I've seen something on another mud that i thought was pretty cool. Its an underworld. Basically when you die - verses just going back to a healer or being injected into the normal realm somewhere you were transported to the underworld where you had to solve puzzles, do mini-quests, or fight your way out. The idea i have on it is that the part of the area (underworld) that you are sent to would be based on your race/class/level - basically adding diversity and perhaps even some randomness so people that continually die in a certain level range dont get to do the same task over and over. You of course wouldnt be able to recall in this area as that defeats the purpose and if you die in the underworld there could be some sort of penalties such as a negative spell affect that cant be cancelled and has a long duration - or perhaps more of a stat loss (5 stats instead of just the 1) and you would then be thrown back into the realm.