Right so first off, some thoughts on respawning. No respawning is fine in a free-for-all context where you don't have to answer to anyone except yourself. It would work well in arena deathmatches. In addition, if respawning was added, it would add complexity to the way 'mech damage and destruction could be handled
Ok, so now onto the main event, as we have seen from the Community Warfare blog post, the game is strongly geared towards teamplay; in the majority of cases displayed in their beta concept, players will be fighting alongside fellow faction/merc corp players. I will assume that a significant proportion of this people will be playing as part of a team of people they know/are associated with rather than a pickup game. If they are catered for correctly, this sort of person will be more dedicated to the game and play it for longer, something that can only help the dev's business model.
Right, but "what does this have to do with respawns?", you say, well it is in the title "Don't Split the Team". The biggest mistake the devs could make, other than making the game boring, is making hard for a team of players to play together.
This is the heart of the reason why respawns are needed. If there no respawns and a Lone Wolf dies, he can just hop into another battle, if after battle 'mech damage is handled correctly. However if a Team Player dies and there are no respawns, he either waits for his team or splits it. Now I don't know about everyone but I would say ~5 mins is the longest I would wait for my team due to an in-game mechanic, any longer than that and would decide the game simply wasn't worth my time.
Now if respawns are implemented, I would suggest the system works differently in death matches and objective games. For objective matches, I would suggest respawns work on a timer/waved based approach with would make death mean something, but not make it the focal point of the match, just a means to an end, whether that be capture a hill, escort a HQ truck to a safe place or w/e. For deathmatches, though perhaps there should be rounds, where anyone who dies in a round should stay dead for the remainder of that round, make the rounds short enough and have some sort of stalemate condition after a certain time has passed. This makes staying alive much more important.
As for how to implement 'mech perma-death and after battle damage, thats a little out of my scope.