First, lets talk about how the current changes are making QoL worse for players (especially casual players).
1) Changes to XP Items widened the gap further, not less. Infinite turn-ins mean the rich just scoop everything up while the casual is left looking for XP items in an empty housing market, and farmers have doubled or tripled their prices to account for the nerf in drop rate. Also, they are camping the shit out of all the spots.
2) Changes to mob type bonus from 400 max to 200 max is a flat 200% nerf to XPing speed (assuming you have an optimized route) that increases exponentially based on how you play. Manage to build a good bomb group? Still facing a 200% reduction in top-end XP (assuming you found the mobs). PLUS reduction in task bonus (slightly mitigated by tokens, but more on that later). Are you soloing a stealther? Good luck, because you were *probably* trying for mob bonus OR XP items which are now nerfed in drop rate AND XP reward. Oh, and I hope you know a good camp for every mob type bonus, because if you don't...
3) Rotating Mob Type now means you join a group, wander aimlessly for 30m searching for something that is both red/purp to your highest member AND proper mob type, get set up, then find out what you thought was a ghost is actually a humanoid, so the group disbands to go play literally anything else because no one wants to do that crap anymore. Most groups are just settling for the same old XP spots (so giants which were 400 are now 0) or new spots that are close to port hubs with lots of mobs and no bonuses. Levelling is now MUCH slower. LIKE..400% SLOWER.
4) People still aren't grouping melees and stealthers. In fact, now they're all just rolling farm classes because farming and XPing got harder, and with a server with a declining player base it's not like raids are getting more and more common...
I could go on, but now I'd like to bring up some changes that would actually be QoL improvements.
1) Keep tokens in, but increase rewards for task slightly. With the tradeable tokens, I don't think the task bonus needs to be as high as it used to be, but it's way too low now.
2)Increase XP Item rewards. Again, not back to previous values, but slightly. Also slightly improve drop rate and mob density for some of these camps.
3) Come up with some other huge social incentive for stealthers/melee. If you won't give us 400% on mobs anymore, give us 200 more from stealthers. 100 from melee. THEN you might see some melee groups.
4) Casuals need a way to obtain credit and feathers. I don't know if Task Dungeons are the answer but right now obtaining credit for items is way too hard for the average player. I have all farm toons on all 3 realms and I dropped over 50 plat this week just on feather items because the scarcity of credit and feathers from lack of raids has lead to some pretty nasty inflation prices on items.
I guess what I'm saying is stop nerfing XPers and casual QoL. I think the changes could have positive consequences but right now the numbers don't add up.
1) Changes to XP Items widened the gap further, not less. Infinite turn-ins mean the rich just scoop everything up while the casual is left looking for XP items in an empty housing market, and farmers have doubled or tripled their prices to account for the nerf in drop rate. Also, they are camping the shit out of all the spots.
2) Changes to mob type bonus from 400 max to 200 max is a flat 200% nerf to XPing speed (assuming you have an optimized route) that increases exponentially based on how you play. Manage to build a good bomb group? Still facing a 200% reduction in top-end XP (assuming you found the mobs). PLUS reduction in task bonus (slightly mitigated by tokens, but more on that later). Are you soloing a stealther? Good luck, because you were *probably* trying for mob bonus OR XP items which are now nerfed in drop rate AND XP reward. Oh, and I hope you know a good camp for every mob type bonus, because if you don't...
3) Rotating Mob Type now means you join a group, wander aimlessly for 30m searching for something that is both red/purp to your highest member AND proper mob type, get set up, then find out what you thought was a ghost is actually a humanoid, so the group disbands to go play literally anything else because no one wants to do that crap anymore. Most groups are just settling for the same old XP spots (so giants which were 400 are now 0) or new spots that are close to port hubs with lots of mobs and no bonuses. Levelling is now MUCH slower. LIKE..400% SLOWER.
4) People still aren't grouping melees and stealthers. In fact, now they're all just rolling farm classes because farming and XPing got harder, and with a server with a declining player base it's not like raids are getting more and more common...
I could go on, but now I'd like to bring up some changes that would actually be QoL improvements.
1) Keep tokens in, but increase rewards for task slightly. With the tradeable tokens, I don't think the task bonus needs to be as high as it used to be, but it's way too low now.
2)Increase XP Item rewards. Again, not back to previous values, but slightly. Also slightly improve drop rate and mob density for some of these camps.
3) Come up with some other huge social incentive for stealthers/melee. If you won't give us 400% on mobs anymore, give us 200 more from stealthers. 100 from melee. THEN you might see some melee groups.
4) Casuals need a way to obtain credit and feathers. I don't know if Task Dungeons are the answer but right now obtaining credit for items is way too hard for the average player. I have all farm toons on all 3 realms and I dropped over 50 plat this week just on feather items because the scarcity of credit and feathers from lack of raids has lead to some pretty nasty inflation prices on items.
I guess what I'm saying is stop nerfing XPers and casual QoL. I think the changes could have positive consequences but right now the numbers don't add up.