nekkid, and had to RUN back to your corpse to gain your equipment back. Ahh, corpse runs to Krayt Valley....

[Impaqt]

Ok, so Eladrin considering your argument, I think there's a flip side to it:

If you're "hidden agenda" isn't to (take items out of the economy/switching between people's alts) by binding them, why don't you have an UNBIND for non-raid, non-already bound items?

THats Easy.....

THere is a Benefit to binding the Item. It eliminates Permanent Damage.

There would have to be a Penalty for Removing that bind. ANd it hasnt been thunk up yet.....

[totmacher]

I'm not saying unbinding would be easy. I'm just saying it would be doable, if you really didn't want to stick your Boots of the Innocent on one character forevermore. Why not something like using a Siberys Dragonshard to unbind it?

[flatlyne2001]

I'm going to be examining ways to repair permanent damage on bound objects as well in the future. At the moment I don't have the tech needed to do that, but it's on my M7 wish list.

Well get inventing dangit