The one thing unclear to me about L4D.

[Dashi42100]

My dad and I are counting the days untill L4D comes out. One thing continues to elude us, respawn times. We are wondering, when you die...how soon do you respawn. I know how you respawn...your inside of some locked closet or something and you have to be released. What we don't know is How long you are waiting to respawn. It is a hard decision for them though. Too long a wait and when you die it will be boreing as hell. Too short though and people will be less inclined to stay together and value their lives, thereby takeing a chunk out of the tension of it. So my final question is: How long after you die can you jump back into the action?

[wowzerss]

maybe in around 10-15 mins or something

[Skeetles]

It seemed that there were respawn points along the map, so the time would be dependent on how far the group was from the next respawn point.

10-15 minutes is really long, like half the length of one map.

People didn't usually die in our group though.

[Dead Fish]

The survivors will also respawn when a checkpoint is reached. So, dying at the beginning of a map would suck, but will always try to make it as far as possible anyways, I guess. :)

[Clamzoni_of_RI]

And if you die in a group, chances are the entire group goes down. EpiC Phail.

[Shrubberyjsc]

Yeah, I really don't have a problem with the survivors having to wait quite a while.

The moral of the story is "Don't Die"

It's perfect for Survival-Horror.

;)

[kyrickell]

Too short though and people will be less inclined to stay together and value their lives, thereby takeing a chunk out of the tension of it

Perhaps those of us fortunate to have played can verify.. but from what I understand when you are found (In a closet or whatever it may be) and respawn, you only have a pistol and don't have full health.. So I think it'd generally be unwise to be careless, even if you have the "I'll respawn soon anyway" mentality, since when you DO respawn, you're probably worse off than if you had managed to barely stay alive, but kept your equipment.

Also, (again, maybe someone else can verify) I think the team gets an award if you complete the scenario without anyone dying.. so I'd think most people would prefer to achieve that..

Myself personally wouldn't want to be dead for any amouht of time. I can only hope my teammates feel the same way.. or they'll get the boot ;)

[squerl]

Hey Dashi, that's really cool that your dad is looking forward to L4D too!

To answer your question:

As you probably know, each scenario (Hospital being one scenario) is broken into 5 separate maps. One entire scenario takes anywhere from 45 minutes to over an hour to complete (on normal, higher difficulties will take longer), and as mentioned before every Survivor respawns at a new map. That means that each map will take anywhere from 8-15 minutes. Each of these maps should have around 3 or 4 rescue points (like closets). I'd guess that these are spread out pretty evenly, so I would assume that your average out of game time would be around 2 minutes or so.

Also, (again, maybe someone else can verify) I think the team gets an award if you complete the scenario without anyone dying.. so I'd think most people would prefer to achieve that..

That's correct, and kyrickell is also right about you having only your pistol. With that and the awards, YOU DO NOT WANT TO DIE!

[AzH]

I read that when you die you get a bleed time first where your life ebbs away and you can be rescued by your team mates. The infected can damage you further during this time. If rescued you're back to health. If not rescued you go to a checkpoint (if towards the end of the map) or a hiding place if near the beginning.

[Armored_Zombie_Cow]

Each of these maps should have around 3 or 4 rescue points
that seems a bit much.
i was thinking like 1-2

[Clamzoni_of_RI]

Are these hiding places invulerable to zombies? (Closets) Or can the infected find you and make the closet into a refrigerator full of human bites? It would make dying even more of a negative experience because the team would then have to out of its way, into dangerous areas to retrieve you and risk finding a horde of infected flying out of the building your, once breathing, respawned teammate was.

[Armored_Zombie_Cow]

no u are safe in the closets

[krunsh]

I'm more intersted in knowing the respawn time of the infected... they are the one who will die a lot.

[Clamzoni_of_RI]

Dang it. Oh well, I guess thats good.

[Punisher 36O]

I'm more intersted in knowing the respawn time of the infected... they are the one who will die a lot.

im sure i heard it was up to the director? i mean the ppl playing as infected not just the AI, if the Survivers have been taking a beating and need a break. does it wait till it thinks they have had enough then spawn you?

[Armored_Zombie_Cow]

probably.
i thought it was said taht the spawn time was usually about 30sec. to 2 min.

[Clamzoni_of_RI]

Undead spawn times will probably be long considering the amount of normal infected they throw at you. I can see ammo might become an issue for trigger happy players.

[Big_Bubbaloola]

I can see ammo might become an issue for trigger happy players.
Reminds me of Aliens:

"What are we supposed to use? Harsh language?"

Stay frosty people ;)

[Ellis]

maybe their are no respawns for survivors and they just spectate while their character screams and yells to be let out of the closet some where up ahead of the map. and also iam going to have a field day asking people if they want to come out of the closet lol

[caboos]

he moral of the story is "Don't Die"

It's perfect for Survival-Horror.
ya survive or face the horror, the horror is being bored while playing left 4 dead, aka waiting to respawn

[Redeemer]

It would seem like respawn time is directly dependent on how quickly your buddies make their way to a closet. I wonder if closets will be Director-controlled, too...