I've always liked the way DotA has done it, where the higher level you are the longer it takes for you to revive.  At level one it's around 4 seconds or so, but by the end of the game it can take over a minute before you come back if you've hit max level.

Not appretiated those, just tried it and it appears to reduce the death penalty to 10 secs which is probably right an dhalf the gold. Obviously doesn't effect Pantheon and skirmish but worth checking out.

Thank you

Tals

I agree that it's a bit too unbalanced.  you do need a penalty for dying, but as it is right now you lose the gold you would earn, lose the control of the map due to being dead, you give the other team gold (and a lot of it), you give the other team xp.  it all adds up to a rather huge swing.

You do take longer to come back based on level how it is right now btw, and I think the respawn time is fine.  personally I think the gold/xp reward is what is a problem. 

It's so bad right now that basically you have people bailing on games as soon as they die because they know that the rest of the game is just downhill with the steamrolling from there. 

The time they are gone and a small amount of gold/xp should be more than enough of a bonus.  you can earn gold/xp from creeps and towers while they are respawning as it is.

The upgrades part of his post is still valid though.

Not really to the level I was indicating. The custom one was.

Tals

I don't think the main problem with deaths is the respawning time, while it could be "more scaled" according to levels (e.g : 10 sec at lvl 1 up to 1 min at lvl 20 without upgrades/items) , for me gold and XP are more important .

In most of 2vs2 or 3vs3 games I play , the fate of the game is sealed within the first 5 min or so, depending on an early accidental (or not ^^) death because of a bugged skill which did not cast, a small lag, a shitty pathfinding while trying to escape or simply the lack of skill ;op

Thoses early deaths are so rewarding for the opposing team that if they know what to do, your team will never grind back to their level/power.

A solution could be slightly lowering rewards for killing demigods and upping gold mines income (so your global income remains the same) .

It's definitely been my experience that in general once the opposing team gets the upper hand early in the game it's very difficult to come back. I'm not saying it's difficult for some uber god-like player to turn things around (anticipating the leet players out there to respond with "bah, I can die all I want and still win"). I'm talking about the average to lower-skill player that is probably the majority of the population. Remember the majority? Yeah, it's important for them to have fun so that they don't give up the game and you still have people to beat up in the future.

It's just no fun to fight a losing battle right out of the gate. It would be great if the game could determine when a team is severly outclassed and help them out a little. Boosting the losing team makes it more fun for that team, and makes it more fun for the winning team by offering more of a challenge. Then again maybe some of the leet players get more joy out of being 5-7 levels higher and just annihilating the other team. Personally I enjoy games that are close fights. Makes me feel like I accomplished something if I had to actually try hard to win.

I like the idea of the scaling death penalties. I think that could definitely aleviate the situation. Time in limbo, xp and gold rewards to the enemy... It makes sense to start low and build up. Slapping newbies with 30 seconds of staring at a faded screen doesn't seem like the best idea to allow them to enjoy the game. As for the comment of being able to buy items to decrease the death time, and upgrades... give me a break. You really think a losing team is focusing on spending all their very hard earned gold on that? No, they're spending it on whatever they can to try and stop the annihilation like armor, potions, etc.

I'd really love to see some sort of "Underdog" code put into effect. If a team is getting severely trounced, lagging behind by multiple levels, have the game ramp up their gold a little. Have their regens increase a little. More xp maybe. There are lots of variables that could be increased by small amounts (or even big) that could keep the game fun for both the doomed team and the Force of Nature that is the dominating team.

Even with death penalty set to draconic I still think they are not harsh enough.

Good players simply do not die 1v1. And in 2v2 and higher situation an equal number of players in each team dies.

Game makers should not balance games around the skill level of noobs and casuals (for those there is The Sims 2009) , they should cater for the highly skilled and experienced gamers. Games tend to stagnate quickly if the skilled people leave because the game isn't for them.

A death or two does not cost you the match and resurrection time already scales a lot with level.

Please try to apply critical thinking, people. Statistics and correlation; when someone dies early on they are more likely to be a worse player but certainly (by definition) playing worse at that time they died. Deaths are correlated to worse players. They lose because they are worse throughout the game. If your skill level is lower and thus died then most likely you are going to lose unless something changes. It's not the actual deaths themselves that are giving an insurmountable advantage ( just a modest one).

So think of early deaths as a wake up call: your team need to improve their game or you will lose.

Higher levels do increase the death penalty.  At level 1, it's a mere 25 seconds.  I suggest playing custom games and trying it with the death penalty set to light.  When I started playing, I didn't like it much either because I was used to a shooter that had a 5 second respawn time.

There's something else you need to consider though.  Deaths are supposed to be really really really bad.  You have a healing crystal for a reason.  You're not supposed to die, you're supposed to know when to retreat and heal up.  If you died you made a mistake(or the game bugged, but the big one that can cost a lot of lives is finally being fixed).

Also, one death won't make the game unwinnable against experienced players unless you're not very experienced yourself.  It'll get them an extra item, or a few extra potions, and it will also get them a couple of free creep waves.  Early on, the creep waves may give a nice level advantage but it's still not insurmountable because you'll gain the missing levels back in a few waves as well(and their rate of gain will slow down so you're back on even footing if you do it right).  The extra item will make the fights harder, but it's not like them having an artifact and you not.  It can get to that point if you keep dying, but if you keep dying, they're just playing a lot better than you.

The big issue with the death penalty is you kind of have nothing to do in a mismatch but stick it out or ragequit.  A concede button will fix this.

Alpha492 - holy crap... I can't even respond to you... I just keep looking at your avatar with my mouth wide open... ha