I've been only been here since this April so I know that a lot of established people won't like this idea.  I think it's worth considering even if it's not worth implementing outright, however.

Let me just say before anything else that I'm sure everything in MR is the way it is for a good reason and I'm not trying to complain so much as offer the insight of an outsider to how we might achieve more consistent player growth.

There are some things missing from the MR experience that are present in other more popular text based mmo's.

The most important factors as relates to user base growth would be these:

1. Lasting sense of growth/gains.  (virtual treasure accumulation either in the form of wealth or stats.  Currently the only ways to have noticeable gains between characters is through holding onto credits and unspent hustle points.  Other than that all your progress/wealth is gone.  Prompting a question to the player every time their character dies, "Do I try again or do I just leave.")

2. Continuity of Community (There are many lovely people here who I truly adore but it is very difficult to maintain a friends list when people's names change frequently and crews are utterly destroyed so often)

We could increase player retention and player base growth at the same time by finding ways to increase the value people see in their accounts.  The main sources of value being a representation of time spent playing in the form of time-locked gains (stats or wealth) and making it easier for them to stay in touch with friends. 

When you make friends here you don't want to leave but when your friends' characters die and change their names and you lose touch you lose another reason to stay.

Here are my suggestions:

1. End permadeath entirely- replacing it with extended hospitalizations.  This would function similarly to now where a character name cannot be reused until it has exited the system.  Players would still maintain multiple characters each with their own separate stats but their property and wealth would remain intact.  This could keep up the daily habit of coming to play while reducing the loss in value a player has for their account upon character death.  After the hospitalization previous characters could return with perhaps some skill decay, lowered but not completely reset stats from being in recovery so long.  Again this would be to reduce player frustration over loss in virtual value of their account.

2. Player Account Names, separate from Character names.  We could still maintain the cloak and dagger excitement of not knowing who someone is or (who their bloodline was if you prefer) by separating Contacts lists into an account friends list and a character contacts list.  The idea being that when you become friends with someone you can communicate with them through your account to their account without revealing who your current characters are.  By keeping a continuation of social groups through multiple characters I think MR could grow its community more easily. 

We lose a lot of social momentum every time a group disbands and as much as we try it takes lots of player effort to maintain those connections.  The casual player who just pops in to see what it's all about and then losing everything they worked for and all their friends won't work hard to find people.  They'll just go to another game that makes it easier for them to socialize, play and feel like they're getting richer/more powerful consistently.

These would be difficult to implement and I would go so far as to say catastrophic to MR if they were just slammed in as game changes without testing.  MR is a living community, for me it's been more about its player base than the game itself.  I would suggest a public test server for new features so a large number of community members can get a chance to try them and give feedback so that any big changes can be tailored to this community.

I hope I've made sense.  Sorry for writing you a book.  I love this community and MR has given me a lot of good times already.  Looking forward to watching it grow and thrive in whatever way the developers see fit.  Take care all and thanks for reading this.

"I think getting rid of permadeath would eliminate one of the big aspects of what draws me here."

That's exactly the reason I think this sort of thing can't be done carelessly.  I really do think MR has a fantastic core community and that it's definitely got potential to grow but we don't want to lose that core of players who make it great already.

I want to see a consistent growth of value in player accounts over time while not walling off new players from reaching top tier accomplishments (CL, GF, owning Casinos, whatever their goals might be).  Is that even possible?

The problem is, the game requires death to keep the economy in balance. Take me as an example, been here since 2004ish, when I put my mind to it I can earn quite a bit of money, 100's of millions is not impossible in a 6 month period. I am already IWP, I already have my casino, I have billions of dollars in credits and cash. I can literally buy anything, as we saw with the soviet state when they were scamming the casinos. You come along, think you are making it to the top, and I have you killed (seriously wounded) you get out of hospital, I do it again. You still don't get a chance to make it to the top, cos I have all the money and all the power after playing for 16 years, compared to your 2 or 3 months (example only) 

Izzy always says that if we are going to add money to the system, then we need a way to take it back out again. Total Available Cash In Game: $2,200,000,000 amongst 505 people... I've seen that over 6 billion. add that up over the years and it would soon be 60 billion, or 600 billion. New player joins my crew, bang, IWP straight away, nfp. How can a new player ever hope to compete with that?

The current system, despite any flaws it may have, means that with time, luck and effort, any one in this game can kill anyone else. ANd that is a great leveller. Any games I played with no permadeath, I'm no  longer playing, because it is too hard for a n00b to break into the established cliques. I'm still playing this game over 16 years after first joining it.

Good points all, as I said before I don't have the experience that many members of the community have so your greater insight into what permadeath means for the game is valuable.

I would still like to see an alteration to friends lists so I won't lose touch so easily with other people.

So I'll leave two thoughts here.

First, removal of permadeath is functionally impossible. The entire game is balanced on the fact that when a character dies, most of his money, as well as what he has spent on BGs, Wacking, etc. are gone. Removing that would utterly destroy the game economy. In addition, doing this would, all said and done, Tie in game success to length of time in game, and complete the truth of what some say that it's always the same folks at the top. 

I see why you suggest it, and i respect the idea and the effort put into it, but it would not work without a complete game rebuild.

My second note is based on something you said. I too dislike losing track of my game friends when we all die and take on new names, but that's something that can be reasonably circumvented. Set up a chat through something else(whatsapp, or any of a number of texting apps that give you a randomly assigned phone number for just the app), or just exchange phone numbers or FB accounts). ALL OF THAT SAID, If you can come up with a way to keep up with those contacts in-game without revealing current game names, please introduce it as a separate thread, and the let me know. If it will accomplish those goals, I will be a vocal supporter of it.

I think a better way to go would to have a non-lethal attack option, in addition to WACKs.

I disagree with this completely. Permadeath is what keeps us coming back. You always want one more run always trying to make it better than the previous one. With this you'll just be complacent and not try as harder. Also not only will you be at a disadvantage to those older accounts who have been playing for years but It'll also take you years to catch up and even then you won't be able to reach them. Those regimes at the top that form from time to time will be impossible to remove.

Also there's one thing gangsters value more than the money, women, and drugs that they gain during their life of crime. It's time. Because of their line of work they live very short lives some last a bit longer sure but knowing that at any moment they could die they value time the most. Not knowing when exactly it happens when it's all over. Knowing that our time is limited with our characters no matter how strong you are. That sense of danger that's always around the corner is what makes it exciting.

"Permadeath is what keeps us coming back."

Permadeath causes people to get frustrated and leave the game not try for one more run. Horseshit on the gangsters valuing the time before they are killed. It doesn't make it exciting. It makes it not worth spending a single dollar on.

I'd say it's both

If permadeath isn't the problem, lets put the wacknack death percentages back to where they were and increase tyler's chance to take out people on the hitlist. I mean, dying is what brings them back. Lets make it happen.

-100

Permadeath is what makes this game a unique and very real experience without death in the game it becomes Mafia Wars or any other casual browser game and would ultimately kill the game

Horseshit on the gangsters valuing the time before they are killed. It doesn't make it exciting. It makes it not worth spending a single dollar on.

Have you seen the The Sopranos? Or any good decent Mafia Movie/TV show ever. The Sopranos ending can be debated for years. But that fade to black.

"You probably don't even hear it when it happens, right?"

The threat of death the constant looking over your shoulder in this game keeps it interesting and at times heartbreaking. Imagine spending some quality time with your crew in Crew chat or lounge or whatever family run competition and the next thing you know bam. They're all dead.