See now thats the irony of MMOs, a noob character should indeed be easy to whack and rob, because they are precisely that, a new character. Many players 14 years ago when UO came out understood that. They understood that you needed to develop your skills, just as a real fighter etc needs to develop skills. They also understood that this new online roleplay game was a world in which not every person was a hero and that life in this wonderfully crafted world of fantasy was a sometimes harsh and tough existence.
Somewhere along the line it got lost and now everyone expects to be the hero, everyone expects to be rock hard at any level and everyone expects that no matter how "bad" things become for their character everything will be alright providing they just pop to an NPC.
I find it staggering in many modern MMOs that there are any creatures in the wilds at all given that the worlds tend to be inhabited by thousands of heavily armoured , powerfully magicked people running about all over the world who are all apparently immortal and can never actually die. Does kind of make you wonder just who is actually buried in all those ingame graveyards and how you actually kill anyone given that all it takes is a low level priest to ressurect them
(but thats something you have to overlook as pedantism)I remember UO so well, I also have never played an MMO since UO which had quite the impact on me that it had. It really felt like a breathing world, a real place of fantasy where I met some people who excelled in the arts of combat, other people who simply tended bar in player run taverns, other people who didnt fight at all and were humble shopkeepers running their stores and keeping their shelves stocked for their clientele. Pacifist players who never drew blade or cast spell in anger, even a deaf and dumb player who in 4 years of playing never "spoke" once and did all their communications via text emotes. (*Shenmar makes the motion of a sea wave with his hand* etc.)
I remember the harshness of my first journey out of a town, the fear, the trepidation, the actual worry for my character and his no doubt imminent death. The adrenalin rush of being chased through the woods and caves by PKers, would I get away, could I throw them off, often I couldnt but sometimes the rush of victory that I had eluded these would be villains. The way that death had an impact and wasnt just a case of "oh I need to get back somewhere quickly, I know, I will just die here and use it as a form of rapid travel".
UO was the closest to an online version of the PnP AD&D that I experienced, there was almost an emphasis on the social aspect of the game (much as with the social aspect of PnP AD&D). When Origins made UO they had a company motto which was "Origin : We create worlds" , that was smack bang on the truth for me, they created a real MMO world with all the villainous and all the wonderous aspects therein, where so many others merely created MMO games.
However, just bringing back UO today wouldnt help much, as there has been a massive polar shift in the types of people who play online games these days. Its an entirely different sort of person compared to 14 years ago, some would say generally a better type, others (like myself) would say generally a worse type. The userbase for a new UO would definitely be small, perhaps enough to turn a profit, but nevertheless small. I suppose, somewhat ironically, the closest userbase to UOs I have seen these days is on Laurelin server in LOTRO. Though even then its somewhat of a shadow of the days of the UOTC and CRC era on Catskills - UO.
I'll never see its like again online, thats for sure, but I'm very happy that I got to experience it.
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