Does Harsh Death Penalty really make the Challenge, or does Harder Gameplay make the Challenge?

I know I made this thread before, but after seeing Dark Soul (the sequel to Demon Soul) being hyped up at E3, and seeing the developers cheer on "Player Frustration" as if some kind of positive feature, I have to question the dirrection of many games are going, in order to simulate Challenge in Video Games.

Really has Harsh Death Penalty become the norm way to handle difficulty in modern day gaming?

To be honest, I believe players are confusing "Frustration" with "Challenging".
When something gets less Frustrating, players make the automatic assumption that its some how becoming less challenging. 

lets take a look at WoW for example.
Blizzard made "forming groups" less frustrating, but somehow that translate to people, that Blizzard is dumbing down the gameplay and making it easier.
Blizzard lowers the raid format from 40 man, down to 25 and 10 man groups, in order to make group formations less frustrating, but again, players some how translate that to Blizzard dumbing down the game and making it easier.

Back to Demon Soul. This game was popular for its difficulty. But lets be real here people. Was it really the gameplay that was Difficult, or was it the Harsh Death Penalty being very Harsh?
Take away the Harsh DP, and keep the exact same gameplay elements, is the game "so called" Hard any more? heck no! Only thing that makes Demon Soul "Challenging" as people seem to put it, was the DP, and that alone.
But lets think harder about that. "How can something That effects you when you LOSE, make the game Harder?"
In my opinion, Developers are simply being lazy, and using the HDP as a scape goat on making actual Challenging gameplay experiences.

I want to point out gameplay that actually applies a true challenge, rather than deploying gimmicks like HDP. That game is "HALO". yes its a FPS, but thats not the point. Just look at Halo's different difficulty modes. (Easy, Normal, Superior, Legendary) How is it that the Developers were able to make the game harder, but at the same time, not effecting what happens when a player dies? The Penalty of Death, doesnt change from different Difficulties in Halo, but that game still gets harder.

If this is possible to do, why is it so hard to for most Developers to do the same, and deliver actual challenges in video games, rather than these lame gimmicks?

Difficulty = how much skill is required to avoid failure.

Penalty = what happens if you fail.

Therefore death penalty doesn't make games harder.  It just makes them more painful or inconvenient.

If a developer wants to make their MMO "challenging" then a Harsh Death Penalty is an easy way out.

Making challenging game play takes more time, effort and skill(that is, to make it challenging and NOT stupid hard).

Harsh Death Penality forces players to actually think before they act. So in that regard, it does make it "harder" when compared to your typical MMO where players suicide to teleport back to a town. Other than that, Harsh Death Penality usually comes with more challenging content to force players into grouping. HDP is somewhat of a barrier of entry: "You must be social, and intelligent to enter".

But what really makes a game challenging, is the harder content or gameplay/mechanics and features. Without those, HDP doesn't mean much. But without HDP, it's a solo game where players suicide for the hell of it.

The main hook for players who enjoy HDP, especially in PvP games, is the adrenaline rush you get, but that in itself is unrelated with making a game challenging.

There has to be a balance of both.

Otherwise you have something like STO during the beta - a null death penalty (you respawned like 30 seconds away from the encounter that you died to) combined with incredibly difficult combat (mobs would often focus the same group member depending on how you aggro them, pretty much instantly killing him). Yet you would be able to easily overcome that by repeatedly coming back and finally overcoming the challenge.

Harsh penalty doesnt really make a game more challenging.  It only makes it more frustrating.  Let me give you an example.

In this Wii RPG I had, you can only save in the beginning of the dungeon.  So You go through the dungeon then get owned by the boss.  Congratulations now you have to do the ENTIRE dungeon again to have another try. 

Was it hard?  No the boss maybe just got lucky or I didnt know the tactics for the oss (I dont metagame).

So whatever I try again do the whole dungeon and now I know the boss will kill anyone with full hp when he hets 50% health.  Great.  Then BAM I die at 25% hp because apparently I needed to use fire resistance items before he reaches 25% hp because he will burn us to death if we have anything less than 50% fire resistance. 

Is that hard?  Nope.  Is there any way to know what was going to happen in the fight?  Yes through guides!

