Remove xp penalty's from death

I'm all for a death penalty, there are many different ways it can be done.

Just GGG took probably the only one that doesn't work and the reductions we have seen didn't make it work and never will.

The static % of level never will work, no matter what figure they choose. Well it will 'work' at a certain level only.

Like say, 30% is nothing at level 30, still nothing at level 50, maybe it becomes about right at level 80 but then is too harsh at 85 onwards.

Now take 5%, this is again pointless early on, but remains pointless further, there again will be a small window where it is fitting but again becomes too harsh.


^Don't read too much into where I placed those, hypothetical and debatable, but the point is, any amount they settle on will have a large amount of levels - short amount of time where it is too mild, followed by a small window where it is fitting, followed by a short amount of levels - long amount of time where it is too harsh. Whatever you do with the static %, whatever you make it, it will be unfitting more than it is fitting, at a really big ratio. Reduce the overly harsh and extend the pointless, reduce the pointless and extend the overly harsh, the sweet spot will move but get no bigger.

But like I said, I think it's intended to work that way.

I think they want the penalty to be almost meaningless early on as to not punish newer players, it hits the sweet spot in the late 70s to mid 80s where GGG seems to want all builds to be able to reasonably make it to then it starts to get harsh after 85, which from all design indications are optional levels.

Reading the past couple pages, when did the death penalty become about reaching level 100?

My issue with the death penalty is not about reaching 100. When a softcore character dies, that's a great excuse to end the session because it's irrevocable and negative. The issue here is ending on an irrevocable, negative note leaves players with a negative impression of the game. A player with a lowered perception of the game doesn't do much good for anybody.

The main issue I have with the death mechanic is that it doesn't offer a lifeline to get the player interested again-- A recovery mechanic to show that you have learned from your mistake. Rather than leave on the negative note, a player would be encouraged to push forward and turn the death into a learning experience. Not simply because the best/most skilled players know to learn for their mistakes, but because the game mechanics reinforce it upon everyone regardless of skill level. This makes sessions less likely to end on a sour note and helps player retention.

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PolarisOrbit wrote:

Reading the past couple pages, when did the death penalty become about reaching level 100?

My issue with the death penalty is not about reaching 100. When a softcore character dies, that's a great excuse to end the session because it's irrevocable and negative. The issue here is ending on an irrevocable, negative note leaves players with a negative impression of the game. A player with a lowered perception of the game doesn't do much good for anybody.

The main issue I have with the death mechanic is that it doesn't offer a lifeline to get the player interested again-- A recovery mechanic to show that you have learned from your mistake. Rather than leave on the negative note, a player would be encouraged to push forward and turn the death into a learning experience. Not simply because the best/most skilled players know to learn for their mistakes, but because the game mechanics reinforce it upon everyone regardless of skill level. This makes sessions less likely to end on a sour note and helps player retention.

The argument has always been about punishing players unfairly due to deaths out of their control or when playing at a higher level and ultimately getting to level 100.

In regards to pushing yourself into a better character, if your goal is level 100 then naturally each death will do that. I would support a "recover body" implementation to where a player has the ability to recover their body for partial XP gain back again, but either way people think % is too harsh and that would only help players not playing in a FULL party.

I think its very clear that some people don't like % XP loss because its "unfair", but at the same time proposed solutions like -mf or any time based penalty wouldn't serve a proper purpose.

In D3 SC death literally means nothing. The only time it even matters is greater rifts, that is comparable to doing like uber atziri at higher grift levels where your character needs a certain set of defenses in order to do the content. Death respawn increases every death in grift by 5 seconds, up to 30 seconds, but in order to advance to the next level you must complete the rift in a certain time. This game is much different then PoE, but at the same time is an ARPG game and should, just like historically (D2, ect) punish deaths.

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Moosifer wrote:

In rampage w/ cartos being more frequent.

78 = 15-20c a piece
4 chisels + trans and augs = 1.5c
10-50 alts per - 1-5c (right? forget what the alt:c was)
1 regal = 1.5c (or if bad regal add scour and everything again)

So ballpark 5c to roll back then. Now I think people are spending more because cartos aren't as forgiving.

So 20-25c per map in investment. Probably closer to 30-35c now?

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Moosifer wrote:

Return is all over the place. Are you selling 78-80 white bases? Are you alching items? Are you checking blue items for top tier rolls (tyrannical ambushers/harbingers for examples). So you could be pulling a killing if you want to go through the hassle of getting bases and then selling them in chat, because xyz doesn't give ilvl so can't sell there.

