style="margin: 2px; width: 210px; float: right;">

href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/64641" target="_blank"> style="width: 200px; float: right;" alt="Death in EVE"
src="/image/view/64641">

We’ve
all experienced it at one point or another; that
sinking feeling you get the first time you realize that
you’re staring down on the ragdoll body formerly known as
your character. Whether you bit off more than you could chew
or simply were in the wrong place at the wrong time, nothing quite
compares to the sudden realization that not only has your beloved
character died, but that there are... style="font-style: italic;">consequences.




*queues up the death march drums and wailing horns*



Enter the dreaded style="font-style: italic;">Death Penalty;
a gameplay mechanic that oftentimes is at the very heart of the debate
between what constitutes casual vs. hardcore in MMOs. This lone aspect
of design can even go so far as to help some players decide whether or
not they want to give a new game a few spins around the virtual block
based simply on which side of that fence they want to plant their feet
over a longer period. For some, the thrill of raising the stakes and
going all in is paramount to having an enjoyable MMO experience, while
others might prefer to simply bop along in a persistent world that
lacks the same kind of harshness as this nutty place commonly referred
to as “real life”. MMO gaming style="font-style: italic;"> is
an entertainment industry after all.



So why do we have death penalties at all? Is it all about providing the
risk vs. reward factor, or are there deeper thought processes at work
behind the design decision to include them as a gameplay mechanic at
all? To help answer these questions, Ten Ton Hammer contacted two of
the leading developers in the current MMO space race; Noah
“Hammerhead” Ward, lead game designer for href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/eve/" target="_blank"> style="font-style: italic;">EVE Online
and Hermann Peterscheck, lead producer for NetDevil’s
upcoming href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/taxonomy/term/306"
target="_blank"> style="font-style: italic;">Jumpgate Evolution.



The core concept behind the death penalty has actually been around for
far longer than when the MMO industry first sprang forth from the video
game ether in the late 90s.
While the rules may have seen some fairly dramatic shifts over the
years, death in gaming has always amounted to a setback of some form or
another, provided that the game itself offers some form of reward
– even if that reward is simply a fun experience. 
But what overall purpose does it serve, and why has it become one of
the staples of modern MMO design?



style="margin: 2px; width: 210px; float: right;">

href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/49157" target="_blank"> style="width: 200px; float: right;" alt="Infernals Attack"
src="/image/view/49157">

NetDevil’s Hermann Peterscheck provides some insight into the
core concepts behind one of the most debated of all MMO gameplay
mechanics by first taking three steps back – or maybe that
should be more like three decades back – to a much simpler
point in video gaming history:


“One of the
first games I ever played was the original Space
Invaders. In that game it was basic. You fire one shot at a time at
enemies that descend upon your ship and if they get to the bottom or if
you get hit by their shots, you lose a life. Lose 3 lives and the game
is over. The death penalty was, you lost a quarter. They had to have
some kind of failure in order to monetize at all. Fast forward to home
consoles. I had most of the old school consoles, but the game I
distinctly remember was the original Castlevania. In that game you had
3 lives and 3 continues to beat the whole thing. It took me all summer
to accomplish that. In that case the death penalty provided a challenge
- a considerable challenge.”



From there, Hermann goes on to explain how the basic driving force
behind the design decision process hasn’t really changed as
much as you might think in the years since arcades were the height of
the social gaming experience:


“So you can
see a trend here and that is that the purpose of
the death penalty is to monetize the product and to provide an ongoing
challenge. MMOs are no different. What is at question is what
constitutes a challenge and it is in that area that we have much
debate. I think many times developers see their job as to somehow beat
the player as opposed to providing them with entertainment. Remember,
the purpose of a game is to provide fun for the players not to beat
them. There is no automatic "this is the perfect death penalty"
formula. You have to test your game and see if it is "too easy" or "too
difficult" depending on your audience, game mechanics and so on. As
long as you remember that the death penalty is in service of the
entertainment value, its fine.



