Any longtime players never bother with tradeskills?

Nope. And I don't ever plan to.

Tradeskilling, for me, provides zero fun.

The only way I will ever see the TS reward items is if a TS commissioning system is implemented (a'la EQ2).

vendor bow to 282, then arrows made with Tainted Feathers. Tainted Feathers can be farmed from the doggos that fill the entrance valley to Shard's Landing

I recently gave up the fight on TS and it was the most freeing feeling ever lol. My bags are no longer overflowing with garbage I might need to TS with someday, and after /bar all the items away I am "rich" lol. /middlefingeratTS

All the big quests they have been adding for TS is finally what got me going on EQ again. It was getting kind of old and same old same old. As a grouper I would never see the kind of gear like the earrings you can make. I have never taken a break from EQ but was getting close to. This bought new life to the game to me.

I've been playing since 99, and I finally did tradeskills this expac so I could get the Rallos Zek ear.

I'm glad I did it now, but the process was painful and expensive.

Yeah my bad (finally checking now) the bow is only 282, I was irritated I went from 202 to 269 on arrows before I found the all vendor 282 bow..Rough Shadewood Compound Bow (Hemp).

I hear that. I've been playing EQ since 2000, and got into tradeskills in 2001. Was able to cash in on a lot of the Cabbage quest earrings around that time. Have never stayed on top of them all the way along, but because I started them so long ago, it was always a much smaller hill to climb to get caught up.

If I was starting from scratch today, and knowing what a pain they can be, it would be very daunting, for sure.

Just be glad you didn't have to put every mat into the TS container, one-by-one, for every combine, and had access to recipes

That was based on prices on my server. Farming the mats yourself does not make them cheaper (opportunity cost). I can farm plat faster than I can farm random mid level tradeskill mats.