Any clues in game? no

Was it frustrating? OHH HELL YES! I HAD TO REDO THAT DUNGEON 2 DAMN TIMES! -.-  It wasnt challenging it was just annoying!

Now lets take that somewhere else! Take any random mmo.  This time, when you wipe at any point in the dungeon, the whole thing resets.  Do you think thats "hard"? nope just meta game so you know what to do and when o.o  Thats not hard thats just frustrating.

Or how about regular quests?  What about if you died at any part of the quest, you have to do the entire quest over again starting from 0?  Yeah.  Thats not hard.  Thats frustrating o.o  It WILL teach people to be more careful.  But for the most part, it doesnt bring challenge to the game.  It just brings frustration.

Harsh penalty can be fun, but pointless when the rest of the game is fairly easy. I wouldn't want to see harsh DP implemented in an easy MMO like Lotro/Rift for instance, but it was a lot of fun in EQ1 when mobs at or below your level could still very easily take you down if you weren't careful.

edit: It really needs to be implemented to supplement an experience in a game. Using EQ1 as an example again, mobs could surprise you at any time if you weren't carefully looking around, they could jump you from behind a tree or a hill, and unless you were prepared to make a run for it you could loose your gear. Going into dungeons was extremely dangerous knowing if things went wrong, your belongings could end up lieing deep inside surrounded by tough mobs. It was scary, but it felt adventurous and immersive.

Smarter AI and Tougher challenges to overcome are more fun that having to grind off a death penalty (by either removing XP penalty or grinding cash to repair damaged equipment) IMHO.

Better AI and particularly improved Mob grouping behaviour is something more MMO Dev teams should invest time into.

Besides Harsh Death penalties lead to player frustration, repeated player frustration leads to player unsubscribing, players unsubscribing leads to MMO shutdown. Harsh death penalties are overrated and quit unpopular as a whole, you need some sort of penalty to stop people using suicide as a method of travel but you shouldnt use a death penalty system to try to make your game more challenging/harder.

I don't think death penalty contributes to challenge at all.

A harsher death penalty, to me, is more of a motivator to play more carefully, more strategically and, generally, not play the game as though Leroy Jenkins is your personal role-model for gameplay.

It doesn't factor at all, though, into the "challenge" of the game. The challenge comes in terms of the tasks and trials you are given and how, well... challenging they are.

The challenge would be trying to survive in a dangerous MMO environment that has a harsh death penalty. The death penalty is the cost for failing to do so.

I will say that a harsh death penalty certainly enhances the sense of challenge because there's more riding on it.

If you simulate a virtual world then a death must have a meaning, if you develop a virtual hack n slay adventure ride its not neccessary to have any consequence following a death but start over the fight.

Death penaltys have never been fun in the many games i played!

The last world simulation was SWG and it was quite ok for me to have battle exhaustion and relax in an cantine and get my wounds healed in the hospital.
I believe there be many more ways to make death has meaningfull consequences in a virtual world game.

In past Daoc a death in PvP had a meaning if nobdoy was left to ressurect so you spawned in the realm portal keep and had to wait for the next teleport into the pvp zones.
I have never complained about that and thought its the logical penalty for failing.

Challenge comes only partial with it and a harsh death penalty does not make a weak game any better if the gameplay is lacking depth and fun: Gameplay > Death Penalty!

Originally posted by MMOExposed

In my opinion, Developers are simply being lazy, and using the HDP as a scape goat on making actual Challenging gameplay experiences.

 I want to point out gameplay that actually applies a true challenge, rather than deploying gimmicks like HDP. That game is "HALO". yes its a FPS, but thats not the point. Just look at Halo's different difficulty modes. (Easy, Normal, Superior, Legendary) How is it that the Developers were able to make the game harder, but at the same time, not effecting what happens when a player dies? The Penalty of Death, doesnt change from different Difficulties in Halo, but that game still gets harder.

If this is possible to do, why is it so hard to for most Developers to do the same, and deliver actual challenges in video games, rather than these lame gimmicks?

Difficulty level's in most non-MMO games are examples of dev's being lazy too - as generally all they do is spawn more mobs, and/or give mobs more health. And in RTS games, all they do is allow the AI to cheat, and get a large bonus to resources etc.

Though honestly, the only thing I find challenging about PVE in MMO's these day is finding a group. So you do have a point.

