Character Death (MvP & PvP/CvC)

[Kiran]

@Steve.

I think what needs to be take into consideration is this: Is not about deaths/kills that form a player, but how he or she reacts to an event.

I understand a lot of us are powerful by pnp standards and some are veterans of years. But imagine the horrors and sights these people have seen through the years. Armies of undead, demons who can subdue a whole town. Hordes of rancid ghouls and ghastly wraiths. Take also into account, the amount of people/things your character has murdered, how does that affect him or her?

I tend to on top of perma killing my chars often, also play scared/cowardly/fearful etc even though my characters are level 30. I mean, the stuff they see day to day can sometimes be horrible. My previous character had a complete break down when a portal would open up randomly anywhere due to his first experience in game with one, through a DM event.

Honestly, whether it is my character just got killed, barely got killed, or perhaps saw something horrible, or watched a friend/person get murdered... some of the best roleplayers out there I have seen actually continue that roleplay, even years on with their character. The effects these tragic events had on them I know a certain Thayan when he got killed due to rp/pvp/any time his character would become a bit more crazy, a bit more detached from the world. It was small things to start with, but after years, you could really see it if you had been with him from the start.

And once more, this is something I, as a person, think is cool. Others dont, and again, that is cool too. We all play the game to have fun. My fun is intrigue, perma killing, real risk/reward and a bit darker roleplay. That is how I relax. I would say I am by default the weird one for it. I understand why people do not enjoy the above. Maybe their life/work is stressful enough and this is just a nice gateway to relax and forget about that kind of stuff.

In the end, just have the curtesy to speak to people ooc before you do sometrhing "life changing" to their char. Understand their opinion and ideas on it. Seek out like minded people for your rp if you cant do the above.

@Hoihe.

No one remembers mine, but I do, and I loved it.

[Hoihe]

I can see losing items really strongly opposed, since most stuff you get is luck based, if you find something really cool and thematic, there's little to no chance you'll find another item like it down the road. At least an exp/level penalty can be recovered.

Same for characters. Getting a character you actually enjoy is a massive dice roll of rolling up dozens of characters until one sticks. Thus, it's a fair trade.


I advise everyone for permadeath to go and burn 3 random items selected by dice based on wearable slots in a campfire everytime they die.Hell, even I could do this.

This would even help server inflation.

And even those who don't care about their character at all to take risks seriously.


As for Kiran - NPC deaths can do the same as PC deaths. If a DM wants to have such tragic influences in their events, murder some NPCs. I know it affected my own character, although I don't want to spell out exactly how until it comes up.

[Mursey]

I haven't been around long enough to meet any characters who died. And from what people have said it doesn't seem to happen very often.

Knowing permadeath doesn't really happen and allowing it to influence your actions is already metagaming. But that's never seemed to to stop anyone in any setting or RP I've ever played in where that was the case.

[Hoihe]

I'm afraid I can't name any BGSCC characters who have died because I haven't been around long enough to meet any. And I also suspect it doesn't happen that often.

Knowing permadeath doesn't really happen and allowing it to influence your actions is already metagaming. But I've never known that to stop anyone in any setting or RP I've ever played in where that was the case.

Well, in that case we don't need an OOC tool to ruin OOC enjoyment. We already got one for it: breaking a rule that can be punished appropriately without removing one's ability to enjoy the game.

[Mursey]

On the other hand, the absence of permadeath can ruin someone' else enjoyment of the game. A player who has no fear of his character receiving their just reward for antagonising another character can be very frustrating to interact with -especially- when the character being antagonised in a vengeful type. By not accepting that your character could be killed for their actions, you are taking away that other players right to remain true to the concept of his own character as being vengeful. Instead, the vengeful character's player has to consistently come up with less and less convincing reasons -not- to kill the character who is antagonising them. Again and again this results in the vengeful character being abandoned as unplayable or frustrating while the antagonising character carries on being played, doing whatever they like, with no fear of meaningful consequence for their actions.


That's hardly fair, is it? It basically comes down to the anti-permadeath player deciding that their enjoyment of playing their own character persistently is somehow more important than that other players enjoyment of being able to play -their- character consistently. Pretty much "My RP is more important than your RP".

On the other hand, the non-permadeath player would feel the same way if there character were killed. The trick is to find a compromise that works for everyone, without ruining everyone's enjoyment. The measures you've proposed (like losing character levels and gear) are a step in the right direction, I think. But I have a feeling that as things stand it's a compromise that wouldn't really make anyone happy.

