Drowning deaths are out of line with current death mechanics

[Sevenless]

Drowning remains a relic that is out of depth compared to other mechanics in a couple situations. One of the most notable is the ability to break boats, or hitbox block swimmers, and cause a very rapid and unexpected pvp death for inexperienced players. Being Koed by animals on deep water is also surprising, and makes some beaver dungeons incredibly dangerous due to escape paths having deep water on them. Asphyxiation wounds instead of instant death was an appreciated first step to bringing drowning in line with the wound system, but these situations aren't fully covered by it.

To finish adjusting the current game mechanics, a cap on asphyxiation damage dealt per "swimming mistake" could be implemented, with an additional wound (pneumonia?) dealt to mimic KO mechanics from combat if someone reaches the cap. When a character "finishes" drowning (there should still be an opportunity to loot their gear for pvpers), slipping below the water and appearing unconscious on your hearth fire fits current gameworld mechanics. It would still be possible to die if you have other wounds accumulated, and the severity of the impact could be tuned by the total asphyxiation cap (either % or a flat number) and how the pneumonia wound works. If oceans should be more "serious" either a higher asphyxiation cap or a different "ko" wound could be applied.

I'm aware some people will dislike this minor inconvenience in killing hermits, my apologies.

[linkfanpc]

Nightmarishly dangerous swimming is a classic Haven trope, and i'd be a little sad to see it go to be perfectly honest, but it really doesn't make any sense whatsoever. It's essentially an instant kill to noobs or anyone who gets their boat smashed and/or blocked. It's just such a dumb and lame idea for a permadeath game and needs to be remedied.

[drakesaint]

Nightmarishly dangerous swimming is a classic Haven trope, and i'd be a little sad to see it go to be perfectly honest, but it really doesn't make any sense whatsoever. It's essentially an instant kill to noobs or anyone who gets their boat smashed and/or blocked. It's just such a dumb and lame idea for a permadeath game and needs to be remedied.

I'd agree with a "temporary" death with a hard stat penalty for several RL weeks. That is, the character becomes "missing", and cannot be accessed for a few days. After the time lapse, you can try and log in, and he will be teleported to a random shore, with random parts of his gear at the time of his death missing, and the stat penalty, time missing directly correlated with how far he was from the shore. The stat penalty would be huge, but slowly reverted back, as some sort of drowning penalty. Remake the Ferryman's Ring to either remove or greatly reduce this stat penalty, but NOT the time lapse.

Obviously, drowning again while having the stat would kill (with exception of the Ferryman's Ring).

[VDZ]

That is, the character becomes "missing", and cannot be accessed for a few days.

No. Literally being unable to play for several days is not fun in any way. Especially not as a punishment for being in the middle of a lake when a hostile snekkja sailed on-screen.

I think that first and foremost the stupid ways to kill players via boat destruction should be fixed somehow. For example, don't take asphyxiation damage while KOed, and let players hearth home from the water. People going for an ill-advised swim still get fucked over as they deserve, but running into a Snekkja fast enough to block wherever you want to go while they KO you and break your boat would not make you go from perfect health to 100% full death with no chance of body recovery (with the attacker leaving no more than a Battery scent).

Once that's solved, the lethality of swimming becomes a non-issue (outside of crash bugs); everybody still taking asphyxiation damage would be doing so as a direct result of taking a risk, and you need to screw up very badly to actually die to asphyxiation damage while swimming (you get quite a bit of leeway).

[drakesaint]

That is, the character becomes "missing", and cannot be accessed for a few days.

No. Literally being unable to play for several days is not fun in any way. Especially not as a punishment for being in the middle of a lake when a hostile snekkja sailed on-screen.

Ah I see, you'd rather lose your character outright.

[MagicManICT]

I'm just going to say that, during world 11, we (the village I was in) had a couple of drowning deaths--one almost immediately after another. I made up a batch of "silver for the ferryman" after the first one and told folks that if they're going to be out and about and end up in a bad situation to put it on. Did anyone do it? Nope. At least, not when I made them. Next drowning, they disappeared. Not another drowning death that world, but I had to restock at least once.

I agree with Sevenless here in principle, but we do have a means of dealing with drowning. The bigger issue I see here is the bugs that have been reported almost every world by someone that just hasn't played enough, doesn't follow the forums, or otherwise gets caught up by some of the more serious edge cases when it comes to interacting with deep water. For everyone else, silver comes up early enough, and the rings are cheap enough I consider it a non-issue... at least, once those edge case bugs are resolved.

[VDZ]

I'm just going to say that, during world 11, we (the village I was in) had a couple of drowning deaths--one almost immediately after another. I made up a batch of "silver for the ferryman" after the first one and told folks that if they're going to be out and about and end up in a bad situation to put it on. Did anyone do it? Nope. At least, not when I made them. Next drowning, they disappeared. Not another drowning death that world, but I had to restock at least once.

I agree with Sevenless here in principle, but we do have a means of dealing with drowning. The bigger issue I see here is the bugs that have been reported almost every world by someone that just hasn't played enough, doesn't follow the forums, or otherwise gets caught up by some of the more serious edge cases when it comes to interacting with deep water. For everyone else, silver comes up early enough, and the rings are cheap enough I consider it a non-issue... at least, once those edge case bugs are resolved.

How is Silver For the Ferryman going to protect you from boat destruction aka the #1 cause of drowning deaths? They'll just take your rings before wrecking your boat and you'll be just as dead.

[MagicManICT]

Maybe it's been too long since I died in the water, but last time I drowned, I didn't KO from asphyxiation, just died. That was the beginning of last world when I overestimated the swim distance for a river with a bear or such chasing me. When can they take the ring, then, if you don't KO? Is it going to save you if they knock you out first, take your equipment, and then break your boat? No, that's true, but you can always just jump ship and drown yourself--don't let yourself get knocked out.

[DDDsDD999]

Maybe it's been too long since I died in the water, but last time I drowned, I didn't KO from asphyxiation, just died. That was the beginning of last world when I overestimated the swim distance for a river with a bear or such chasing me. When can they take the ring, then, if you don't KO? Is it going to save you if they knock you out first, take your equipment, and then break your boat? No, that's true, but you can always just jump ship and drown yourself--don't let yourself get knocked out.

Incredible.

[MagicManICT]

If I'm wrong, tell me. I avoid PvP encounters playing solo, and have never had the bad luck of getting jumped while out boating. The last time I pulled this trick was legacy, and it worked back then. As far as I'm aware, the silver for the ferryman works the same way still.