This is not a good idea at all. Keeping people from using your product is a good way to fail as a company.
5 Likes
DIII has Pool of Reflection bonus loss on death and GR timer penalty. I think designs like this are much better than lazy âwe just take ur xpâ old ways, since they incentivise more engaging gameplay.
4 Likes
Noone remembers the old Nephalem Valor bonus? After killing an elite, you got a buff that raised your magic/gold find, stacking up to 5 times. You lost it after you died or changed your skills. There is something there, an incentive for staying alive and keeping the same build.
Not to mention dursbility loss that ends up costing gold and DR on being abke to rez at your corpse, which costs time. And unlike the masochists favorite D2, if you die in a boss, you have to restart the encounter. You cannot jus throw yourself at a boss until it finally dies.
I prefer the D3 methid, but if there was to e a penalty, i would go Hollow Knight style, get back to where you died and you regain whatever you lost, no gear loss, just small amounts of XP and gold until you get back.
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Death penalties is one of my pet peeves with A-RPGs.
Softcore needs a much more substantial death penalty in D4.
Meaningful deaths lead to more engaging combat, it leads to better stat and build balance (defensive stats/skills increasing in value).
Making death matter is a fundamental pillar of good A-RPG design imo.
Iâd like some kind of inspiration from the A-RPG Sacred 2. It had a Survival bonus, which slowly build up during the game. It gave MF bonus, better drops and other bonusses - but also increased monster lvls, so there was a risk/reward aspect to it as well . If you died you lost it all. So you lost a bonus when dying, but the game also got a bit easier for you again.
I also liked it as a mechanism because it was a bonus that was building up. Dying merely bought you back to default. It was harsh, punishing, you could lose countless hours of bonus stats, but it was not unreasonable, and it still left room for HC to have its place too. And the Risk/reward aspect just added a nice extra touch.
The bonus could also be lost if respeccing. Another important pillar in A-RPG design, to make your build matter.
Corpse runs and xp loss are not great death penalties. They both risk being extra punishing for people who are already struggling, by making the game even harder (need to get corpse back / losing power through xp loss). Not really good design. Make the death penalty something that is valuable for everyone, but does not make struggling players struggle even more with their survival.
A good death penalty makes people feel rewarded for staying alive, rather than punished for dying.
Pool of Reflection was the right direction in some ways. Just way too small and short-termed bonus for it to matter.
5 Likes
No people remember, they just choose to ignore because bringing things up like this doesnât fit their narrative of D3 being all bad.
I remember that but D3 haters think that death penalty in D3 is too weak, but when I suggest something extreme and punishing they think it is stupid. Sigh.
Debuff timers etc. (including being unable to log in, or get items etc) for X time is pretty much the worst way to design death penalties - or any other kind of penalty in a game.
Because it tells the player to stop playing.
A good penalty tells the player to get back on the horse and keep playing.
It is not about whether it is more punishing or not, but the way it affects player behavior.
While I consider XP loss a bad death penalty (as described earlier), at least it does tell players to get back in and earn that XP back.
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Fine. If that so, how about this? Every time you died, one of the item in inventory will disappeared for good.
Should also auto delete your game, and account. Also an auto ring from your mother-in-law.
Edit: after thinking, I think the Auto call from mother-in-law is abit too much. Maybe 50% Chance only.
4 Likes
Same issue as with XP loss. It punishes the people who are struggling the most, by making the game harder and harder each death.
It basically goes against âeasy to learn, hard to masterâ.
A good penalty must feel more impactful for people who are otherwise doing well in the game, than those who are struggling to progress.
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I am not a D3 hater, Itâs a great game that I have played for almost 8 years. The penalty is too week.
I just want D4 to be even better, donât water everything down so much. Make things meaningful.
3 Likes
How about it make your gear âlose experienceâ, i.e. youâll have to complete the level before your gear kicks in âfull powerâ again⌠They could make weapons do less damage or give lesser amount of affixes temporarily
The whole concept of âleveling gear as if itâs a characterâ is VASTLY unresearched tbh, in the other topic posted that white items should have like 4-5 âlevelsâ to update based upon your experience therefore tailor the affix bonuses based on what you use the most to kill some stuff, same here with the death penalty
Your gear loses 1 level and need to âreenter combatâ quite a while before it gets into âfull shapeâ again⌠Itâs not lore friendly nor realistic, but you know, in games gameplay quality is what counts the most tbh 
EDIT: Heck even in D2 there were things like âlow qualityâ, âcrudeâ, ânormalâ, âsuperiorâ & stuff⌠So yes, you die your gear becomes âcrudeâ first (if it was superior then normal), then you die again it becomes âlow qualityâ and so on and so forthâŚ, and the next X amount of experience instead of gearing your level, you end up ârelevelingâ your gear
how about this idea: combine HC and SC in the same mode: every new part of the map you are about to reach / unlock is hardcore. to make it softcore you have to reach something like a waypoint and build ârespawnersâ
-you die in an area with installed respawners: lose gold, xp and respawner takes damage
-die in an area without respawner: perma death
-monsters can damage/ destroy respawners.
That to me sounds like an interesting game mechanic for a certain mode of play or some specific/weird dungeons 
⌠Donât think would work as a âoverall mechanicâ to the game tbh
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me neither - but itâs only brainstorming ideas here,
Had a similar idea where instead of TP scroll/channel you have a âPortal stoneâ that you push as you progressâŚ, but have to recharge it killing mobs therefore âafkâ portal wonât work (unless you wanna quit the whole dungeon and start over) 
Kinda reminded me on that one tbh
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The death penalty should mean something at least for SC. While I think the penalty in D2 was too great (at high levels this set you back days), the death penalty in D3 is too light.
Iâd see it as a buff your character gets for not dying in the past x time frame. Say 10% bonus to all stats if you havenât died in the last 15mins. If you die, you lose that bonus for 15mins. At the same time, I rather not see it as a stacking debuff on a player âlike dark soulsâ where you get penalized heavily for dying a lot and your character becomes useless for some time.
You can also set the death penalty as a - chance of magic find for a period of time meaning dying lowers your loot chances for say 15mins.
I like that, i agree its better to get bonus for staying alife instead of dying penality. But then after you died what happend, you lose bonus but do you get back up on your feet where you was standing?
Spawn back in nearest town imo.
Maybe outside the dungeon if in a dungeon.
1 Like