Every character has 100 points – let’s call them ‘Souls’ – to represent full vigor and the ability to wantonly return after an unfortunate turn of events. Dying to player conflict* or in an event*** would reduce the Souls pool by 33** points, meaning one would need four such occurrences to happen for the final embrace of death to claim the character’s life****. Note the ampersands, please. Now, every hour tick of the server ('THE SERVER HAS BEEN UP FOR N HOURS', we’ve all seen those) would regenerate 1 Soul to all those below the 100 mark. Therefore, the longer you play, yes, you have more risk being involved in events and coming in conflict with other players, but likewise it strengthens the character as a lasting presence. Overall, these aspects will combine to give both risk (or at least, a feeling of risk, which is what the intended purpose is) and a healthy degree of leniency with surviving for those who feel their character ought not be bound for the final grave.
*The depletion of Souls would be tied to a script already in place – selecting the “Return to home location” option for PvP from the server tools. This means meaningless deaths (lag while running a dungeon, accidentally being dropped by a summoned critter even when the controlling player had themselves set to subduing damage, or bad luck in an event where the DM involved does not feel as if the death carries any weight***) have no impact on the system.
**Bhaal’s Blessing and Myrkul’s Mirth (a.k.a. griefing prevention): In the realm of player conflict, the 33-point full Souls loss would come from being defeated by a player of equal or lower character level, once.
Myrkul’s Mirth, or whatever the system ought be named, would be a calculable reduction to the amount of Souls lost by a player if they were met with unfairly overwhelming odds – Depending on how much higher the winning character’s level is over that of the defeated opponent, the loser will take a reduced quantity of Souls loss (down to a little as 1 lost Soul from an epic-level player wantonly stomping down a fifth-level fledgling adventurer). As the server already has rules preventing multiple conflicts between characters within the same 24-hour period, this can be further expanded upon in that one cannot lose Souls more than once – either to the same player, or depending on how the system is implemented, perhaps not even in the same day.
Bhaal’s Blessing, or whatever the system ought be named, would conversely be a calculable reduction to how much harm a player can do to others in quick succession. The first successful Souls loss caused by a player would be the full potency under MM, but then BB would wane and they would do additionally reduced loss (i.e. full 100% loss for first, 66% for second, 44% third, etc.) ultimately preventing one individual from going on a meaningless killing spree. Full BB would be restored to a character once per week, day, server reset, or whatever would feel most viable.
***Automated Souls loss from player conflict would be handled under the purview of MM/BB. During events, however, DMs would impart Souls loss based on the circumstances of story and actions taken by players. A successful assassination attempt against a PC, as run by a DM, could cause much greater quantity. Conversely, brief carelessness against a lesser evil could cause much less (or a DM may assign Souls loss even to non-death related actions, such as a few points lost when battling the life-draining force of a big bad vampire/demon/wraith).
On the other hand, a consumable, nontradable token can be introduced into the system for DMs to award players for successful completion of events. These tokens can be saved up and then used at a later date to restore a set quantity lost Souls, once again to serve as a representation of the character as a lasting presence for the feats they have accomplished.
****Ultimately, even when reduced to 0 Souls, there’s nothing to say that extensive efforts from other players, through action and RP, can’t bring a lost but well-loved character back from the grave, and restore them to life through a DM event. Of course, these actions would be difficult in their own right, and may carry their own involved risks, and in that regard would not go counter to the base purpose of the system – to give a palpable weight to the death of a character.