[Hoihe]

On the other hand, the absence of permadeath can ruin someone' else enjoyment of the game. A player who has no fear of his character receiving their just reward for antagonising another character can be very frustrating to interact with -especially- when the character being antagonised in a vengeful type. By not accepting that your character could be killed for their actions, you are taking away that other players right to remain true to the concept of his own character as being vengeful. Instead, the vengeful character's player has to consistently come up with less and less convincing reasons -not- to kill the character who is antagonising them. Again and again this results in the vengeful character being abandoned as unplayable or frustrating while the antagonising character carries on being played, doing whatever they like, with no fear of meaningful consequence for their actions.


That's hardly fair, is it? It basically comes down to the anti-permadeath player deciding that their enjoyment of playing their own character persistently is somehow more important than that other players enjoyment of being able to play -their- character consistently. Pretty much "My RP is more important than your RP".

Yay for

"Anti-permadeath people are bad RPers"

and yay for

"I want to ruin others' enjoyment."

Permadeath literally prevents me from roleplaying properly.


For me, to roleplay - as in to actually mantle my character rather than pretend to be some DM and play "Puppet-master" with a bunch of hollow gimmicks, I require 3 things:
1st) Reservations shelved
2nd) Some ease-in time
3rd) Knowledge that whatever happens, I will always be able to use the same medium to experience the same unique perspective different from my own. The perspective may evolve or devolve, the world around it may shatter, but as long as it is continuous and unending, I can feel calm.

Cue a DM event where I was forced to attend because my character is a pseudo-paladin regarding some things. We were told it's a permastrike event. Before that, I was enjoying the pre-battle anxiety and dread. Suddenly, I was jolted out of it and put into an anxious state where I felt more like a DM puppeting a bunch of NPCs than actually roleplaying.

The event, which would have been awesome and could have afforded me a plethora of amazing/dreadful emotions and sensations to experience, became a stale and anxiety-inducing "I'm literally playing Dota 2" thing.

Only after the risk disappeared could I ease back in, and then it was great once more. Hundred of elven NPCs died, my character would react to such in a rather strong emotional way, so I could mantle that emotion and cried along.

For a bunch of no-name no-consequence NPCs I never met.

If you want tragic emotions, just kill an NPC. One is as good an RPer as you claim, then one should be able to feel the same degree of tragic loss as from a PC.

[Ewe]

Basically, what it comes down to is those against permadeath generally are too attached to their PCs. It's not something that comes easy to everyone to separate themselves completely from their PC. If you've poured your soul into your PC and it causes you great OOC distress if something bad happens to them, then I think you need to take a step back and really reflect on it.

Permadeath doesn't actually prevent anyone from RP'ing. You just reroll and keep RP'ing. It's pretty standard to have to reroll eventually in every dnd game ever made. Detachment is the key here. Don't get so invested that you'll blow your stack the moment something bad happens to your PC.

[Hoihe]

Basically, what it comes down to is those against permadeath generally are too attached to their PCs. It's not something that comes easy to everyone to separate themselves completely from their PC. If you've poured your soul into your PC and it causes you great OOC distress if something bad happens to them, then I think you need to take a step back and really reflect on it.

Permadeath doesn't actually prevent anyone from RP'ing. You just reroll and keep RP'ing. It's pretty standard to have to reroll eventually in every dnd game ever made. Detachment is the key here. Don't get so invested that you'll blow your stack the moment something bad happens to your PC.

Sod off with being judgemental of other people, aye?

For me, to roleplay - as in to actually mantle my character rather than pretend to be some DM and play "Puppet-master" with a bunch of hollow gimmicks, I require 3 things:
1st) Reservations shelved
2nd) Some ease-in time
3rd) Knowledge that whatever happens, I will always be able to use the same medium to experience the same unique perspective different from my own. The perspective may evolve or devolve, the world around it may shatter, but as long as it is continuous and unending, I can feel calm.

Cue a DM event where I was forced to attend because my character is a pseudo-paladin regarding some things. We were told it's a permastrike event. Before that, I was enjoying the pre-battle anxiety and dread. Suddenly, I was jolted out of it and put into an anxious state where I felt more like a DM puppeting a bunch of NPCs than actually roleplaying.

The event, which would have been awesome and could have afforded me a plethora of amazing/dreadful emotions and sensations to experience, became a stale and anxiety-inducing "I'm literally playing Dota 2" thing.

Only after the risk disappeared could I ease back in, and then it was great once more. Hundred of elven NPCs died, my character would react to such in a rather strong emotional way, so I could mantle that emotion and cried along.

