IRE Asks: Would you play a hardcore character?

I probably would NOT go for this exactly. Just the effort put into characters makes deletion seem a little extreme.

I've seen some MUSHes offer a death system where the character WOULD be deleted, but only if first they marked themselves as killable, then agreed via a coded RP system that they were killed in RP. Of course, this is based more on theater roleplay, rather than a random, skill-weighted dice-roll.

However, the lure of permadeath is quite attractive in many ways. It would for sure make the whole experience a whole lot more believable and "life" would be much much more valuable a commodity. Perhaps a happy medium somewhere...

What's that, your router died, oh, well there goes your character you just spent hours working on. Cause you had the audacity to bash, hunt, do anything that might get you killed.

Probably a lot of people would stop playing

Losing your character forever? Nothing I look for... I'm even afraid of touching the hardcore button in most RPGs.

On the other hand, there are some cases when I would accept a permanent death or at least "loot corpse" death. I could agree with it, though, if there were certain conditions for perma death. Like hitting a certain level of infamy- at least making the corpse lootable in such cases would make people less mad at serpents, which might in turn stop the permanent nerfing of our skills.

While it is possible to have a playable game with permanent death, there are several conditions that make it nearly unworkable in an existing game like Achaea:

1. There should be no mix of "hardcore" and non-"hardcore" characters, or else a non-hardcore character can hunt hardcore characters at no real risk to themselves.

2. Existing characters should not be made "hardcore".  People have invested too much in many characters to lose one to a lucky ambush.

3. The effect of internet outages/disconnections/lag would have to be eliminated somehow.  Losing a character to an enemy is one thing.  Losing a character to something far below your level just because you were disconnected is just frustrating.

4. Hardcore characters would have to advance substantially faster than current characters.  No hardcore character is likely to last the time it takes current Achaea characters to get to Dragon.

5. All real-money purchases (including the results of spent credits) would have to be transferable from a dead hardcore character to a new character.

The one way it might work (assuming the technical issues in condition 3 could be dealt with) is to have hardcore characters alongside the non-hardcore characters that do advance faster (perhaps using a quadratic progression of experience per level rather than the exponential one that Achaea currently uses, plus possibly more lessons per credit spent), have real-money purchases be transferable from a dead hardcore character to a new one, and have the hardcore characters be "hardcore" only with respect to deaths from other hardcore characters or non-player characters/creatures.  (i.e. if a non-hardcore character kills a hardcore character, or aids in doing so, the hardcore character resurrects just like a non-hardcore one.)

No. Definately not. 

I have one main who I'd hate to see die and never come back. He's virtually me. But, for my alts, I make and kill off them all the time so Hardcore is nto really a problem, but if it's someone I like I'd rather keep them alve

I have before and I never will again.

I played a game once where death was permanent, because it was an absolute RPI game set in middle earth and there wasn't much way to make sense of people not being dead once you killed them. But it also had a very different focus, and a very mature player base, so people never attacked others without a roleplayed out reason, and even then the culture valued looking for creative ways of handling situations in ways that were both in-character but didn't kill anyone if it could be avoided.

I'd probably give it a try on an alt, but I don't think it would work well within the current rules of Lusternia. It's the kind of thing that a whole game would have to be balanced around. For instance, there would have to be some kind of system to severely inhibit or prevent ganking people in non-pk areas, and even then a simple trip to Faethorn to influence Fae becomes a game ending problem. (I don't even want to think about how this would affect Imperian, where the whole world is open-pk, and even under the current rules newbies have to run for their lives to avoid being randomly ganked outside of their home city)

As other people have mentioned, internet connection issues would somehow have to be accounted for, and I can't think of any way to do it (the guys at IRE might be though?). In his youth, Luenn was killed by a weevil when my internet provider decided to perform unsheduled maintenance on their server.

Credits would also have to be accounted for. I can just imagine a top tier player who's payed thousands of credits for lessons and artifacts loosing it all to a quick ambush and forgetting to put up their defences. Do those artifacts then go to the killer? To the victims family? what if the victim doesn't have a family? Perhaps to a legacy character?

tl;dr The whole game would have to be balanced around this issue for it to be viable. The current IRE games aren't so it wouldn't be.

