Survival, Creative or Hardcore ?

Hardcore has been an issue for me ever since it was released way back. The problem is there should be an intermediary step before simply goin:

"oh they fell off a cliff in a cave, guess its time for a new world."

They need a hard mode but not quite hardcore and not simple buffing the mobs and disabling natural regen.

My answer: Survival + Hardcore DataPacks (best of both worlds with no stupid drawbacks)