Underworld

[Yolan]

OK, I am not big on Icelandic/Norse/Anglo-Saxon Mythology, by which I mean, I don' know much about it. However, is there a kind of underworld, as well as a Valhalla?

Thought: Perma death is a harsh, but intrinsic part of the game. Many of the negative effects may well be ameliorated by the future introduction of ancestor worship. But, what about making death and dying more interesting for those to whom it occurs?

Proposal: After death, the player character enters the world of shades. Everything goes largely monochrome, blurry? Other player characters cannot see you, but you can see them.

As a shade, you can choose to head back to the Circle of Brodgar, where a bright pillar of flame is visible (invisible to normal players, obviously). Throwing oneself into the flame means character deletion, such that you cannot log on your shade any longer.

A shade can interact with the world to a limited extent. For example, picking up objects and such. Each time they do so they use up a little of their energy, which recovers slowly over time.

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Now, that's all I have to say in specifics, but I would be interested to see what kind of ideas the devs could then work into this basic set up. It could be a platform for all kinds of cool mechanics. Especially, it could be worked into future magic/worship stuff.

[XkrikX]

well, i know at least in norse, there is Hel, with one 'l' and it is frozen unlike hell which is burnin

[Jfloyd]

Hmm, a good idea for this would be, you start off at the Ring, and you can just kill your character, and recieve its benefits, or you could do a long trial to earn your character back.

[Axehilt]

Lots of dev time/effort has gone into making the normal gameplay fun.

"Death mode" (the afterlife, being a ghost, whatever) basically turns off that normal fun gameplay.

So the decision to implement death mode shouldn't be made lightly and unless someone comes up with amazingly-fun sounding gameplay to do while dead I'd suggest keeping the existing system (which immediately punts you back into normal gameplay, where there's a huge variety of fun things to do and more coming each week.) Because spending any significant amount of time in death mode is like playing an entirely new game -- and if that game is significantly less fun than the normal gameplay, that's not cool (you already have to waste a bunch of time trekking back out to your property after a death, which is enough of a different game...in addition to the obvious and significant stat hit.)

The best death-related stuff to work on at this point would be stuff you can do to mitigate the losses while alive. Like if I can build shrines all over to commemorate my ancestors, and each shrine saves an additional 5% of my skills if I die (up to a maximum.) Shrines would be expensive to construct, and might even be destructible by your enemies.

[CG62]

Oh come on. Having a ghost-type system for death would be awesome. Nothing too heavy...

-Invisibility to mortal Hearthlings (J&L aren't mortal, and therefore could see the ghosts)
-Some sort of character deletion system (The Pillar of fire in the RoB)
-Limited abilities to interact with the world around you.

It could even expand onto the gameplay of living hearthlings. Perhaps Shamans could see the dead, and could communicate with them?

Hell, an entire religious system could be implemented on ghosts (ghosts visit shrines, and based on their amusement with whatever offerings are left, they use part of their energy/life force to "bless" the owner of the shrine).


I think this idea could be REAAAAALLY COOOOL.

[Cajoes]

well, i know at least in norse, there is Hel, with one 'l' and it is frozen unlike hell which is burnin

Hel was the half-corpse mistress of the deads domain, Nifelheim. (world of mist), which indeed was cold as f****. Half her body was that of a dessicated corpse... Do not think too hard on this. She was the only (documented) daughter of Loki the trickster and she is the ruler of the nine worlds of the dead. And accepted less heroic souls than Valhalla's stringent requirements. IE: Death in glorious battle.

The opposite of Nifelheim was Muspelheim, or the world of fire. Which was home to giants and guarded by the fire giant Surt, ruler of fire. Wielding a massive blade that burned hotter than the sun. (Lightsaber? (Giant lightsaber?!))

Amazing what wiki will fill you in on. For instance the swedish word for Hell literally meaning "Hel's Punishment."