Should the player be able to die?

[Leotamer]

I would just prefer a "Are you dumb" warning to come up. Or atleast be able to toggle bewteen the 3.

[squirrelnest]

I feel like the player being able to die is more of a flavor element than one of gameplay. DD seems less like a roguelike to me and more like a puzzle game with rpg coloring. I'm not terribly sure how that factors into the discussion, but its my one thought on the subject.

There was one time I clicked on a monster with a combat prediction of death intentionally. I was playing a a rogue and was totally out of resources. I needed two more hits on the boss to kill it, and I didn't have dodge prediction. I figured a 10% chance of victory was probably better than just heading home. (It didn't work out.)

Is there any other time when you would want to attack a monster with a combat prediction of death?

[The Avatar]

Only when you absolutely MUST. Basically if through WETWUT or something you get cut off from an exit you must kill yourself.

[booooooze]

I'm a grumpy old man, sure.

I read everything. My apologies if I come off harsh/condescending.

I view the game as a hybrid of nethack and minesweeper. Much easier than either. I die in both of those maybe 95% of the time. Actually, now that I think of it, nethack has an explore mode. Perhaps that is a happy compromise? You can have your risk-free game, but it doesn't count for anything.

Why do I care? I don't know. I'm just a grumpy old man, I suppose.

[booooooze]

I guess I'm the only one that wants the game to be more hardcore. Like, if you die, it sends an e-mail to Nandrew and he catches a flight to your town and punches you in the face.

I support this. I'll pay extra for this version.

[Leotamer]

I'm a grumpy old man, sure.

I read everything. My apologies if I come off harsh/condescending.

I view the game as a hybrid of nethack and minesweeper. Much easier than either. I die in both of those maybe 95% of the time. Actually, now that I think of it, nethack has an explore mode. Perhaps that is a happy compromise? You can have your risk-free game, but it doesn't count for anything.

Why do I care? I don't know. I'm just a grumpy old man, I suppose.

It depends on what you mean by risk-free. I don't want to restart, losing money and time just because of a misclick or lag. But I do want to risk that if it was a result of an error on my part.

[Lujo]

I know what would work (without leaving a bad taste in either sides mouth)! You could make monster click to select as an option. So when you click something you see its stats page. That would also allow you to mouse over new effects like weakening (well, new to a new player) and it would make misclicks non-devastating. Of course for people who don't want their arm to fall off from exhaustion, this would be toggleable. That could also work as a system for the iPhone/Android versions.

This is probably a good idea. If you toggle something like this off, thats a meaningfull decision right there - you're making a decision to increase your chances of misclicking.

[Bloggorus]

Hey I have an idea that would please everyone!

How about a new kind of preparation; Modifications.

Kingdom icon would be a goat (of course), maybe with a cockney accent.

Preps would be:

I'm Feeling Scared:
Players have the option to resurrect upon death, no gold or items carried out of the dungeon.

Knifey Spooney:
Players start with whatever items they want at the start of the dungeon. All items removed from locker, replaced with spoons.

Anabolic:
Players start the game with an extra 20 of every stat. In subsequent runs all enemies become drug testing officials (cursed, poison, mana burn, corrosive, weakening)

Pay to Win:
Completes every dungeon with every badge and every class and race combination. $500 dollars sent automatically from your bank account to QCF game design, no refunds.

Mario Mode:
Engage AI helper. All clicks are changed to the most efficient one as determined by the computer. No real downside, apart from RSI.

Hardcore:
Death in the game deletes your save. Finishing Vicious Gaalan Tet gets you a on the front page of the New Yorker, a million dollars and all the cheap floozeys this side of the river.

Jehora Hardcore:
All clicks have a random chance to hit a few pixels away in a radius around the cursor. All monsters spill confetti instead of a bloodstain.

Rage Quit:
Locks you out of the game for 24 hours, slight boost to damage and reduction of mana on all subsequent runs.

Real Desktop Dungeons:
Takes a screenshot of the game, sets it as your background and alt-tabs to the desktop without you noticing.

Get a Life:
Wonder why you made this post in the first place.

[Lujo]

Some of those are awesome. No, all of those are awesome, except I like some better than others.

But avatars idea is still probably quite necessary to implement.

[TigerKnee]

I don't think anyone here is asking for Vicious dungeons to be "made easier" so 99% of the players can complete it or something. (that's another topic altogether. For the record, I don't care how hard those dungeons are, I only care that 3 classes are gated behind them)

What we're talking about here is... well, let's use an analogy.

Imagine if you're playing a game of chess and you accidentally knock over a piece while moving another. Suddenly your opponent flips the table over and says "AHA, YOU LOSE NOW!"

Because that's what most of the deaths in DD is like right now. I want to "die/lose" because the dungeon has defeated me because I didn't manage my resource properly (analogy: being outplayed in chess), not because of manual accidents.