Not in any IRE game. Perhaps in a game like Awan describes.

And I can't say it enough times. Permanent death would be horrible for IRE games in every way.

It would be interesting and a fun challenge to try with a new character, but I could see myself dying rather quickly to a rat or a lycopod though.

Hell no.

No thanks.

If you think about it, the article is incorrect.  More people would create throwaway alts, so that their main would not be permakilled.  Also if someone was mad enfough at someone, they could throw an army of alts at that person, in order to kill them (IE Grief). 

I'd be willing to try it, but ONLY if they allowed you to transfer your artefacts from a dead character to a live one.  Not sure how they would do this with help seconds, but hey...there has to be a way.

I'm still not convinced that permadeath = hardcore

I have spent too much time and money to loose it all, so no I would not like this.  I think one would have a choice in the matter.

Short answer. NO

terrible idea.  This does NOT work in IRE games at all and there is no way to change that without changing the games entirely

be much longer but it somehow never got accepted basically NO

-es, yes, yes! I've wanted a MUD with permadeath for a loooong time...

But Achaea certainly isn't it, and MKO wouldn't be a good choice by this point, either. With credz and the steep learning curve associated with PvP, there IS a large precedent for griefing, especially considering that permadeath would be optional instead of mandatory (thus nullifying the one restraining factor, ie consequences).

I would not play with permadeath, unless I became a ghost after death (then I might make a ghost alt).

I don't know, I wish death meant something, anything.  Currently it's not more inconvienient than just dropping a some gold.  LAME!

I think it would be really cool if there was a hardcore mirror of Aetolia or Achaea. That way the dynamic wouldn't get messed up in the existing games. That would also solve the problem of really high level artied out toons interacting with the permadeathers. It would give you something fun to do during downtime and you would go into it knowing what to expect.

I've put hundreds of hours into Hhaos and would be extremely upset up if he was able to die permanently

just no. If I wanted that in a game experience I'd go back to D2 and forget about IRE games very quickly.

I don't think it would work very well, as described. Scary thought :O

I would be for permadeath if we had a main character  as our main account that is not permadeath for our artifacts and estates, and have any subsiquent characters be permadeath but can have the artis and estates to use.  i think anything that is payed for in RL currency should stay with you no matter how many characters you go through.   Then again, losing my level one hundred and two character would be the pits :(

I would be for permadeath if we had a main character  as our main account that is not permadeath for our artifacts and estates, and have any subsiquent characters be permadeath but can have the artis and estates to use.  i think anything that is payed for in RL currency should stay with you no matter how many characters you go through.   Then again, losing my level one hundred and two character would be the pits :(

I might try it with a new character, but can't say that I would be very much inclined to do or earn anything of value knowing that it will be lost as soon as that character days. Perhaps if there was a way to have things of value (like artefacts that cost real world money) transfer after a certain period of time, it would be more appealing.

No Permadeath Please please please

a permadeath would completely make me turn the other way.  I rarely go bashing because I don't like dieng and losing the experience. Losing all my stuff on death would be such a saddening thing I don't think I would be able to take it (or maybe I would after throwing a few hundred at IRE to replace lost stuff, I know they would like that).

With the undead jester idea

not with the current 'conflict' system and playerbase, there would have to be major changes in rules and stuff. But if they made a hardcore achaea where everyone was mature enough I would give it a shot!

A hardcore game has to have the following things in a roleplaying environment:

- A way to train without risk.

- A combat system capable of incapacitation rather than murder.

- A way to remove potential monetary loss to the player.  Perhaps an earned inheritance kind of thing.

- The game absolutely has to be built from the ground up with the idea of player death in mind.

I might try it, but not on any of the current IRE games.

One imagines that RP would not be a major concern of such a realm. If you don't live past 18 what is the point exactly? Why not just go play a first person shooter?

No, it's going to break my heart!

not a fan of the permadeath idea, i can't even think of a way it could work.

