83 réponses à ce sujet

[Sylvius the Mad]

AlexXIV wrote...

Then you need a different way to make RPGs. Most quests and encounters suggest that the protagonist can't fail/die. I mean if you are realistic then the protagonist is a fool because he/she runs headlong into impossible odds.

A game that asks the protagonist to do such a thing is a lousy game.  There needs to be an in-character justification for everything PC does.

If the protagonist cannot die, then I would expect someone within the setting to notice this, perhaps the protagonist himself, and for that anomaly to be remarked upon.

I would like my protagonist to be no different from the other characters within the setting.  I abhor plot armour.

[Gunderic]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

PantheraOnca wrote...

As an FYI, rolling to live SUUUUUUUUCKS.

I don't see any other way to avoid having the players be confident their characters will survive.

I love the rolling to live approach.  But then, I also think that 80% of all RPG characters should die before they reach level 5.

I think that would've been neat (Constitution/Willpower roll or something), but then I'd also want to have an option to avoid the Joining and so on...

[EmperorSahlertz]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

You're completely ignoring roleplaying considerations. The possibility of death should affect the behaviour of the characters, and if the player's goal is to implement a coherent character design, then that influence should filter through.

And you are completely ignoring that the computer RPGs are NOT made for hardcore RPers, but rather for all the casual people out tehre, who wants to relax with a fun game in the wee hours of the night.
Most of what is done to a character makes sense from a story perspective, but if tehre is one thing that is most important in a game, rating far above immersion, it must NEVER become irritating. If a game becomes irritating, then the player will simply put down the game and move on. You know what is irritating? Dying a bazzillion times to the same "roll to survive" roll, becasue you failed to pick up the right stat 5 levels ago. People don't want that. Oh I'm sure a lot of hardcore RPers want it, but they are a very very disappearingly small minority, and can safely be ignored, when it comes to gameplay design.

Modifié par EmperorSahlertz, 08 novembre 2011 - 09:23 .

[Sylvius the Mad]

It doesn't need to be irritating. It needs to be credible within the setting. A PC that cannot die is not credible. A PC that can die, however, need not be irritating, particularly if the game gives the player the tools necessary (like reloading, or console commands) to overcome those chance-based obstacles.

[EmperorSahlertz]

But reloading takes all the power out of the "roll to survive" the whole point of it is to have a serious impact on the player taking the risk. If he can simply reload afterwards, it is only an annoyance since it won't have hindered him at all. "Roll to survive" only wokrs in cases where you have a DM who can make sure your character actually stays dead.

[REgentleman]

This is an interesting topic, but it seems to me that an important part of this argument is being left out- in a videogame RPG, if you fail at something, such as a random-number-generator roll, that then causes your main characters to die, what is the game supposed to present you with next? I would assume it would have to offer an alternate outcome which would still be appealing to play.


Example: there is a turn-based tactical RPG for the SNES (released in Japan only ), whose name I'll leave out in case it would spoil any fans of the series it's a part of. There is the option in the first half of this game to set up opposite-gender pairs of your characters (units in an army, in this case), such that they fall in love as part of the story. If a pair is successfully matched, and the female survives, then their children will be usable characters in the second half of the game. The children will have different stats and proficiencies based on who their fathers were, and some elements of the story will be changed around, depending (there happens to be a theme about passing down royal/holy blood to ensure the avoidance of or cause catastrophe, but anyway).

If you don't set up pairs, though, you're not screwed in the second-half of the game, because substitute characters will take the place of the unborn children. Your experience will be different, perhaps harder, and perhaps your favorite characters from the first half will seem to have gotten short-changed if this route is taken, but the direction of the story remains the same, and the game is perfectly completable. Some might argue the story is more compelling this way, and even prefer it.


Assuming Sylvius has some experience with roleplaying, can I ask what direction oldschool RPG's go in when a player-character dies? Does the GM say, "Better luck next time! Go home, reflect on what might have gone wrong and make a new character for when we try again later." I can accept the point that plot armor is a poor design choice, but if a videogame takes exactly that approach, the player is almost forced to metagame, which I think is a higher price to pay than the existence of plot armor.


Tl;DR: Your character fails the Grey Warden roll, they're dead. In a tabletop RPG setting, what happens next? What happens next in a videogame RPG? Is it necessary for them to take different approaches, and why might that be?

Modifié par REgentleman, 08 novembre 2011 - 10:58 .

[Sylvius the Mad]

EmperorSahlertz wrote...

But reloading takes all the power out of the "roll to survive" the whole point of it is to have a serious impact on the player taking the risk.

No.  Are you even trying to pay attention?

The point isn't to have an impact on the player.  The point is to have an impact on the CHARACTER.

If he can simply reload afterwards, it is only an annoyance since it won't have hindered him at all.

I don't want to hinder the player.  As you say, annyance is bad, and hindering the player will do nothing but annoy him.  Why would you want to hinder the player?

"Roll to survive" only wokrs in cases where you have a DM who can make sure your character actually stays dead.

You're completely missing the point.  The reason to have a roll to survive event is to make death a real possibility within the game's setting.  You don't really want death to be a real possibility from the player's perspective unless the player wants his character to die, and that certainly can't be determined by a random number generator.

If death is a real possibility within the game's setting, then the characters within that setting will be less likely to engage in high-risk behaviour.  Because they can die.  They can die at any time.

Do you understand now?  Please tell me you understand.  The point is not to punish the player.  The point is to make the setting work better as a coherent whole.

[Sylvius the Mad]

REgentleman wrote...

Assuming Sylvius has some experience with roleplaying, can I ask what direction oldschool RPG's go in when a player-character dies? Does the GM say, "Better luck next time! Go home, reflect on what might have gone wrong and make a new character for when we try again later." I can accept the point that plot armor is a poor design choice, but if a videogame takes exactly that approach, the player is almost forced to metagame, which I think is a higher price to pay than the existence of plot armor.

Low level characters are generally treated as disposable, and high-level characters generally have some means to get around death (like resurrection), plus they're also less likely to die.

[PantheraOnca]

I think there needs to be a bit of clarification. What I really meant to say is that non-optional rolls to live suck. Allowing a player to choose to do something that has a real possibility of character death is super-fine in my book.

If I choose to do something dangerous, I should have to deal with the possible consequences of that for my character.

If the entire party is going to have to go through the joining in order to continue the campaign, I don't think that's good design. I guess if players can choose to not participate in the joining and still be in a party with each other that would be fine by me, but I think that stretches the setting beyond its intended shape.