Patch 4.3 and Another Gear Reset

Greedy posts about a topic dear to my heart in feeling what saps the fun from WoW.  The problem is, I don't know a good solution.

To me, gear resets are a bad simple solution to a complex problem.

There has to be some guiding princples to inspire people to play. This is outside the constructs of the mechanisms created (e.g. quests, 5-mans, pvp, raids, professions, etc.).

Principles of WoW:

1. People like to feel like they are progressing forward (like leveling, getting skill points, honor points).
2. People like to be rewarded for their "play" effort (complete task get item / point / gold). It is the incentive.
3. The amount of "fun" one feels is a ratio to the amount of effort and skill required for the desired reward value (if I do X, I get Y).
4. For the maximum enjoyment of customers, content should be tuned such that majority of players (the bell curve) can complete normal versions of content (including raids) given a reasonable amount of effort. That is, given X hours of trying, they succeed.

Gear Resets Are Bad Because:

1. Deflating the reward, removes the incentive. I can just wait and they'll give it to me for no effort.
2. Since it will just be given to me, I'm not really making progress, it's just being given to me.
3. I'm not having fun because the amount of effort required for the value is also deflated. Deflating fun.
4. No pride in the accomplishment because I will have it given to me regardless of my skill.

Where Blizzard Fails

1. They use Gear Resets to push players forward artificially by having them out gear content and by nerfing content so that more players can succeed. However, the "fun" has been removed because there is no longer any value other than to see "sort of" how the fight used to look. The gear is obsolete.
2. They use gear resets to help players "catch up" that are "new" but it punishes existing players by devaluing their effort -- it becomes wasted.
3. They believe that just "seeing" content is all players want... yawn. Just show me a you tube video.

The problem in the system is that players are interdependent to play this game. One must not only play it, but find people at similar skill / effort / gear levels to achieve the goals. The gear reset is Blizzards effort to help us find those people by creating more of them ... giving content... at the same time, reducing the value of exiting player's rewards.

You have to deal with the noted issues of player "poaching" and having to "gear up" players to catch up. Playing with friends at different skill levels and thus inhibits ones ability to progress because many of the fights are single-mistake-wipe designs. "Your not making an effort" slows "my ability to make progress".

I agree that gear resets are bad because they punish existing players, but I don't think Blizzard has made enough effort in really fixing the problem which lies in the interdependency of multiple levels of skill and maintaining the individuals ability to progress and be rewarded for it in a game that requires collective work.