Dead players under specific circumstances should have their loot transferred directly into dug graves.

[Qairon]

This is one I've been thinking about for a while, and since there's even new gravestone skins, decided to just spitball now. Basically, dead survivors could replace empty graves over time. Maybe after a certain amount of time after they've left (this is mostly from a pub servers standpoint where someone that dies has a like 9/10 chance of instantly leaving after they've kicked the can).

Essentially, all of their loot, or maybe one from it that is already eligible for gravestone loot, such as a gem or gear, gets transferred into the dug grave, and refreshes it. I don't think it should happen right away, or even any time soon, especially if the dead player is still in a server. I'd say like, 5-10 days after they've already logged, or have not went to retrieve their stuff within that time.

Perhaps it could even be a special event, like a special Krampus that can spawn in the gravestone biome when you're naughty instead of a regular Krampus, that specifically has hunted these dead players' loot. 

Nonetheless, Digging that grave/killing the miniboss would give the aforementioned loot. I think this would be both an interesting way to make gravestone biomes technically renewable in MP, keep circulating that player loot economy, and also give people a reason to stick around in lategame worlds if they know they can usually count on getting a good start from a failed survivor predecessor before them. After all, that's a very common theme in Don't Starve with the procedurally generated boons, finding useful items that were realistically on a dead corpse like rope, a miner hat, or even a walking cane. Those were always a welcome sight that boosted morale.

I know it's just as "nice" to find these same items on the actual corpse, but oftentimes people die waaaay out of the beaten path, like, in the middle of nowhere on some no-mans land corner of a ruins/caves, at sea (at which point you'll probably neve see those items again, with how vast it is), or even in one of the dozens of paths in the Labyrinth, with all of their items essentially wasted if nobody even knew where to look for it.

Also, In games like this where the cooperation is often drop in-drop out with complete strangers that, quite frankly, can sometimes hoard resources with zero communication (which is a completely valid way to play, I think we all have or do still do this to some degree), I think our death giving back to the world should have more of an impact. A "decomposer" layer to the food chain if you will.

 

[Mencken]

Great idea, I think 3-5 items would be good.

[GelatinousCube]

Awesome idea! I just want a way to undo all the damage I did in the early days of my 10k + world... refilling graves, erecting pig heads on sticks around touch stones etc. 

[Well-met]

Interesting idea

[LunaBuns]

Very yes. I had a similar idea last night as my friend and I were playing. I actually love all of the new gravestone skins, but there’s no way for us to have more or to refill dug graves (on console). I wanted to either have fallen survivors turned into gravestones, be able to refill already existing graves with bones, or both. Have them be destructible if you don’t wish to have them in certain spots. Inspecting a grave could be similar to inspecting fallen survivors; “Here lies LunaBuns, Died of starvation on day 100”

[Qairon]

11 hours ago, LunaBuns said:

Very yes. I had a similar idea last night as my friend and I were playing. I actually love all of the new gravestone skins, but there’s no way for us to have more or to refill dug graves (on console). I wanted to either have fallen survivors turned into gravestones, be able to refill already existing graves with bones, or both. Have them be destructible if you don’t wish to have them in certain spots. Inspecting a grave could be similar to inspecting fallen survivors; “Here lies LunaBuns, Died of starvation on day 100”

Absolutely. Even just makeshift graves would be nice, the same way you can hammer the Stagehand enough times to get endtable blueprints, a similar method would be nice for gravestones to get a craftable one. Also, I think Graves recording the most recent players death after it's taken their loot would be really interesting. Goes in line with how the world adapts with the players.