The Death Express

kingfatzo · Post by **kingfatzo** » Thu Jan 11, 2007 9:16 pm

yAy for scuicide !

JesterOI · Post by **JesterOI** » Fri Jan 12, 2007 5:21 pm

Should be a real attraction for the emo's

Lorkar1 · Post by **Lorkar1** » Fri Jan 12, 2007 5:37 pm

I have to say again that I LOVE this feature. WOOT!!!!! No more 50 minute walks because of encumberance!!!

Post by **Metis** » Fri Jan 12, 2007 7:15 pm

1 reminder a great helpful feature, if you get stuck and relogging doesnt help and nobody around you can at least kill yourself if no DM on to help.

kgb · Post by **kgb** » Sat Jan 13, 2007 3:43 am

I'm gonna be a party pooper and pose a question.

Doesn't Death Express now eliminate the effectiveness of being level-drained via trapped chests, monsters or via enervation or energy drain spells by a cleric/mage?

The way I see it the affected player can simply kill themselves and be rid of any ill-effects. Any way to stop players from doing this?

cheers
kgb

kingfatzo · Post by **kingfatzo** » Sat Jan 13, 2007 5:38 am

kgb wrote: The way I see it the affected player can simply kill themselves and be rid of any ill-effects. Any way to stop players from doing this?

cheers
kgb

need not make things complex !

the player could have simply had recieved a PK from another person and been rezzed on the spot to remove effects....not having to walk back to where they were !!!11!!1

with the instant death - it ports them back to their bind point which requires them to walk back to where they were...thus paying a "penalty" for killing one's self to remove drains, etc....

its no different than when i decided back before the book addition that i didnt feel like walking my level 40 toon back home...so i just ran into a massive mob of spawns for the quick route .... with 985,000 xp on one of em...its not like im loosing out on anything

now there is a easy way to look at it.

Elric of Melnibone · Post by **Elric of Melnibone** » Sat Jan 13, 2007 9:43 am

Woot no more getting trapped in the planar store.......now if I could only destroy or sell those pesky return tokens!

Kirg · Post by **Kirg** » Sat Jan 13, 2007 11:14 am

Apparently doesn't work in no PVP zones. So, you'd be still trapped there.

Nolan Silvermoon · Post by **Nolan Silvermoon** » Sat Jan 13, 2007 11:40 am

Bummer

JesterOI · Post by **JesterOI** » Sat Jan 13, 2007 6:05 pm

randdo · Post by **randdo** » Sat Jan 13, 2007 7:23 pm

All though I use and find the Death Express handy by saving a lot of running around time, I personally feel that it has taken away from NS4 experience. No longer will people have to worry about running into someone that they "dislike" while they travel "home" and run the risk of pk once they have finished a quest. No long will players have to worry about carrying a "much too heavy a load" in their packs then figure out a return travel route to sell all their goodies or what monsters they might have to fight on their way back.

To me the Death Express is a-kin to having a super "haste" item. It is nothing more than a glorified (very nice fx) recall stone. NS4 never had them before so why start now. As far as asking another player to PK one for a fast return "home", you still need that player there to carry out the act. plus they have to be of a level able to carry out that act.

Although I like the convenience of the Death Express it just doesn't have that NS4 feeling. (If it ain't broke why fix it. Less can be more.) Add to much and lose the uniqueness that is NS4.

Post by **Binkyuk** » Sat Jan 13, 2007 9:13 pm

the standard way of returning home for 90% of people was to drop party and have your friend kill you. that seems pretty broken to me...

and as for running into someone who wants to PK you on the way home - heck yeah! that was a free ride!

Post by **Zing** » Sat Jan 13, 2007 9:53 pm

I have a couple of comments to add.

Firstly the DE button works in all areas. The restrictions affect every area and can be re-discovered in the first post of this thread for those who have lost the way about what they are.

Secondly, Randdo makes some very good points and these exact same things were discussed at length by the team here.

A time comes where as a dev team you realise that players will find their own way to have fun no matter what we intended. People PKing each other for a free ride home was one such common element on the server that was obviously never intenteded to be, but consider our dilema.

Why do they do it?
Because walking home is boring seemed to be the most likely.

Do we care?
Well we could invoke some complicated scripting which records your party members etc and hands out XP penalties if you die at the hands of one of them etc. But wouldn't this make the server less player friendly?

Is there a message in this?
Well sometimes the dev team has to take common unintended adoptions in style of play as a message about what is fun and what is not.

What should we do about it?
Stop it, embrace it, ignore it?
The jury is still out on this one. If we stop it we risk raising the amount of tedium vs fun times. If we embace it there is a chance that the 'feel' of the server changes for the worse (but people are PKing each other for transport left, right and centre anyway). If we ignore it then we're not really doing our jobs. This happens so often 'off the record' that we are only really left with option 1 or 2. We decided 2 meant more fun, so thats why we picked it - for now...