Something else to keep in mind is that presentation is a big
part of this. The best example of this is Space Quest in which it was
actually fun to die because of the amusing little animations and text
they had. If you can actually make it FUN to die, I think that's the
ultimate death penalty. Space Quest was still challenging and often
frustrating, but it didn't feel punishing to me. I don't know what it
is that makes developers hungry for player's blood, but I think that we
should do everything we can to make failure as painless, and even as
fun, as possible.”



style="margin: 2px; width: 210px; float: right;">

href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/66376" target="_blank"> style="width: 200px; float: right;" alt="EVE 01"
src="/image/view/66376">

Indeed, presentation can make all the difference in the world. While
typically not a bullet point feature on the back of MMO game boxes,
which side of the death penalty fence a given title elects to
incorporate can in part help some players determine which game is right
for them. It’s also worth noting that, while still considered
‘niche’ territory by many,
the hardcore end of the
spectrum retains a solid hold on many players, and it’s a
demographic poised to expand just like any other as the industry
continues to grow. Or, as EVE Online’s Noah Ward puts it:


“Games with
a harsh death penalty will always have their
niche because there will always be people who enjoy that thrill. As
more and more people become gamers that niche will continue to grow.
But the main thing to remember is death penalty is just one tool a game
designer has to create meaningful experiences.



It all depends on the intentions of the Game Design. In a game about
controlling territory, running logistics and fighting over scarce
resources such as EVE Online the harsh death penalty is integral and
necessary. In other games the death penalty could just serve as an
annoying reminder or time sink. There is no right or wrong way to use
death penalties in your game; it is merely a tool in the game
designer’s arsenal.”



To help provide some deeper insight into the design process, when asked
what considerations are made to incorporate a meaningful death penalty
during the development process, Noah had this to say:


“I suppose
it would depend on the exact game but in EVE the
harsh death penalty was designed in as a core aspect. All of the ships
in EVE are built by players and as we all know when you build
battleships for a living war is good for business.”



True enough, the loss of ships in battle is a key element of
EVE’s overall design; a penalty that some might consider to
be harsh, yet also serves the dual purpose of driving the
title’s player-driven economy forward. Or to put that another
way, imagine a New Eden where ships simply respawned back at the
station when a player was defeated in battle. Doing so would sweep the
rug out from under those players who thrive on the risk factor involved
in combat, and ultimately remove the biggest cog in the crafting
machine.



style="margin: 2px; width: 210px; float: right;">

href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/61839" target="_blank"> style="width: 200px; float: right;" alt="WoW Arena PvP"
src="/image/view/61839">

Diving deeper into the MMO rabbit hole, Hermann offered up some
compelling arguments for the risk vs. reward factor as it relates to
death penalties and the design process:


“Death
penalty discussions enjoy a holy war type status,
right up there with PvP, player made content and real money
transactions. My own personal view is that you want to reward as much
as possible and punish as little as necessary. Punishment should be
done in order to reward. That may sound like nonsense so I'll elaborate
a bit. A reward's value is based on its rarity, which is directly
related to how difficult it is to achieve. In order to make something
difficult to achieve there must be a possibility of failure - that is a
variable outcome. If you know you just have to push the button one
million times and you WILL get the “Sword of a Thousand
Truths”, that is not particularly entertaining. But if you
know that there is a 1/100,000 chance that killing an epic boss such as
Brutox the Strangler will result in him dropping the awesome epic sword
- and you know that only 15 people have EVER beaten him, that's another
matter.



