Best MMO PvP you ever played?

Where it started is where it ended: Ultima Online launch - ~2000.

+1

UO through UO:T2A was the awesome, everything before Trammel (Renaissance) care bearness ruined a game that forced you to be one up on your enemy at all times, whether that meant fighting or straight up fleeing.

Skill-based character progression, immersive crafting and vending (house vendors/stores were first AH -- not to mention to be a good merchant you advertised on forums, built relationships -- true sandbox!), customizable UI (you could actually drag the display/skill/inventory gumps) -- most of these are not implemented as well on modern MMO games. Not to mention the rep, Honor/Chaos system that governed the risks/rewards of PKing and PvP. All from a game started in like '97 - a full 15 years ago.

Oh my gosh if old school UO gameplay, skill progression, crafting, housing was duplicated in a modern 3D engine, it would slay, but only attract the truly hardcore gamer, cuz if you died, your entire corpse could be looted of its inventory.

/nostalgia

I liked Darkfall's combat, that was pretty fun. You had to aim all of your attacks so it made the combat more visceral and skill based. Plus you had the thrill of looting other people's gear. It wasn't that bad to lose your stuff though since you had a bank you could store multiple sets of gear and materials. I wouldn't wear my best stuff anyway unless I was out with the guild. The overall game was kinda wack though as it was just a glorified FPS with grinding since you had no reason not to gank anyone and everyone you came across. I like a world where pvp is an element of the game not the entire point of it

others that were good were vanilla WoW, Warhammer, and DAOC

eve online, no question. one server, one universe. death always results in material loss, no matter what. even playing the economy is technically pvp. nowhere is safe, you can be shot and killed anywhere. despite these pvp mechanisms, in the end, the big powerblocks usually fall due to political maneuvering and/or corporate infiltration.

i still play eve, and get my fix of real pvp and "hardcoreness" from it. i see SWTOR for what it is: a casual game. perhaps some of you could attain similar enlightenment, in time.

World of Warcraft

/thread