Baldur's Gate : The Sword Coast Chronicles : NWN2 Persistent World

After receiving player feedback and participating in the no muling new character challenge with Ghost, we determined we could improve on the former death system which included 100xp per level loss upon needing to speak with Cyric/myrkul. Taking the xp hit over a death was oocly frustrating and demoralizing. Especially when you reach the epic levels and you spend days rping, only to lose that your progress to an overzealous bugbear when your foot is caught on a small rabbit fence. The experience in itself was oocly frustrating, and did not add to general RP.

Over the years we've wanted to move away from true death in the game, and focus more on knocked out. This is to give greater weight to the true demise of a character. Thus we have designed debuff system that can add roleplay to the experience; keep the depth of failure in character, and add roleplay to the situation.


How does it work? Guide provided by Dalo Lorn:
Respawning from the Fugue no longer has an XP cost.
When you respawn, your character receives a temporary debuff reducing their combat effectiveness. This debuff cannot be cleared by anything short of DM intervention, and its duration scales with character level. Respawning while affected by the debuff replaces it with a harsher debuff and resets the timer. Spending time in the Fugue or offline pauses the timer.

Minor Recovery

• Debuff lasts for 1 minute per character level, with a minimum of 10 minutes. (Including levels you have not taken for whatever reason - it checks your XP.)

• Level drain equal to 1/8 of character level, rounded up. (No level drain at level 1, though, because that would kill you the minute you respawned.)

• -2 to all ability scores.

Exhausting Recovery

• Debuff lasts for 2 minutes per character level. (The 10-minute minimum is the same, though.)

• Level drain equal to 1/4 of character level.

• -4 to all ability scores.

Severe Recovery

• Debuff duration is unchanged.

• Level drain equal to 1/3 of character level.

• -6 to all ability scores.

Traumatic Recovery

• Debuff duration is unchanged. Keep in mind that although there is no debuff tier greater than Traumatic Recovery, the timer will still reset every time you respawn.

• Level drain equal to 1/2 character level.

• -8 to all ability scores.

With this new system of recovery while using Cyric, we have seen more people roleplaying their debuffs and creating rp around it. I want to thank the entire team for their help and participation on this revamp. We could not have these changes implemented without the Development team, DM Team, Media Team, and Admins who all worked together in discussing better fugue system. It is a welcomed change which should keep frustration IC, while avoiding unnecessary discouragement by a bug or otherwise.

Please give players a choice what they prefer:



to pay either the XP
or
wait idle for some time ingame (while watching tv, taking a nap or something).


The later option is just oocly frustrating and demoralizing for anyone who plays alone more often than finding a fitting group.

More frustrating than losing the XP? Especially with Tar's multiclassing penalties, I imagine the thousands of XP would be several days' worth of adventuring gone down the drain.

Granted, finding someone to RP with while you sit the timer out is harder in the UD...

people will start making tanks

A choice between XP and penalty makes sense so long as you aren't max level since at max level the XP penalty does practically nothing thus shouldn't be a choice.

But overall this is just a much better system than what we had before. Don't see why people would make tanks because of this. Since the system is now more lax not less.

Max level characters would pick the XP loss every time if there was a choice. I do think the penalties are a bit lengthy myself but I like the intent and I'd prefer adjustments to the timers if any changes were to be made, rather than being able to opt out of any kind of meaningful penalty.

I will say I do think that it not counting down while offline is a bad choice. If someone only gets a half hour here or there to play then dies and respawns because they don't have time to wait around they are potentially looking at multiple days of not being able to go out soloing as a result. Someone without much time is likely to be frustrated by this, especially if they can't find people to RP with reliably in their play window to keep occupied while waiting it out.

I don't have a problem with them logging out and playing again tomorrow and don't think they should be penalized for that. It's better than them logging in and going afk while the debuff clears.

The new system is really great, imho.

Maybe it shouldn’t affect low levels? Like, only after Level 5?

Don’t adjust the timer to tick while logged off. That just promotes Altitus.

Winterborne wrote: ↑Wed Jun 14, 2023 9:33 am Max level characters would pick the XP loss every time if there was a choice. I do think the penalties are a bit lengthy myself but I like the intent and I'd prefer adjustments to the timers if any changes were to be made, rather than being able to opt out of any kind of meaningful penalty.

I will say I do think that it not counting down while offline is a bad choice. If someone only gets a half hour here or there to play then dies and respawns because they don't have time to wait around they are potentially looking at multiple days of not being able to go out soloing as a result. Someone without much time is likely to be frustrated by this, especially if they can't find people to RP with reliably in their play window to keep occupied while waiting it out.

I don't have a problem with them logging out and playing again tomorrow and don't think they should be penalized for that. It's better than them logging in and going afk while the debuff clears.

+1

Steve wrote: ↑Wed Jun 14, 2023 9:51 am Don’t adjust the timer to tick while logged off. That just promotes Altitus.

I don't understand how them wanting to play multiple characters is a problem. If they have the option and that's what they prefer it doesn't hurt anyone else to let them.

If i choose to play an online game i want to play it - not wait online to be able to play!

Why does death have to be so inconvenient!
Stupid death!
I am so sick and tired of bad stuff happening!
When I play a game I only want to win. So, no more bad stuff- only winning kind of stuff from now on!!!

Why this was done?
Basically, losing exp is very frustrating, it's work you already put in the game, it has no IC impact, it is overall a really really bad feeling to have, and to me its an outdated punishment for an RPG. The current system with the debuff, even if you wait, the average player (especially in epics) would have lost more exp through 100/lvl than they'd do waiting the ~20 minutes, and theres the upside that the player can still do things while they have the debuff, I mean hell they can technically go try to kill mobs again (though I'd recommend going to a lower level area).

While I don't speak for the entirety of the Staff team, I highly doubt (and would personally be against) adding back exp loss even if its a choice. Like Tekill jokingly puts, death isn't supposed to be nothing, it is supposed to be inconvenient, it is supposed to be annoying, what it isnt supposed to do is frustrate you so much you don't want to play anymore. There has to be a sizeable enough downside to dying.

Something in discussion, though, is the penalties for lower levels, so that may be alleviated in the near future as Staff discusses it more.

This system obviously takes a bit of getting used to, but already I can see people more confident to explore areas they wouldnt go to in fear of exp loss.

Winterborne wrote: ↑Wed Jun 14, 2023 11:14 am

Steve wrote: ↑Wed Jun 14, 2023 9:51 am Don’t adjust the timer to tick while logged off. That just promotes Altitus.

I don't understand how them wanting to play multiple characters is a problem. If they have the option and that's what they prefer it doesn't hurt anyone else to let them.

With no IG timer, then it’s the same situation for a Level 30: don’t care about dying, and everything is risk free…and just log into your other 17 level 30 PCs, forever consequence free. If you the player do play Level 30 risky, then you will now have to take the consequence.

Consequence in role-play is generative.

Fantastic improvement in my opinion. Loosing XP after death was always so frustrating. The feeling of wasted time.

What Nathan said +1.