It'd be an interesting thing to try. Maybe a with a few characters ...but in the end, no. I prefer to die and come back to kill whoever killed me

you would lose all the players.

perma death makes only works if you didn't care about the game.. trolls would enjoy it as they would create 100's of characters a week like they do now :)

stupid idea for the cost of crap you pay here.  You might have a viable model if you consider lowering the cost of artefacts/lessons/everything for a HC character.

If my artifacts/lessons/properties were transferred to my next character, I would consider permanent death. Even then, it would most likely be a resounding 'no'. I know some muds have permanent death after dying x amount of times, which is better than losing your character immediately.

What would be interesting was if your soul would get lost in whatever version of the Underworld that your IRE game of choice has, and couldn't return to the real world for x amount of days. It would have other areas/thingies down there.

As it is, Achaea's RP pace is slow, and most new characters would be hard-pressed to get a decent level of interaction with fellow players on their first week in. If we do put these hardcore rules in, I'd expect those new characters would poof before the week passes.

Also, this limits interaction quite a lot! Especially with enemies. You'll never know if an enemy will go straight to the point and kill you without even RP-ing anything. It makes things too risky.

I remember back in the day, (about 10+ years ago) DragonRealms used to be permadeath if you died. People would grief, grief, grief just so they can rob your grave and take your stuff. Imagine training and working on your character for about 2 years, then all of a sudden some lame-ass who kept out of the mainstream of things came up for no reason at all and just killed you? Yep! That's how it used to be. Then people got so sick and tired of it that SIMUtronics decided, okay, no more permadeath! And also we would like to introduce a new skill called resurrection! haha! Those were the days!

It would be scary, and I don't think I'd go for it. However, I've seen other RPGs (that, you know, took those first two letters seriously) that had a permadeath system where you had more than one life, or you could go softcore and have infinite lives.

Hardcore characters were able to die five (maybe ten) times before, in essence, Maya would tell them that they really screwed up that time and dust the character. Was a lot harder to die in those games though.

It's fun for certain games, like say when I used to play Age of Reptiles Mud or the spinoff Early Human one: Children of Gaea, where the whole point of the game was survival. Eat or be eaten, defend your territory/tribe against the other pack of raptors/tribes, expand your territory, fight for dominance, breeding rights etc. Every move you made would be preceeded by scenting or looking around for the bigger dino/predators, and if you were careless you ended up being lunch. There wasn't any 'verbal' channel system outside of the ooc one, and you had to get creative with emoting behavioral cues and in game emotes.

Maybe if IRE were to do a new game based around that idea from the start it would work, but i don't think it would as an added effect in any existing IRE game.

Also I would never play this hypothetical IRE game.

I'd make random characters that were hardcore, and when I tired of them?

DEATH

add the option!

no

It's not April 1st! I'm so confused... how can such a ridiculous idea be asked with any tone of sincerity outside of April Fool's Day?

Here's the line of troubles you have that come to mind immediately for me, even if things like MKO's duels are used carefully for practicing and such (avoiding a broad number of accidental deaths).

1) Combat's kill-oriented, bashing and exploration are often quick means to deaths early on, and character levels are centered around precisely those things.

2) Every little disagreement already risks turning into lolpk. Competent, sensible, people can at present laugh such things off. Trade that in for permadeath and you have the incompetent griefers killing off anyone who disagrees with them.

3) The sensible people lost in stage 2 = often your (now former) city, order, guild, house, etc leaders. When you have a political structure that's player driven, giving so simple a way to send it crashing down as a lolpk is... well as I said to start, ridiculous.

4) You now have little more than griefers leading griefers, turning the city guards against any who disagree. Why argue with, or even kick the source of dissent... when you can just have them killed by your trusty swarm of NPCs? If this was an acceptable leadership paradigm, Anders would still lead Krondor.

wtf

I played a game a long time ago where permadeath was only possible in an arena. You had to type accept a couple different times before you could enter to duel with a fellow player. Not a whole lot of players did it, but the ones who won usually received in game items from the gods.

