[MUD-Dev] Maintaining fiction.

[Peter Tyson]

In an earlier post I mentioned some ideas for providing some
continuity to players in a permadeath environment.

Seems I was widely ignored! *sniff sniff*. But my point
remains. Players do not like Permadeath. Hell, they hardly like PvP
(going be server numbers).  If you want to include it, fine, but
provide some kind of 'release' for players.

If my character dies, I want to see their son, daughter, spawnling,
come through and take on the mantle of their parent. I want some
reward for my many hours of past work.

I think players are less deluded about how the fact that these are
-games- than many designers ;) They are unlikely to change their
opinion no matter how impressive you make the game.

Make it fun, internally consistent and developing in some direction
and 90% of players will be happy. Catering for the last 10% will
likely result in the other 90% being fairly unhappy.

Introduce permadeath on UO tomorrow and watch the servers drain and
accounts close. The only alternative is to offer some kind of
limited permadeath or inheritance system, and even that is likely to
be unpopular.

Permadeath also means any fame your character gets is almost
certainly lost when you die. As a player you have to find all your
in-game friends again (or use ICQ constantly. Hmm, fiction
breaker?). Few are hard-core enough to want to start completely from
scratch over and over.

Inheriting a unique last name might resolve that issue some, but
still not perfect.

The are so many other fiction breakers already (including players
themselves) why try and lock them off to the detriment of players? 
If you offer a system of rewarding and challenging players, of
offering players new opportunities upon the death of one character
(leading to another?) then the system might work, but all other
options seem punitive and.. well.. dull :)

Peter Tyson
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