I've had thoughts about monster respawns since I recently purchased Dragon Age: Origins. I love the game except for one thing: monsters never respawn. Basically, once you're through with the game, your character is pretty much "dead." (Not counting DLC or expansions to prolong their lives a little.)

I see a few advantages for this for the developer: he/she has a tighter control over the player's level and resources if quantity of monsters are not infinite.

However, I think that the freedom to grind, whether it's to raise my level, get resources for making potions, or just to gloat over the overpoweredness of my new über character build by overkilling a few bad guys, is an essential part of a RPG.

What are your thoughts about respawning in RPGs? Also, if you'd rather have respawns, what do you think is the best way to make it work? A simple respawn timer? (MMORPGs) Upon loading an area? (FFXII) Upon reloading the game? (Diablo II) Upon starting a "new game+"? (Mass Effect) Something else?

My thought is, player's shouldn't be able to notice re-spawns (and not everything needs to re-spawn). I actually like spores model of populating the world with a balanced Eco-System.

For RPG's, this would consist of large groups of monsters traveling from and to different areas (with their own reason for doing so) so there is a chance the player will encounter a group they have no chance of defeating. The hard part is body clean-up.. which could be accomplished by other monsters eating them. It all helps makes the world come alive.

Another idea is the ability to revisit quest areas; like a castle the was previously occupied by some villain and now something else took it's place and repopulated the castle (in a world of nefarious things, stuff like that would happen).

Several of Bioware's RPGs have no respawning or respawning limited to a few locations and/or monster types.

There are a couple points to consider.

First, if the player is making multiple trips to the same location, depending on the distance and difficulty of reaching that location, having to fight through the same hundred monsters he or she killed before could be a momentum killer.

This would apply in particular to game worlds that are open enough to allow a player to stumble on a monster-infested location, but also have quests the player might discover later that will send him back to that location.

Another example would be a game where limited carrying capacity might encourage the player to make multiple trips ferrying loot back to base camp or the local shop.

Furthermore, if the player starts clearing out a location, then discovers he was underprepared and needs more supplies, wants to recruit help, or needs to stop and heal or recover magic, respawning can be horribly depressing.

At the same time, as somebody who likes being able to farm XP to achieve specific character-building goals, I personally like having some respawning monsters available throughout a game.

As a player, I would prefer a respawning system that had some sort of simple underlying logic. If you argue that wildlife tends to migrate throughout a wide area, respawning animals make a degree of sense (an Oregon Trail type of system where the respawn/encounter rate decreases as you kill them off to reflect over-hunting may be an interesting way to handle it). Generic humanoid creatures that are not tied to a particular location could fall into a similar pattern.

On the other hand, if there is a story-based reason for the existence and placement of a particular enemy or enemies, it's probably better that most or all of them stay dead. For example, if the Hammerfist Tribe of orcs is harassing Happyton, then if the player goes to the cave and slaughters the tribe, bringing them back for the sake of XP and loot can be immersion breaking. A more logical take would be to maybe respawn a small number to represent "stragglers" not in the cave during the slaughter, or spawn other wildlife to simulate their takeover of the tribe's former environs (like a pack of wolves moving into the cave).

This is far less of an issue when travel times are not significant. Morrowind, for example, can get away with respawning almost everything because many key quest locations are small enough that the player is not often inconvenienced by it, and mass transit/warping allows the player to bypass the huge areas where enemies have respawned.

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Original post by Crowseye multiple trips ferrying loot back to base camp or the local shop.

oh how I hate loot ferrying! (or even worse inventory tetris!)

anyway I agree, there has to be a balance to it and certain zones shouldn't allow re-spawns to be in.

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Original post by Tntricker My thought is, player's shouldn't be able to notice re-spawns (and not everything needs to re-spawn). I actually like spores model of populating the world with a balanced Eco-System. For RPG's, this would consist of large groups of monsters traveling from and to different areas (with their own reason for doing so) so there is a chance the player will encounter a group they have no chance of defeating. The hard part is body clean-up.. which could be accomplished by other monsters eating them. It all helps makes the world come alive.

I have to second this one. Spawning should be like breeding. You can use monster dwellings which spawns new monsters, but when you destroy them, it is over. The player can choose to get rid of the continous spawning by destroying all dwellings or to leave some for later farming. The options of such a system would be great. Think of a classic orc-human conflict where each side have their dwellings and housings and the player can take quests to push one or the other side back (destroying housings/dwellings).