(GH2) The Final Death: wtf?

[mix1]

The immortality of a PC was a part of GH1 charm. In GH2 that's not so. Why?

[Erathoniel]

The permanent injuries, for one, speak loudly.

[Anticheese]

I thought that in GH1 you got the first rescue free and from there it depended on your fame/lawfulness?

[Joseph Hewitt]

That's the way it was supposed to work, but in the current version it doesn't. I can't remember whether or not that was changed in the lost version or not.

I decided to go for permanent death in GH2 because that's the way I planned things originally. I think it gives a nice sense of danger to things. Currently the game doesn't delete your save file after death, so you can restart from the beginning of the scene, so it's not exactly the same as permadeath in other roguelikes.

The number of resurrections you get is based on your heroism trait, not fame or lawfulness. Having a medic in the party can also get you some resurrections.

[Onisuzume]

Nurse! Pass me that head, stat!

[Michael]

Quoting: mix1

The immortality of a PC was a part of GH1 charm.

GH1's character-death mechanic was an interesting twist in roguelikes.

Most roguelikes just boot you out of the game if you are careless enough to let your HP go negative.  GH1 breaks your character, hands it back to you, and dares you to play on...

I've never actually received a Permanent Injury, because my characters always get broken first by loss of their Mecha and consequent poverty.

Quoting: Joseph Hewitt

Currently the game doesn't delete your save file after death, so you can restart from the beginning of the scene, so it's not exactly the same as permadeath in other roguelikes.

So it's "legal" to take Mulligans in GH1 and GH2?  I was under the impression that the absence of savescum-prevention, and the ability to configure out autosave, was just left in for debugging convenience.

For reference here, I looked up the code:

In GH1, the code sums your Heroism, 1, and a Team Medicine skillroll divided by 20.  If this number is greater than the number of previous resurrections, you get off scott-free.  Otherwise, you get a permanent injury and continue to live.  (However, certain scenes inhibit all resurrection, leading to actual death.)

In GH2, the code divides your Heroism by 10, and adds a random factor.  If this number is less than your previous Resurrection count, you die.  On top of that, resurrections can be inhibited if a "Rescue Scenario" fails to load.  If you survive the above, you then have a flat 1/3 chance of permanent injury.

[Erathoniel]

I really preferred the GH1 style. Of course, could there be an immortal mode, or an injury-free mode?

[Michael]

Quoting: Joseph Hewitt

I decided to go for permanent death in GH2 because that's the way I planned things originally. I think it gives a nice sense of danger to things.

I was just thinking -- if you want more of a "nice sense of danger", you should probably just remove the Auto-Eject rule.  Presently, mecha combat is too safe for the character.

Having one's cockpit in the head is supposed to be a safety tradeoff, giving a maneuverability bonus at the risk of being killed by called shots to the cockpit.    But this is meaningless because you almost never die due to cockpit hits.  

In fact, due to the separate bug that enemies don't claim your mecha when you lose and it's still repairable, being headshotted is preferable, since repairing a head is so much cheaper than replacing a mech.

[Erathoniel]

Well, the mecha is expensive enough to ruin your life if it goes boom in some cases.

The head still costs some cash to repair.

[Michael]

Quoting: Erathoniel

Well, the mecha is expensive enough to ruin your life if it goes boom in some cases.

But it doesn't go boom (in that sense) if the battle ends because just the cockpit was destroyed. So it makes sense to tradeoff the pilot's safety by putting him in the head.  You may lose more battles (or maybe not due to the MV bonus for a head cockpit), but you keep your mech more often.  

It might make sense to use a body-cockpit mecha if you had a mission where failure would be game-breaking even if you and your mech survive.  Then you can take more hits before failing your objective.  If you do fail, you'll usually need a new mech, but if the mission was that important, you don't care since you would restart (or savescum) anyway.

[Erathoniel]

You still have to repair it, which could cost you a good deal. What about an eject failure? 1=scattered on cockpit chassis, 2=left on battlefield (spacesuit, anyone?)

[Michael]

Quoting: Erathoniel

You still have to repair it, which could cost you a good deal.

But much less than replacement.  The opprotunity cost of not being paid for the mission will hurt more.

Quoting: Erathoniel

What about an eject failure? 1=scattered on cockpit chassis,

Those aren't common.  In fact, until I actually looked at the source, I was under the impression that the PC was specifically guaranteed to eject safely.

To auto-eject in GH1, a Dodge skill roll is made.  For some reason, for this particular roll, each point of speed counts for half a skill level instead of a third.

In a head-cockpit mecha, you must roll 4 or higher to escape injury.  (Rolling 1 or 2 is instakill).  If your Dodge skill + Speed/2 (rounded up) is 16 or higher, your roll is the sum of at least 4 dice, and will always be at least 4.

At a rollstep of 11--15, you have three dice and can only take damage on a freak roll of 1 on all three.  Speed 15 Dodge +5, which many players will start with, gives a rollstep of 13.

Quoting: Erathoniel

2=left on battlefield (spacesuit, anyone?)

I'm thinking mainly of GH1, which has no space.

[Erathoniel]

Well, true. There should be penalties for ejection. Maybe self-destruct switches?

[Michael]

Quoting: Erathoniel

Well, true. There should be penalties for ejection. Maybe self-destruct switches?

How would self-destruct switches be relevant here?

Actually, a realistic penalty for ejection would be to have all ejected mecha lost if the player's team doesn't win.  If the mech is salvageable, your victorious opponents will claim it as a prize.

Another thing that could be done is to declare that Ejection is a feature that not all mechs have.  So if the mech is downed, the character has to crawl out on his own, hoping that there's no raging fire in or around the mech at the time....

[Erathoniel]

It's automatic when you eject. That way they don't get the mecha. Or, you could crawl out, rem-det it, or secure the area on foot/with other mecha before it can be captured.