Stories tend to need a timeline in order to be meaningful, in the point A to point B sense of the word 'meaning. Respawning timelines tend to resulting in a games 'meaning' being only a cumulative numerical measure of levels or uber loot.
The suspension of mortality common to most RPGs today dilutes the sense of character and story, resulting in an inflationary system of levels and loot, where character is meaningless, and players are defined by what levels and loot they possess.
MMORPGs aim to incorporate elements of mythic literature and modern mass communication. Mortality is a key defining aspect of human experience. Drama uses mortality to add emotional impact. The lack of mortality in MMO's undermines story development.
responding to Ian, Your article implies that the amount of effort lost would be trivial or nonexistant. I'd like you to expand on that claim. I think that the loss 'needs' to be non-trivial, but it 'could' be made somewhat trivial using inheritance, allegiance, or account karma type measures.
Mortality is the driving force behind drama, storytelling and re-enactment. From a literary perspective the suspension of mortality is a limiting factor, the influence of the arcade dynamics, 'insert quarter for more lives', has I think handicapped games as a storytelling medium. Granted a lot of the enjoyment is gleaned ...
