I haven't been happy with my weapon combo for a while so I have been researching potential upgrades for a casual player like myself. One weapon I had looked at was the Fist of the Five Blades from DoN,
18/19 STR+12 STA+12 WIS+8 AGI+13 HP+110 MANA+105 END+105 SVF+16 SVD+12 SVP+13 100pt fire based DD effect.
But thats required level of 70, I'm only level 67, so thats a ways off. The second was
http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=31957. But those drop in Riftseekers, which you have to be 69 to zone in, and again, I'm only level 67.
So anyway, a few days ago some of my hardcore raider friends go to SSRA (and allow me to join them) and they kill Glyphed/Exiled/Cursed and XTC. In a stroke of pretty impressive luck, the
http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=12498 drop off Cursed and XTC drops
http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=8603. So now I am set for weapons, but it got me wondering, why the hell is this stuff even close to what is req level of 70? or dropping in a req level of 69 zone? We did these mobs with 2 groups, (including a couple bots) and it wasn't a tough fight. I do realize that its a by product of mudflation that the SSRA mobs no longer need a raid to take them down. Need to be 69 to get Flamelicked Claws, or you could get a comparable weapon from what, 3-4 expansions ago? I don't consider a few more HP and 50 pts less damage on the proc to be an upgrade.
Required levels are there to stop people farming for level 30 twinks.
In Luclin those were endgame weapons requiring 40 person+ raids. Nowadays they can be done with less if you have extremely nice gear, but they're still raid mobs with 500k+ hp. Even now they're still viable raid targets for a number of guilds.
The mob that drops the claws in RSS is one groupable and designed as such from day one - hence the level.
BTW those weapons don't get upgraded until the EPs and even then not by much, you had an extremely good day there :)
Khayden