When an idea for a book came into my head recently, I also saw some ways it might be moved into a game, namely an (MMO?)RPG. What if we took a dual-world into account, where if you died, you started over in the other world, and so on. But you didn''t just spawn as a level 30 again. No, you died, you deserve SOME punishment. So you started again from scratch, like being born again. BUT, BUT, if you were to make it back to an old safehouse or stash, you could have your equipment back. I''m trying to flesh out this idea and all it''s flaws, so I''m asking for help with this one, I think there''s promise for a cool new feature here. The one major one I can come up with is making both worlds interesting and vital to the story, so that you have to switch between them at least a couple of times in the course of the game to complete quests. This would keep people from just stashing high-power equipment somewhere, so that when they die, they can simply get themselves killed again so they might have their loot back. -Ryan "Run_The_Shadows" -Run_The_Shadows@excite.com -"The best way to make someone feel pain at your words is to either tell the truth, and make it sound horrid; or to tell a lie that reflects their own personal fears and resentments of themselves."

You talking physical planets or different realities?Stark and Arcadia from the Longest Journey..that''d be an interesting concept to modify.
If you''re not familiar with that game basically one world is magic and the other is science.

You might want to read "To Your Scattered Bodies Go" by Philip Jose Farmer. It deals with death, resurrection, but in a different place, and so on, but there''s a lot more to it than that, but all in all, the premise was pretty simple.

It was a really cool book.

I think one of the keys to MMO games is this ... let each player proceed acording to their desire ...

From this simple rule you can deduce that it should NOT be neccesary for an individual player to switch worlds unless they want to. But having two interesting worlds, that it is possible to jump between (only by giving up the former), might be made to work, if you focussed on making it atractive to a decent percentage of the players instead of neccesary for all in order to advance in the game.

The idea of two different world united in such a symbiotic relationship is very appealing ... as is the idea of making the player give up something in order to gain something else (new different quests and abilities) ... I''m not sure I like the stashing stuff so you can get it back idea though ... perhaps instead just make it that the player (their soul or whatever) retains what it gains throughout its various "lives", but basically just cannot access it. Each time through you get back up to speed quicker than the last, but never for free, and never some magical restoration. It could be the measure of a life ... a life is LIVED if you exceed the point you reached the time before, and WASTED if you failed to achieve your former glory.

I don''t like the idea of having it only optional of switching worlds upon death because that defeats the purpose of it. At that point you might as well be running two seperate games. I think maybe the incremental-re-learning thing might be an intriguing idea, though. The thing being though, it''s not like you could just dump your entire bundle of swag somewhere and just expect it to be there whenever you get back to your life. If you rent a storage space for 2 months, paid in full, it''ll be there for 2 months, if you don''t get back to it by then, AND manage to get the key to it, etc, then you''re tough out of luck.
Intriguing thought popped into my head:
What if you could learn a whole new skillset every time you died? You might start life as a Fighter-ish class, learn weapon skills, etc, and then die in a fight against some big-bad-boss-type-creature and be able to be born again on the other plane/world and choose to become a Mage-ish class and learn those skills. Find some balance where there were a good high number of highly-specialized classes(8-12 classes, maybe?) And make it possible, but exponentially harder, to be able to learn every possible skill between lives.

-Ryan "Run_The_Shadows"
-Run_The_Shadows@excite.com
-"The best way to make someone feel pain at your words is to either tell the truth, and make it sound horrid; or to tell a lie that reflects their own personal fears and resentments of themselves."

Who says that a bundle of swag that has been dumped somewhere needs to be there next time around anyway?

This is akin to an idea a client of mine had where, when a player is not online (in an MMOG) their equipment may be stolen from them by someone of suitable skill. Extending that to a dual timeframe, what if loot from one world could be housed in special places (or within magical wards) and could then be retrieved once the player returns. But another player (or creature???) of sufficient power could come along and pick the lock (which rusts over time, so it becomes easier the longer you''re gone) or dispel the geas (which, like a lock, decays).

Oh, and I aggree with Run_The_Shadows that the player should not be given a choice as to wether or not he/she gets dumped in the other reality when he/she dies, because that''s punishment for screwing up.

However, there is another cool option that would make travel between realities more acceptable. if a player has decided to make the switch, he/she should be able to be sacrificed by a priest. When being reincarnated in the other reality, he/she would retain some power (levels, if you''re using them), even though all items would be left behind.

George D. Filiotis
Are you in support of the ban of Dihydrogen Monoxide? You should be!

A friend and I once started writing a potential sourcebook for one of the major RPGs, and one of the worlds we discussed used exactly this technique. If you''re interested, you''re welcome to the treatment text.

ld

Wouldn''t this be interesting:

If you die defending your country, you go to the plane of the good.

If you die by someone murdering you (i.e., monsters, etc) you go to the plane of neutrality.

If you die by suicide or foolishly (i.e., trying to steal something and you get a knife in the heart) you go to the plane of corruption.

At the plane of good you are greeted by angels and have the option of choosing the new reality that you will be reborn into.

At the plane of neutrality you are greeted by a few angels and are told that you are to be reborn into a new reality. You might get choices or not, I''m not sure.

At the plane of corruption you are greeted by a fallen angel who ressurects you into a reality of his choice, and everytime you are resurrected by a fallen angel you lose some abilities. I.E., you could have minuses to strength, charisma, attack, etc.

Just a thought; And I like this idea.

quote:

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Original post by bishop_pass
You might want to read "To Your Scattered Bodies Go" by Philip Jose Farmer. It deals with death, resurrection, but in a different place, and so on, but there''s a lot more to it than that, but all in all, the premise was pretty simple.

It was a really cool book.

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Wow good call that whole series was excellent. (Well, except for the end with the "Wathans" and such...)

Actually the Riverworld series would really make an excellent MMORPG setting. You have people exloring a strange new world, a huge variety of types of people from British explorers to Nazi''s to cro-magnons, limited reincarnation, etc. (The penalty for death was basically that you reappear in a random location that may be hundreds of miles from were you last were)

How about when you die you go to the underworld and have to fight your way back out, each time you die the underworld gets progressively harder until it gets to the point where you can''t get back out because it''s so difficult and so in effect it''s game over.

However you may have instances where you have to go to the underworld perhaps to rescue someone or get something. In these cases you may have to die on purpose or find another way in, (something like the River Styx maybe?).

For added effect you could have monsters or people you''ve already killed waiting for you in there aswell as the usual demons and whatnot.

- DarkIce