The general player base needs to improve

[Shurrikhan]

Before I get to responses...which is going to take me a while because I have quite a few posts to digest, I do want to say this one this: I think it would be helpful to have a perspective from someone experienced with an outside MMO. I've never played WoW, or SWToR, or BDO, or Everquest, or Lineage...I have no idea how content and mechanics run in those from their casual stuff up to their raid-level/difficult-level instances. Would love to hear thoughts from those Eorzeans who migrated from one of those games.

WoW is my other major MMO. I've also played things like BDO, GW2, B&S, Rift, WO, NWO, and a bit of ESO, etc., but WoW is the only of those one similar enough to really make meaningful comparisons, imo.

WoW felt more lore-filled and certainly produced content at a significantly higher rate, but until this most recent BFA revision to leveling, everything short of the latest expansion was treated as disposable in terms of difficulty curve or gameplay-integrity, non-game before the real game so to speak, and could frequently leave a foul taste in the player's mouth that removed most semblances of it being a role-playing game with any real story. If you leveled all your alts up within a given expansion, so you only had the next to go, it felt great. But if you had something to level up from scratch several expansion in, you could scarcely even understand why people would pick up the game anymore outside of boosted characters.

Combat-wise though, I loved that CC and target-swapping beyond just target focusing or add-burns were real mechanics there, though. Utility was meaningful. Though you ultimately needed a healer and tank for maximum efficiency, your toolkits were strong enough to allow for a great deal of creative play, especially pre-streamlining (WoD-Legion). Though the game's obviously had more chances just due to sheer duration, super-speed Monk and maybe HW DRK are the only instances of gameplay that I'd call incredibly strong -- by my own tastes -- whereas WoW has had 10+ specs over time that were similarly brilliant, without even touching on the nostalgia of where they were used and what all they could pull off outside of normal play or as just a numeric thrill (e.g. 5-Hunter dungeoning, trio-plate DPS as swap-tanks, tank-dps WotLK Feral, or the ridiculousness of the most powerful form of Combustion or pre-nerf raid Sub Rogue).