Has any game done this yet?

[Stephen Zepp]

I still maintain, as I always have, that the MMO of the future once we are done with DIKUmuds will be a cross between Battlefield style resetting, Shadowbane-like ability to affect the landscape, and Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory leveling model.

Remember how everyone said that SB was teh ROX in beta because everything kept resetting, so no one guild could just crush and own everything permanently?  Picture a twitch Shadowbane (or where everyone started out with the equivalent of "lvl 60" MMO skills) done right, a MMO-size fantasy BF2 map where permanent structures could be erected with incredible speed, that reset everything every two weeks.  Dragonriders, airships, mass 100 person spells that could drop an enemy city into the ocean...but it didn't matter because it would all end in a week and you could try a different strategy.  I'd fucking pay for that.         

Keep in mind that SB's attempt at a "recycling server" failed miserably...of course, they made everyone start from level 0 every 3 months and totally build up, but even with faster exp, much faster building and less upkeep (required farming), it still didn't make it past one cycle. the idea does sound good, but it seems a lot of people get quickly frustrated with having to do everything over and over again as well.

[HaemishM]

Nothing Shadowbane has done after it's first 3 months is of any value to this discussion, since the sb.exe probably fucked everyone who would have played on that server more than once in their tiny little anuses.

And no, I would not have wanted to relevel from 0 in SB because leveling in that game was fast but BORING.

[Samwise]

it seems a lot of people get quickly frustrated with having to do everything over and over again as well.

I think the grinding-up-from-level-0 thing might be a larger part of that than you're giving credit for. Doing the same thing over and over isn't frustrating if that thing is fun and if there's some variation in it (which is all but guaranteed in a pure PvP game).  PvE grinding is not fun and never has any variation in it.

A Counter-Strike server resets its state every five minutes or less.  People still don't seem to mind playing round after round on de_dust.  I suspect, though, that if you had to shoot a bunch of NPCs for a minute at the start of each round before you could start playing, people would get annoyed.  Even a short grind is still a grind.