ironman-challenge
Latest
The Game Archaeologist: Ironman modes and elective permadeath
One facet of video games that's been around almost since the very beginning is the difficulty level. This has allowed the player to choose how hard or easy a game would be from the onset, influencing factors such as the number of enemies, hardiness of bad guys, fragility of the player character, and available loot (or lack of it). I used to love how some of those '90s shareware titles would mock me for picking easy, sometimes portraying my character wearing a baby bonnet and sucking its thumb. Real gamers, the devs implied, go tough or go home. With a few exceptions, MMOs operate on a fixed level of difficulty for all of their players. Instead of assigning blanket difficulty client-side, the game world portions difficulty into areas, usually according to level or activity. Some games have instances with adjustable difficulty levels, but past that what you get is also what I get. This might be changing. A very fringe but dedicated group of players have championed such ideas as elective ironman and permadeath modes for their MMOs, and at least one studio is responding positively to that desire. Would you choose to make your MMO experience harder than everyone else in exchange for nothing more than a bigger challenge and a more "realistic" experience?
Night elf priest iron-mans to level 90 with no greens, no talents, and no deaths
It's a world first for night elf priest Lyssan of Vek'linash (US), who has bypassed death, gearing, talents -- all the conveniences of modern-day Azeroth -- to hit level 90 in the player-created WoW Ironman Challenge. A report like this would normally include the winner's class specialization and gearing, but not for this player, yet the Ironman's brutal ruleset prohibits not only those basics but also death itself. That's right: If you die during the WoW Ironman Challenge, you re-roll. Period. Here's a look at the grim core rules of the challenge: No items equipped other than white or gray items. No heirlooms. No talent points -- no specialization. You may train class abilities. No professions, primary or secondary, other than First Aid. No food or water above vendor-quality white items. No groups -- no BGs, no instances, no raids, no quest groups. No guilds. No enchants, scrolls, potions, elixirs, or glyphs. No outside financial or equipment assistance (including gold or bags from other characters). The Big One: If you die, ever, you delete that character and start over at level 1. The next closest participant in the Mists leg of this event is currently level 87. Kripparrian, the player-run hard-mode competition's former title-holder in Cataclysm at level 85, does not appear to have leveled in Mists of Pandaria. We'll have a full interview with the triumphant Lyssan next week, after she takes a well-earned holiday rest! (And if it were me, I think I'd go out and die a few times, just for sheer relief ...)
