Incarnates: Forgetting the lessons of the Hollows

Back in the day, when I first joined the game, there was a lot less content - that was back towards the end of I6. Back then it was almost "mandatory" to do the Hollows. The alternative was street sweeping in Kings Row - and if you ever remember that you'll know how painful that was. So it was Hobson's choice - Frostfire was your friend and again and again and again ad infinitum. Don't forget this was pre-the XP Curve smooth and Radio Missions and the (in)famous revamp. It literally was that or a very long painful solo slog until... well it's been so long I forget.

The Hollows was, and remains, great content. It actually outshone a lot of later content in terms of quality and continuity, but the problem was that because of its ubiquity, it became interminable. By the 15th time of David Wincott saying "just take care of those 10 Outcasts" you didn't want to play any more you wanted to punch him in the mouth. Let's not forget that the Hollows arc took real time in those days. This was long before someone could run from 1-12 in a few hours doing regular content. Even on big teams who knew their stuff there was still many hours to be played. But of course that was the same for everyone. And how we laughed when the Kheldians came and blitzed everything then cried like little girls at the first sign of a Void or Quantum.

The alternative was the Snakes of Mercy but that was a ghost town even then and it took a long time to get to good content red side.

It took a long time for the Devs to get that message, and a lot of good players died in the Hollows, moving on to pastures new, before getting to high level, because they didn't like the grind of Frostfire and Atta. When the Eastgate finally got a makeover, it was after the horse had bolted: Radio Missions had taken over and the world and its dog was scoping for jetpacks.

Doing the Hollows now is an active choice and it's a good, refreshing one, but it actually has to be made by the player and his/her friends and colleagues. In many ways the makeover signified the death-knell of the Hollows because it was too little too late. The entire zone was a curio from a bygone age, left to Trolls, Outcasts and the Igneous. If Meg Mason and Foreshadow were real people they'd want to do to the Devs what we wanted to do to Wincott when it was being played.

But the Hollows got forgotten, and people moved on as new content was doled out, and now the entire zone is mostly a graveyard. If it gets run now, it's mostly nostalgia, or badges.

Many of you reading this can see where I'm going already: But for those who can't it's very simple: The Hollows was excellent content and yet the mandatory grind, more than anything else killed it. For a long time it seems the Devs had taken heed of that lesson. But these trials, well I am being very subjective here of course and I freely admit it, but they aren't of the standard of the Hollows arcs, and yet they are more grindy.

Once there's an alternative they will be a wasteland.

"You got to dig it to dig it, you dig?"
Thelonious Monk

I agree it was a poor choice to make all the new loot come only from the two new trials (of course you can build the new loot extremely slowly by farming shards in normal content, but that's about 1/20 speed and the new exp is exclusive.)

One suggestion I have is to add an incarnate mode to normal taskforces that give all the enemies a +2 level shift and give incarnate drops at a reasonable rate.