For a bunch of no-name no-consequence NPCs I never met.

If you want tragic emotions, just kill an NPC. One is as good an RPer as you claim, then one should be able to feel the same degree of tragic loss as from a PC.

[Planehopper]

Last warning to clean this up. Please do not reply with insults and regurgitate what you've already said multiple times. I dont want to lock the topic, but I will follow up with individuals.

[Mursey]

Yay for

"Anti-permadeath people are bad RPers"

and yay for

"I want to ruin others' enjoyment."


[/quote]

Where in anything I said above did I say that anti-permadeath people are bad role-players or are deliberately trying to ruin other peoples enjoyment?

Permadeath literally prevents me from roleplaying properly.
For me, to roleplay - as in to actually mantle my character rather than pretend to be some DM and play "Puppet-master" with a bunch of hollow gimmicks, I require 3 things:
1st) Reservations shelved
2nd) Some ease-in time
3rd) Knowledge that whatever happens, I will always be able to use the same medium to experience the same unique perspective different from my own. The perspective may evolve or devolve, the world around it may shatter, but as long as it is continuous and unending, I can feel calm.

Cue a DM event where I was forced to attend because my character is a pseudo-paladin regarding some things. We were told it's a permastrike event. Before that, I was enjoying the pre-battle anxiety and dread. Suddenly, I was jolted out of it and put into an anxious state where I felt more like a DM puppeting a bunch of NPCs than actually roleplaying.

The event, which would have been awesome and could have afforded me a plethora of amazing/dreadful emotions and sensations to experience, became a stale and anxiety-inducing "I'm literally playing Dota 2" thing.

Only after the risk disappeared could I ease back in, and then it was great once more. Hundred of elven NPCs died, my character would react to such in a rather strong emotional way, so I could mantle that emotion and cried along.

For a bunch of no-name no-consequence NPCs I never met.

If you want tragic emotions, just kill an NPC. One is as good an RPer as you claim, then one should be able to feel the same degree of tragic loss as from a PC.

Can I suggest that to avoid situations where you might feel forced into doing something with your character that you really don't want to do, it might be an idea to avoid playing characters who adhere so rigidly to a certain code of behaviour that you feel compelled to take that action anyway? I don't want to suggest that you should just have decided not to do it even if it was something your character would do, because playing your character consistently is obviously something that's very important to you for your own enjoyment of RP. But I think you might be setting yourself up for trouble and distress by playing such a character on a server were permadeath is possible, even if it's fairly unlikely.

[Hoihe]

You literally said it.

That's hardly fair, is it? It basically comes down to the anti-permadeath player deciding that their enjoyment of playing their own character persistently is somehow more important than that other players enjoyment of being able to play -their- character consistently. Pretty much "My RP is more important than your RP".

Here's the deal:

Anti-permadeath people are inclusive. I hate permadeath, but you can kill off your own PC all you like as long as it's not my PC nor you demand I do it to my PC.

Permadeath people are exclusive. Even if someone hates permadeath, they MUST permadeath or they consider their "RP more important than my RP intent to destroy them."

[Ewe]

I don't understand why you are making three demands of what you must have in order to RP? I don't see anyone else needing certain things in order to RP. They just RP. It doesn't seem like a strong argument for why perma-death should be banned.

[Hoihe]

I don't understand why you are making three demands of what you must have in order to RP? I don't see anyone else needing certain things in order to RP. They just RP. It doesn't seem like a strong argument for why perma-death should be banned.

It puts people into "I'm playing Dota 2" mentality over "I'm roleplaying", due to the OOC anxiety caused by it.

[Ewe]

I think that OOC anxiety isn't felt by everyone. I think it's only felt by those who've fallen into the trap of being too attached to their PC. That's what I was trying to get at.

[Mursey]

Not really. I'd argue that neither type of RP is entirely inclusive of exclusive.

All it take is for non-permadeath players to avoid doing anything that would make pro-permadeath players feel compelled to actively try to murder the non-permadeath player's character.

Likewise, pro-permadeath characters would have to try to avoid interacting with non-permadeath characters in a way that is liable to produce that sort of conflict as well.

If the NWN2 community was bigger than it is, it wouldn't be an issue at the moment. We could have permadeath players on a permadeath server and non-permadeath players on a non-permadeath server. But the community is too small to sustain that right now. So we all just need to find a way to compromise and get along.

Pretty much both groups need to accept that they have to make sacrifices and allowances for the enjoyment of the other.