But with that said, I primarily stick to PVP, as that's where I find my challenge. I just wish dev's would give us back a meaningful DEATH PENALTY here so that things would be more exciting and intense, and people could once again be held accountible for their actions.

Originally posted by TheCrow2k

Besides Harsh Death penalties lead to player frustration, repeated player frustration leads to player unsubscribing, players unsubscribing leads to MMO shutdown. Harsh death penalties are overrated and quit unpopular as a whole, you need some sort of penalty to stop people using suicide as a method of travel but you shouldnt use a death penalty system to try to make your game more challenging/harder.

I'd actually have to disagree with this point. I just recently re-installed Dofus, an old MMO that now has an "Heroic Server". What it is is basically a server with x3 rates, but permanent death. Despite having the harshest death penality in existance, the server's very populated.

Of course if the game had only a single server and it was Heroic, perhaps Dofus wouldn't be so popular, but as long as they are other "normal" servers AND "hardcore" servers, it's perfectly possible to host a game and have popolated HDP servers.

Anything short of perma death does not equate challenge just frustration and perma death equates max frustration unless the game is designed like D2 originally was with many ways not to die.

D2 probably is the only game to ever get it right at release. Death stung if you played soft-core and hurt like hell if you played hardcore. That of course was before idiot developers decided to make challenging difficulty for soft-core players equate instant death on zoning and impossible to escape stuns and such so soft-core players could feel leet.

death penalty is not there to make the game harder or more challenging, its to make people think twice about doing anything.

if you know that you will loose a metric shit ton of (insert gameplay element) you will think twice about poking that dragon to see what happens

harder gameplay on the other hand is making that dragon, smart. (getting out of your aoe maelstrom, or remaining out of range) so you have to think  before poking the dragon

but its not what makes money

the majority (not me) want easy gameplay, with little or death penalty

oh and they want everything right now too... but hey if 11 people are willing to pay for that... i would do the same thing if i was in the publisher's/developper's shoes.

sadly its not what im looking for.

i want harsh death penalties and some challenge in my games. 

edit: seing alot of talk about permadeath, permadeath is only good in small communities in small servers where everyone roleplays. only place where i see permadeath working is in some D&D ruleset neverwinternights private permanent world server. or in a tabletop D&D pen and paper friday night nerd gathering

Think you missed the point of the death penalty. You seem fixed on relating the relation between a harsh death penalty and 'challenge' which doesn't really capture what a harsh death penalty facilitates.

Harsh death penalty is enjoyable to people that like the adrenaline rush of having something to lose. I don't think it has anything to do with adding to the challenge directly. Can it add to the challenge? Sure, it makes you have to keep your cool and play well under the added stress of knowing that if you mess up then you will pay.

With great risk comes great reward. Anything you accomplish in a game will feel that much better with greater risk.

Of course, however, managing and keeping from going into tedious and frustrating is the key to success.

You are assuming that I want the game I play to be challenging in the first place.

Look all a harsh death penalty does is make you not want to try as often. It makes you not want to take risks, and it breeds the worst type of elitists. You dont want to die so you dont invite anyone  who isnt the best geared, or following the FOTM spec, its not a fun game.

Originally posted by maplestone

You are assuming that I want the game I play to be challenging in the first place.

Challenge in games is not "omg super hard I have to think real hard" 

Sometimes challenge is enough difficulty so that you enjoy the game. 

Do you think mario will be fun if you have perma  star?  Maybe for 5 minutes.  Do you think that tekken will be fun if enemies dont fight back? 

o.o  Would you play those games? 

Maybe fake challenge would work where you feel like its harder than it actually is or maybe you just want to see the game play itself for you.  For that, I can understand.  But Im sure you dont want your people always one shotting stuff right? you want there to be at least some form of faux-challenge oozing out of it o.o 

OP.. your examples of WOW were stupid. They had nothing to do with death panaltys. They were just examples of why WOW is a dumbed down game.

Originally posted by Axehilt

Difficulty = how much skill is required to avoid failure.

Penalty = what happens if you fail.

Therefore death penalty doesn't make games harder.  It just makes them more painful or inconvenient.

Thats the end of the thread right there. Harsh death penalty does not bring challenge.