I'm talking about squeezing every last Alt out, including selling the maps.

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PolarisOrbit wrote:

My issue with the death penalty is not about reaching 100. When a softcore character dies, that's a great excuse to end the session because it's irrevocable and negative. The issue here is ending on an irrevocable, negative note leaves players with a negative impression of the game. A player with a lowered perception of the game doesn't do much good for anybody.

The main issue I have with the death mechanic is that it doesn't offer a lifeline to get the player interested again-- A recovery mechanic to show that you have learned from your mistake. Rather than leave on the negative note, a player would be encouraged to push forward and turn the death into a learning experience. Not simply because the best/most skilled players know to learn for their mistakes, but because the game mechanics reinforce it upon everyone regardless of skill level. This makes sessions less likely to end on a sour note and helps player retention.

I feel simply being able to go back to the content without delay counts for quite a bit here. For example, PoE's HC death penalty utilizes this concept by porting a player to Standard, where they can still play for a bit, try a "what if," etc before reroll... much softer in tone than a straight deletion.

You raise a concern for some of the suggestions in this thread. For example, both the recurring "duration penalty" suggestion and my instance-closing idea have problems by your metric.

However, technically, your idea is moot to death penalty balance, and is more of a well-intended thing to do for dying characters. For example, let's say we gave back half of lost XP when a player kills the enemy which dealt the killing blow; the XP penalty would still need to be balanced assuming precisely this happened, so the revenge mechanic would be taking even more XP than the death penalty requires, then returning this extra bit later. The real death penalty, the non- refundable part, would be completely unaffected.

So really, what you are suggesting is not a death penalty, but a walk-away-and-do-something-else penalty. It hurts players for not diving right back into things, for AFK after a death. Not convinced such a thing would be good for the game, and frankly, it seems psychologically manipulative in a bad, BF Skinner kind of way.

Scrotie to both questions, I'm unsure. With talks of "stealth map drop nerfs" at the beginning of this league I'm not positive from personal experience this league what the cost of sustain high maps are because I'm on my 5th or 6th reroll of the league and I took a little over a month off. I'm not sure if people have gone back to chaos spamming maps or they're still alt/regaling.

Also with squeezing every bit of profit out, like to the point of chancing for voltaxic type squeeze, again I have no idea. When you start chaining them the idea of scouring every map for every potentially valuable white item seems extremely tedious and a waste of time. So like I said I was making (assuming I kept the regals) about 50-100c a day through production and passive trading (procure/xyz). You could probably push out another 25-50 through actively trading inbetween maps. And with a little chance luck you can have bursts of 5-30+ ex. Also could be much higher if you have a dedicated group with an MF culler.

If we got a new set of maps that had level ranges from 82 - 90, and increased overall frequency of maps dropping, that would be a decent compromise, imo.

Still bad gameplay that players get punished by DD, but if we at least had the improvements to maps, that would probably make up for the unavoidable deaths. And we're still punished for them by loosing valuable portals anyways.

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Wolfarus wrote:

If we got a new set of maps that had level ranges from 82 - 90, and increased overall frequency of maps dropping, that would be a decent compromise, imo.

Still bad gameplay that players get punished by DD, but if we at least had the improvements to maps, that would probably make up for the unavoidable deaths. And we're still punished for them by loosing valuable portals anyways.

I agree - 80+ maps would really be a great long-term solution to the exp penalty problem (I acknowledge not all of us see it as a problem, but I happen to). With the opportunity to gain back 10% exp faster, albeit by completing more difficult content, high-level characters won't be as discouraged by a death.

Whether or not it's from desync, we're all human and we all make mistakes, especially in a game that's fundamentally as difficult/random/twitchy as PoE. Dedicated players should be able to recover from those mistakes without feeling caged by them, or like we've fallen off of an insurmountable wall.

@Moosifer: what I'm trying to figure out is map sustainably. Of the 20-30 78s you were running per day, about how many bought, how many found?

I like the idea of doing hard content to reclaim lost xp that was just mentioned a couple posts ago! How about this:

"Purgatory map" - Map level 75-85, XP in these maps can only be used to regain lost XP from death, they're always corrupted, unidentified, and always spawn with 10 mods. Drops no items, no XP penalty on death.

Alternatively:

Map level 70-75, instead of IIQ it rolls "more XP gain", again no item drops, no XP penalty on death.