1918 Wheat Penny Error

The die may have been polished down a lot on that area. Or it is just a stain that makes it look lower on that area. Either way the issue is not a premium for a worn coin. This coin loos similar:


But the metal on the upper right reminds me of Ridge Ring that we see today on the 1980's cents. But it is common at that time. Depending on die aging.

. A type of indirect die transfer?
John1

I'm seeing some progressive indirect die transfer.

Yesterday my image host was not working correctly. But I was looking for examples of the large rim different die wear pattern. On the 1918 coins it looked like this:

Note the die wear is on the opposite side of the date devices? I finally figured it out that this happened on the years with the large rim on the cents as the dies aged.
Other years:





What got me started on this?


This image is in the "Looking through Lincoln cents book", by Charles Daughtrey Page 54. Even then it was not known what caused it. Then a few years later, I realized it only happened on the cents with the wide rim, that had this issue as the dies aged.

What you are seeing on my coin is just extreme die wear. These die flow lines showing make the die look terminal. I've seen worse: