What do YOU consider to be "hardcore" in an MMO?

What are the top three game mechanics in an MMO do you consider to be hardcore? Have you experienced any gameplay quirks that you feel punish the player rather than foster a positive gaming experience?

List three MMOs and the game mechanics that you feel make it "hardcore".

Here are mine:


1) EverQuest: The original Corpse Run: no armor, no weapons, no "ghost form". Just you running to loot your body, training two dozen MOBs after you.

2) EverQuest: Loss of experience upon death. Such a punishing game mechanic, to the point that you could de-level your character if you just dinged and then subsequently died.

3) Everquest: "Hell" levels. EQ was notorious for this. Starting at level 30, experience needed to progress to the next level was effectively doubled. This was true for level 35, 40, and the hellish of all levels, level 45.

 

I like this, I hate when people can die with no consequence. Makes for a more intense game.

1. Loss of experience upon death.
2. No auto regeneration hit points / magic
3. Extended period to reach level cap, even with extreme grinding.

 

Exactly. It also prevents people from zerging a boss MOBs, or playing sloppy at higher levels since there was so much more at stake than just a CR.

 

EVE Online

Death scenario #1

Lose your expensive ship and most of your fittings and cargo if you were carrying any. Sure there's insurance but it does not cover 100% of the ship itself and zero of the fittings. A Tech II ship could easily cost in the hundreds of millions of isk (EVE's currency)

Death scenario #2

Once your ship is destroyed you are left floating defenseless in a pod in space. To add further insult to injury the offending pilot could choose to completely kill you (getting 'podded') which sends you back to the nearest/last station you've arranged for a clone at. This could mean you end up many, many jumps away from your current location. Also if your 'clone grade' is not current you can lose trained skill points (experience) setting your earned skills back days, weeks, or even months.


Awesome stuff.


This is just the proverbial tip of the iceberg of what EVE has to offer in the way of hardcore gameplay.

 

1) Open FFA PVP/PK - Ultima Online, Asheron's Call (Darktide Server) DAoC (Mordred Server)
2) Player looting/loss of items at death. - Ultima Online, Asheron's Call
3) Stat Loss/XP Loss - Ultima Online (Flagged Red/Murderer), Asheron's Call


You can replace #2 with a rewards system but if you don't keep #3 then it turns into honor farming a la WoW.

 

I considered SWG Jedi to be "hardcore" when it first came out. I was in the first 10 unlocks on my fifth profession. When no one had a Jedi.

SWG Pre patch 9, 3 deaths of your jedi and you have to completely recreate him from scratch since you lost all progress. PERMADEATH!! Bounty hunters post patch 9 could make you lose hundreds of thousands of xp points necessary to finish boxes that took enormous amounts of time to fill. 37 million Jedi xp at 100 xp a mob. There were some exploits but the system was anything but easy.

Katana comes for me on Lowca:


My Dark Jedi in the Temple:

 

This.

It was all worth it in the end with full comp and LS damage sabers though.

 

You want hardcore? How about Absolute Virtue in FFXI. I was a part of the MMO, but I'm happy to say I was never so hardcore as to kite AV for 8+ hours, and get no where. Eventually the devolopers nerfed it's health so it could be zerged, but within a few days they had emergency maintenance, nerfed the zerg, and I quit the game after 2 year of dedication. MMO's absorb all your time and diminish productivity to the point you lose your job, friends, and sanity

 

Everquest:

Choosing Troll Shadowknight and paying DOUBLE the XP to get to 60 than a Halfling Warrior paid to get to 60. Not to mention being KOS in every town in the game (including part of your own)

Then finding out the Halfling warrior was a better tank on 99.99% of the endgame content.

Shortly thereafter they removed the hybrid XP penalty....

At least I could /corpsedrag anyone out of dutch... especially funny after they denied me a party spot... You want me to WHAT?

Then they gave me corpse summon... why would I carry coffins... I EAT anything I kill.... /grumble

Everquest and the "sense direction" button... oh sure, I press it 473892472934723492934284729427943 times to max it and then you put in a compass.

Everquest- hey look it's raining newbie woodelves! Trolls LIKE! It's like a feast every day! First you laugh until your green belly hurts, then you fill belly with a few woodelves.

Everquest- *notes newbie elves running towards him* Sorry elfies, but I'm full, I just finished eating your guards... run along... oh wait you were expecting the guards to kill the orcsies... too bad they are busy digesting in my belly.

I miss EQ.

 

Yeah you make fun of him now but when he's leading your raid and deciding who gets what loot we know you kiss his arse.

 

I'm with Phinagle on this one. UO forever!

1) FFA PVP. Pretty much anywhere you go outside of a town, you can get smacked down by someone with far more skill (more Magery skill, Fencing skill, etc. etc., not the other kind; UO didn't have levels). After which...

2) Corpse looting. What's that? Someone killed you? Well, now he also gets to take all your stuff. Woohoo!

3) Not so much applicable in UO, but... XP loss + delevelling. Great fun.

 

When the WoW Battlegrounds first came out, the system was so broken. It awarded ranking points based on what rank you were on the server's battlegrounds points chart. At some ranks, you actually went down the ladder if you weren't on the top 10 points earners that week. This meant playing 24/7 to keep up with all the other no-life WoW players.

MMO me off. They reward people who have enough time to sit in front of their computer, not people who actually have skill.

 

Well, the current Arena system does reward skill, I do think.

Oh, and it unarguably takes skill to crunch the numbers and figure out which pieces of gear are best for your character. Just a different kinda skill, is all, heh.

 

It takes Rawr or a spreadsheet to evaluate upgrades.

 

Lmao

 

EverQuest utilized this same game mechanic on their red PvP servers like Rallos Zek. Although, at one point in time, there was a rumor going around that on non-PvP servers, player killers were using an exploit to loot bodies off players in major cities...

 

UO was fun at first, when combat really was about who had practiced more or who had more skill rating (or luck) but eventually became 20vs1 slaughter-fests.

Everyone had the same skills as only some were actually useful. (and having anything else meant you lost) It was pretty easy to get maxed skill with near-worthless items so no, they almost never had more skill rating than you. UO was about abusing game mechanics and known server lag to get advantages no one else could have. Once cheating became the norm, UO crossed over from hardcore to a worthless game.