Right now we are working hard to make sure there are not any ways for players to circumvent the normal rewards in the game and then we will be able to look at the actual rewards and make sure they require a reasonable amount of investment.
I’m really enjoying the game right now (as I did when GW1 originally came out), and this isn’t specific to your changes, but is more a comment about your (and in extension ArenaNet’s) mentality -bolded in the quote- for changing the game.
Most of the people I used to talk to about and play with in Guild Wars (1) that left early (mainly around the Factions release) had one major reason behind it – the foremost priority became, it seemed, in Guild Wars 1 was in preventing players from playing in a manner that you had not intended, with the secondary priority being in your war against bots, followed distantly by making the game more enjoyable for players directly. Things that come to mind when Factions was released were gated areas (to prevent runners), heavy emphasis on crippling by PvE mobs (again to slow down or stop runners and explorers), loot scaling (to prevent solo or small group players), and all kinds of things to attempt to stop bots (somewhat understandable).
The problem is that from a normal player standpoint it seemed as though you were worried MORE about people ‘getting one over on you’ or ‘playing some way you didn’t envision’ than making the game better for the average player. You still seem to be in that mentality.
Work on fixing bugs and seeing how you can address issues people have with the game BEFORE you go after stopping the people that (for the most part) seem to be hurting your feelings.
Blockbuster fell into the same trap when its CEO blogged about overhauling their ‘in-the-mail’ return program early on because he waskitten off that a very few people were bragging about how to exploit the system. In effect he cared more about that then taking care of the customers. Obviously he made a bad decision.
Get your priorities straight this time around. It wasn’t until after your two main teams left to work on GW2 that the trends started reversing on GW1, making the game more enjoyable. Don’t take it personally if people are playing a way you don’t like or circumventing something you put in unless it is game-breaking (like the mystic forge exploits) until AFTER you work issues related to your main player-base. This isn’t a war between you and them… Leave your egos at the door. Your player-base will really love you for it.
Anyway, just my two cents in a hopefully helpful manner. Either you’ll listen or you won’t. At the worst we can look forward to your current GW1 team moving to GW2 down the road and fixing it if you decide not to listen.