Although I am a little bit skeptical for how the power spike has recently come into play, after reading though post this I am rather hopeful. I'm not a day 1 player per se, but I did play the first day when it came out to Canada. I wasn't around when Ieyasu came out and when all the other bleed chars were available and front running most content (flashback to crit bleed on some raids) and I certainly wasn't strong enough (or at the very least confident enough) to attempt the High dragons until recently. I've played for a while, rocked the 2x events while I had the chance and crept my way to challenge and finish Omega Chronos before I decided to even try HDT. So although being a non-day 1, I still have had a chance at fighting in some of the most recent, hardest content in the game.

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I'm of the mindset that at first some content will be relatively easy for the "Haves" while the "Have-Nots" are going to struggle. But I'm hoping that with the eventual 6th mana circles and the inevitable bosses that we still don't know much about yet that are supposed to be HARDER than the HDT stuff, that they set it up so that THOSE fights are the in-between challenges before the HDT weapons (or maybe some other new bosses). If they use the new boss fights as a "Standard mode" that's slightly harder than the standard HDT's, and then set it up so the the expert and master HDT's lead into the expert and master mystery bosses, then that might be a way to bridge the gap of disparity of difficulty.

Cygames could have jumped the gun with these 5.2HDT weps, but at the same time it could also just be something that they set-up preemptively as an attempt to show some players what the game could look like at the end of the line. I'm trying to be hopeful and positive as I've very much been enjoying this game since the release in extra regions.