Maribelle

Why should it be different?
Why should it be so much different now after the game has been the way it has been for so long?

I don't think it shouldn't be somewhat harder, I think it shouldn't feel like I'm playing a different game entirely.

We've been playing the game seven ******* years.
It's not demanding instant gratification to expect that to mean something

Yes, well I think have at least.

I've learned that most of what I've learned over the past few years (what are we at now, almost seven?) that is CoH specific is mostly not applicable, my character's powersets are for the most part irrelevant after the extra buffs the enemy has received in addition to the level modifiers, the build and set bonuses I have spent time and effort planning, buying, respeccing, and slotting barley make a significant difference in my characters' ability to survive and contribute.

Essentially, I am playing a different game and all my past efforts are null. All that matters is practice for two specific encounters, and building up rewards from those two specific encounters so that I can be as effective as the character was with just SOs in normal content.

Yes, Hami has a lot of rules changed involved in order to make it difficult for a large group of people. Hami was also designed so that each AT could take advantage of what makes them special.
Tanks aren't penalized for holding aggro well and a little support from certain buffers types working together goes a long way of making their job easier.
Controllers and Dominators are given a task that they are well suited for, that they are needed for, and not now told the opposite, that their controls are useless against important targets that they would otherwise excel at containing.
Every buff or debuff set can contribute meaningfully against Hami, with the buffs the enemys now have a lot of buffing sets are fairly useless and with the level difference our debuffers won't be nearly as beneficial as they need to be without the level bonuses.

Maybe Recluses's Strike force was harder when it was launched, and it certainly had the same issues with level difference. It did not have stacking ambushes that were crazy powerful until you've done the SF multiple times. It did not have a timer; your team could stand back, regroup, and say "What did we do wrong? What can we try now? How do we make this team work?"
With the stacking ambushes and the timer before you fail you do not have time to stand back and think, you need everyone to already know how to adapt.

The locking hospital doors seem to only make the issue worse when things are going poorly as a good portion of your people are trying to get back out to help the rest of the team that are getting killed outside. People are not going to regroup so easily. We see this whenever things go poorly at a Hami Raid or a ship raid, even when someone is yelling for people to regroup they are going to see people still engaging the enemy and rejoin.

Hamidon raids tend to take less than an hour to complete.
Most Hamidon raids are followed by a RWZ Ship raid, which also usually take around under an hour.