I don't think this would work for ir the way it is now  Ithink the best would if you wante this  to have mirror worlds where hard core chars could be created and developed.  but, not have them play along side in the same world as the none hard core.  it'd be too confusing and I could see issues cropping up like weeds

Yeah, I don't think it would be healthy for an already established game to have throwaway alts being created. I wouldn't want to waste my time getting to know people because of the chance that they will die and that's it. Perhaps make it to where you die until someone raises your corpse, or it decays (in a day). So if you get killed, your stuck as a soul for 24hrs or until someone gets your body. (You would have to also make it to where bodies can't get carried away from the battle field)

No...

This could either be a good and/or a bad thing for the gameplay of the game - permadeath on 'hardcore characters' might seem an alternative RP, and in moderation and done correctly might rightly be so, but that might then encourage a culture of 'throwaway' characters, which never is good. Given the fact that there is not much 'new blood', so to speak (and only from my experience with new players and so on), that stick around for a considerable amount of time, perhaps, something else should be done...

imagine forgetting to "def" up and dying because of it....ultimate faceslap!!!

No I won't!

I would not play a hardcore character

Hardcore characters would not gel with the current mechanics in most IREs where death is common. 

I just don't see the appeal..It might be exciting, but losing everything just seems like its a waste of time waiting to happen.

Very high risk...well, at least arenas will get a boost in usage!  (maybe)

I love permadeath in Nethack but it's not practical in games without a pause button. If the connection drops or someone knocks on the door or the baby cries, none are really within the player's control so losing your character would be brutal.

guess i aint so hardcore

I'd pass. It may be for some people... Not really for me though.

Not with all the time and money invested in Koe I wouldn't. I guess it could be done, but the leveling would have to be ridiculously easy(not one level a week or so) and artefacts/land would have to be dirt cheap.

With all the stuff that people sink into characters money/timewise, this would be terrible...unless somehow that could be completely shifted over one way. Still, there's just so much RP that would be lost.

No because then no one would fight because one bad day, unlucky power outage, router drop, lag would kill all your work.

I wouldn't like having permanent death in game.

playing experience. I don't know if I would.

hardcore mudsex amirite?

permadeath would suck

Allow our artifacts to transfer over with death and Ill gladly start over and over and over and over.

There's no way permadeath could be feasible unless it applied to everyone, otherwise it would become an enormous grief-fest. And then there'd need to be greater protection on newbies, or everyone would die when they'd just stepped blinking into the sunshine. But I don't think there's any way to *convert* a game to permadeath. People have put too much time into their characters already to pull the rug out from under them.

I'd never play a hardcore character, because I've invested too much into my current ones to lose.

I think it would only work with ire games if artifacts could be transferred to a new character after the permadeath of the prior. Also, only permadeath for those who haven't already reached end game. Overall though, the increase and abuse of griefers would outweigh any benefits.

well, i'm open to give anything a try once. i think it would hugely damage both our leveling systems and combat as well as politics. if everytime you died you stayed dead... city leaders would be changing constantly due to death... though i'm unsure what warsystems it is mentioned above...? hrmm...

I would play, but not if implemented in the existing games.  It would need to be a separate game/server with a different culture from the start.

I don't understand why character that could die permanently is called a hardcore character.  How and when character dies has nothing to do with how hardcore the character is, at least to me.

Bad idea for a game that promotes immersion.

I am Bill Nighy, and I do not support hardcore characters in MUDs, specially IRE. You need time to really flourish, and to have all your efforts gone in an instant due to some raging maniac griefer is a big turn off.

I grew up on permadeath MUDs, so I'm used to the heartbreak that comes with losing a long-lived PC to random NPC#10345345, but I don't think it would work with how the IRE games are set up.

Hell. The damned. No. I'd have gone through dozens and dozens of characters if any of the IRE games were permadeath.

Only when it's a noob on any of the Diablo games. I'm not a big fan of 'hardcore' especially when you're unable to attain something as rewarding as dragon because you're not able to live past a single death.

The permanent death thing would be interesting to try once with an unimportant character, but I wouldn't risk investing greatly in a character that could die permanently.

No thanks.

Only on a hardcore server.

If there was hardcore, but without the griefing, sure.

I dont think so.

To the death!

Hardcore characters aren't for me.

Permadeath instead of suicide as an option to enrich roleplay for those wanting it is something I could support. Could be interesting for alts.