I, though not by choice, would be classified as a casual gamer. This being due to the fact I am a full time student and also work almost full time, so I do not have the time to spend hours everyday to grind away. As the economy stands now, I feel as if it punishes the casual gamer or the gamer that does not have X amount of hours to put into the game every week. I am sure Anet is doing their best to try and fix this, but the price fluctuations (primarily increases) for mats, weapon skins, precursors, armor skins, etc. is becoming ridiculous. I understand that Legendaries were meant to reward dedicated players with the time and effort they put into the game, and I can completely understand that, but even exotic prices have gone up incredibly, and even though they Lost Shores patch said that there is an increase in rare and exotic drops rates, I have actually witnessed the opposite. I have gotten less drops in general (drops being any weapon or armor), let alone rare/exotics, after the patch than before, and this is taking into account I have invested in MF gear since and usually have 100+ MF (Which should be a displayed stat but that is a whole different issue). This makes me wanting to craft the weapons/armor I want near impossible, since without rare/exotics you have no ectos, unless you have enough to dish out 32-36s per, which in return requires grind and a lot of time.
I understand that they want to push Fractals, but the drop-rate differences between regular dungeons, regular mobs/world bosses, and Fractals is substantially different. I used to run around with the zerg in Orr when I had some free time because it required no time commitment and be able to get drops and leave whenever I please. Now if I do not have 1-2 hours to find a group and run Fractals, I will most likely not be able to make money. The diminishing returns do not help contribute one bit, either. I get why they implemented it, and it is to help fight the bots as well, but now with almost every bot gone, I feel like it just hurts the players.
Also, I never even feel like trying my luck with the Mystic Forge due to this. If I get a rare or exotic, If I can make a profit on it, I TP it, otherwise I would much rather gamble and try to pull an ecto or two from the item rather than throw 4 of the same rarity and get back an item that is worth the same as one of the four thrown in. This is a big bummer, for me, since I expected myself testing my luck with the forge a lot when it was announced, but with everything being so expensive, it is probably the most illogical thing to do imo.
In short, I just feel like to keep up with the economy, whether it may be to make a legendary, crafting, or other exotic skins in general, exploring is not good enough anymore. You must grind specific areas for hours to days to get a chance at what you want. Am I the only one that feels this way? Just wanted to share what I have been feeling and get other opinions on it.