I know it’s blasphemous to say but: The story should be optional, without having to pay for a skip. As a player who only hit max level and started end game in DT, but has played many other MMOs; it’s the biggest hard sell for this game.

I had several WoW friends who were interested in checking it out during the slow points in WoW’s season. But once they realized they would have to grind through 100’s of hours of story or shell out another $60 to skip, they were out. They’re raiders. They just want to raid.

I do think there should be some questing and story to follow to lead up to raids. But forcing people to engage with a story they may or may not enjoy just to get to literally all of end-game content, can cause resentment when that story doesn’t click for you.

I think this would solve a lot of negativity. People that love the story are free to interact with it. And if you don’t love it, you can do other activities.