I haven't checked in a while. Doesn't surprise me. I haven't mined with the new sweet spot enhancements, but it sounds even more broken. From what I understand I could get 7 gold ores per node now instead of 75% of the yield from the gold ore tic being non-gold. As opposed to coming home with 50 ores and 60 sands after a massive mining session, I could come home with 150 ores from 25 nodes or so.

System's not sustainable like that unless we're just giving up on the idea that a high-level craft is remotely rare or difficult.
Which is fine, but I don't think many players signed up for that radical of an idea that every craft should be as easy to progress in as a battlecraft, with minimal investment other than time.

I can deal with that radical concept but...why are we doing it? Only reason I can think is so that shells can be their entire economy and community within themselves, that coincides with making the teams smaller and the content less unwieldy.

But if that is the future of MMOs...why not just build games with 24 online players? This is a MMO. If massively is no longer a part of the structure, then it's just a MORPG. Just an extended multiplayer offline RPG.