Thus, you put the penalty and the reward on opposite sides of the scale
and empower the player to choose if it's worth the risk. To me the
general rule is quite simple. If, after playing your game for some
time, the player is worse off than before they started, the penalty is
too harsh. The player always needs to feel that even though they
failed, they have something to show for it. In your mind you need to be
able to tell yourself "OK, Brutox killed me AGAIN, but at least I got 6
lotus roots from his minions, and I gained some rep with the Sacred
Order;" that is very different than "Dammit, Brutox killed me AGAIN and
now I have to grind Greater Dragons for 16 hours just to get back to
where I was before." In scenario A we have progress, in scenario B we
have pure punishment. The wonderful thing about games, as opposed to
life, is that we don't have to have zero sum scenarios. We
can, and I believe should, reward players for their time and effort -
that doesn't mean we make the greatest rewards easy for anyone to
achieve, but it does mean that attempting great tasks should give at
least some reward.”



This brings up some extremely valid points. A good example here might
be that, in href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/wow" target="_blank"> style="font-style: italic;">World of Warcraft
PvP, players are still rewarded something
at the end of a given battleground or arena match even for a loss. It
allows for that sense of achievement while still granting a higher
reward to the winning team, giving players something to ultimately
strive for beyond appealing to their competitive nature which is also
rewarded thanks to via leaderboard rankings.



style="margin: 2px; width: 210px; float: right;">

href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/65353" target="_blank"> style="width: 200px; float: right;" alt="EverQuest 01"
src="/image/view/65353">

Going back a few years earlier, the original href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/taxonomy/term/38"
target="_blank"> style="font-style: italic;">Everquest
was known to
have a somewhat harsh death penalty, incorporating everything from XP
loss to naked corpse runs. Yet there were also plenty of supporting
gameplay elements that helped lessen the penalty, and also helped
strengthen some of the social aspects of the game. Having spent a few
years as a Necromancer in EQ, it was entirely common to meet new
players each time I logged in simply because the class had the ability
to track and summon corpses. Necros were a staple on raids not only due
to their ‘mana-battery’ status, but more so because
they were oftentimes the deciding factor of whether or not a guild
could recover from a wipe and make a second attempt within the same
play session.



Since then, the trend has been to downplay not only the death penalty
itself, but those supporting mechanics have seemingly remained locked
within the confines of old Norrath in exchange for a few added dents in
your armor that you can have removed for a small fee. When asked
whether this trend would continue into the foreseeable future, Noah had
this to say:


“I sure hope
the future of MMO gaming isn’t
downplayed death penalties. While it’s certainly a valid
playstyle and there are many successful games with very little penalty
some of the most fun I’ve personally ever had is when the
stakes were at their highest. There is nothing like the rush you get
when you are warping your fleet into an enemy gate camp. There will
always be people who would rather be going all in at the high stakes
table to compliment all those people who would rather stick to the
nickel slots.”



Hermann provides another interesting perspective, offering up some
possible ideas as to how harsher death penalties could be handled in
the future that might help add to their appeal:


“I think
they will continue to be downplayed, although I
believe there is a lower limit. The reason for this is that as games
get more expensive you have to capture larger audiences and there is
every indication that larger audiences don't like harsh death
penalties. There is a strong correlation between game
population growth and reduction in death penalties. Personally I quit
Ultima Online when they made the death penalty too weak, but I am in
the minority. EA/Origin certainly made the correct decision in
lessening the penalty and protecting the players from the PK armies
running around. That being said, I think that we could see some
interesting developments within the hardcore community in actually
increasing death penalties. One scenario could go
something like this. Imagine that you play the game in a mode where
death incurs a 1 hour "cool down" period per character level,
thus as you advance the steaks get higher. Now imagine that this is an
open, full on PvP world. I mean anyone can kill anyone at any time. Now
lets say that you can accelerate the resurrection timer by paying a fee
- say 100 credits or gold/level - but that money goes
to the person who defeated you. Another way to do this is to have a
kind of player bounty system where you could put a price on someone's
head and hunters could collect it - I know that is currently done in
some MMOs.”




To read the latest guides, news, and features you can visit our EverQuest Game Page.

Last Updated: Mar 29, 2016

About The Author

Reuben "Sardu" Waters has been writing professionally about the MMOG industry for eight years, and is the current Editor-in-Chief and Director of Development for Ten Ton Hammer.

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