What are we up against?
A penalty and cost free ride home is a very attractive and efficient means of transport. There is nothing less than what we have currently implemented with the diary that would have been acceptable. If we charge gold or xp for a portal home then guess what - PKing each other is still more attractive.

Ultimately it was pretty much decided that some form of recall stone was probably a good thing. How that got implemented was also another whole discussion, but killing you meant that all of our transport engine and exploit protection would be automatically used without us having to write new ones (personally I think it shows we have a sense of humour too - a dark one, but a sense of humour none the less).

So there you have it, we decided that in a world without perma-haste this feature should help you to spend more of your time here having fun.

Don't forget though, this feature is still just provisionally released. Pending review. Now is the time to let us have your opinions on the above for our consideration when that happens.

Blystos Re · Post by **Blystos Re** » Sun Jan 14, 2007 12:43 am

*Ahem*

I don't want to be the only one here nay-saying...but what an uber-noob, cop-out, scaredy-cat, LAME-AS-CRAP way to play.

Getting there is half the fun (and challenge), getting back in one piece is the other. You have just effectively given everyone a free portal back-to-wherever. I've gotten..let's see...three or four friendly PKs home ever, at times when it's 2:00 in the morning and I am falling asleep at the keyboard and I'm sitting in a boss chamber with others that want to keep playing (or some similar situation). And even then it has been rare. Any time that I'm able to play long enough to get out on my own, I will at least try.

This just sucks.

I like the challenge this server presented, one of the main reasons I play NC, and now it's being handed over to the power-levelers. Why bother, as randdo put it, trying to figure out how the $^(*% you're going to get home with this load of loot, or making use of the invis or haste potions that you had to trade for so you can sneak your way back out. Why try when you can just POW! Hit the seppuku button and you get to go home and bypass all of that?

I'm sorry. I've held my tongue on this, but it's been bugging me since i read about it. Part of me want's to ignore that option forever...and then part of me wants to use it to rocket a few characters up to 40 just to prove my point. I mean, everyone else is going to...why not, right?

Hey, maybe we could bring Dev Crit back?
Whaddaya say?

/rant

kingfatzo · Post by **kingfatzo** » Sun Jan 14, 2007 1:35 am

1. Alot of MMO-RPG games have a porting feature : for example :

- Diablo2
- World of Warcraft
- OTHER NWN servers
- RPG single player games (i.e. Oblivion)
- etc.......

2. avoiding a pk ? you cant use it when an enemy is even remotly close to you..... only thing i can see as a 'solution' to this gripe is to add a 20-30 second timer on it (i.e. you have to wait 30 seconds before it auctually ports you to prevent a cop-out avoiding a mob of spawns or a PK'er.... Similar to a hearthstone usage in World of Warcraft...or a "camping requirement seen in Everquest......
BUT - if you are far enough away from the potential Pk'er to use it in the first place it is likley you could have just outran the pk-er anyway... the PK argument isnt valad..the device works well...(pwnd case closed)

3. extra loot (encumbrance) - okay....for your super-hardcore-RP'ing people yes i could see why you dont like this --and you are probably the same ones who...nvm thats off topic.....

but think about the convienence options here... as zing had stated ; this feature allows people to have more FUN time rather than the BORING time it takes to walk back home encumbered. (again revert back to #1)......your opinions are of course welcom but so are dissagreements against them ....

4. why would you not want the OPTION to not have to run down giant mountian after questing into the depths of the giant caves? saves ya alot of time and again allows for more quality gaming experience. (mmm double negatives

)

5. Party members can still PK each other back...this saves us the effort of doing so

.....

6. and finally the best of all.... you all whine and gripe about a new feature that was added...mind you a feature that you have to MANUALLY use...not one that you are REQUIRED to use....if you hate it THAT much then....ooooh ill bet you were so lost in your wah wah rant that you overlooked this one !1!!!!1 if you hate it that much then DONT USE IT

7. and to conclude a second time... you should ask the 70% or so of people who DONT comment on the boards how they feel before everyone gangs up on one opinion.....all too often i have seen some threads in the past (not too recenlty) become a griping thread used to get a change made to the server that potentially 100s of ppl play on....not that i am innocent; however you should look at all aspects of a situation before screaming foul...i am sure there are ppl who can become upset over constant changes to interface and is one of the disadvantages to NS4 in its current state....yet it has come a long way even in the year or so that i have now been here; but sooner or later we need to reach a medium where things can be set in stone; not debated and pounded into the mud over and over again...

8. Read #6 again ....if you dont like it; and you arent forced to use it; it doesnt mean you have to use it....if you cant control your own actions...well thats your problem.