MMORPGs How they have changed for the better? or worse?

[Edax]

Using Old School Runescape as measuring stick, one thing that does annoying me about modern MMORPGs is the stat bloat. In Runescape, your HP only went up to 100 at max level. Maybe you could take a potion and increase a stat beyond 100 but for the most part you could feel the difference between +1 or +2 of a stat. Taking a potion for a +10 bonus was huge.

In modern MMORPGs, the expansions introduce such stat bloat that you could have 100k+ HP, gear that offers stat bonuses in the thousands and yet you never seem to feel their impact unless your using some 3rd party software to run the numbers. I remember the original KOTOR (just an old school rpg) where just getting +5 to strength meant a huge difference. You could utterly destroy mobs in a single turn if you got your strength high enough. In the modern era, I can add +200 to direct hit via materia and not notice any real change. As for the HP bar, the number is so inconsequential, it might as well be a percentage bar.

It's gotten to the point that I use item lvl to judge gear and not the stats.