A radical idea

Who is to blame for that?
If everyone on the existing TLP simply stuck around you would all get to see content that is completely new to most of you.

Maybe the next TLP server should start with GoD unlocked with a pre-made level 65 character in full group gear, then anyone who really wants a "new server" experience can still get one & still see later content than PoP, anyone on the current TLP who wants to still see the post-PoP content is at least not drawn away by the "shiny new TLP" desire.

Part of the success of Phinigel was definitely down to having been "followed" by Agnarr & Coirnav.

This is a far more reasonable request than not making a live expansion to focus on content for TLP servers, and there is existing precedent for such content, Veksar was added after Kunark's release and GMM was made for EQ's anniversary, as well as the Lair of the Splitpaw & Temple of Cazic Thule revamps - among others.
I would be in favour of this approach so long as the team can do it without making the Live expansions smaller still.

Is the team currently big enough to make bigger better live expansions AND add maybe one new zone a year to one of the pre-existing expansions to make TLP gradually a bit more expansive?

I don't know, but if the game continues to grow & the TLP keeps bringing players back to EQ then the argument against creating "new stuff" in old expansions does get a little harder to justify.

The biggest criticism I see of early TLP is that Classic, as in the original game prior to Kunark, is too small.
The suggestion to add a "new continent" to that era is not entirely without merit as what that would do is expand the range of available zones at the launch of a TLP before Kunark Launches, it's one reason so many ask for TLP to start in Kunark or even Velious.
This would add a big novelty point to the first TLP that this is featured in - but I absolutely would not agree to adding so many new zones it would be at the expense of live players getting an expansion.

Maybe adding some "new Classic" areas to the existing continents makes sense, it's a lot easier to justfy the discovery of a new dungeon on an existing continent than it is a whole new continent so I think adding some extra content to classic and doing that by way of new places in the existing continents maybe 1 at a time is the way to go with this idea.
Maybe cycle it over time so Classic gets new zones for a few years then add a new one to Velious later on instead.

As soon as you do this people would complain that it isn't in era. They would also have to work to make sure that any new items in those zones match what drops for whatever expansion they decide to release it on TLP which will likely make it useless for live servers.

I'm not convinced that would be the case at all, GMM being the most recent example seems to have largely been positively received, prior to that Veksar was quite popular, so I think this argument is not very well supported, a few might gripe about it but the majority would be too busy exploring it and playing there to bother whining about it.

Absolutely true, but I think that is a point that doesn't even need to be brought up, I don't think anyone has asked for out of era loot.

This entirely misses the point, since it isn't going to be content that is even aimed at max level characters on Live, not everything has to be.

Maybe that is from Legacy of Ykesha "Deja Vu", but we didn't have an annual TLP back then.

The argument TLP players have that they put money into the game so new stuff in old expansions would be giving them something back for that too is not entirely invalid, the recyclers even are supporting the game with bag purchases & krono after all.
And while live max level players absolutely get nothing from expanding old eras with new zones, there's nothing to stop them creating yet another alt to go explore those new places with a level-appropriate character if they wish to.

As said earlier I would not want live players to lose out on an entire expansion in order to do new content for TLP but if resources allow for a bigger expansion next year & 1 new dungeon for classic EQ would that be so terrible?
In my view Live certainly should not think it has some inalienable right to all new content being made solely for them - simply put they are not the only player population pumping money into the game, if they think that they have the say so to block any new content for TLP then I think they are very wrong.

If they had introduced GMM as a level 80 zone in 2019, then I think a lot of people would have considered it a waste. Even Plane of War was released as a level 100 zone, rather than level 65.

TLP players have the option of sticking around after PoP, plenty of content there imo.

I think you missed my point, which was we already have plenty of complaints about items/zones being out of era on a new TLP and your counter example was a zone that was added late in the game not something a new TLP would have. Is it even available on a TLP server until TBL unlocks?

GMM also had content and gear that was designed for current level players when it was released meaning it was of a lot of use for players at the time. As for what I mean by being useless for live players is there is better drops in similar level zones that are disabled on TLP servers due to being out of era. A low level player that would be experiencing the zone could get better drops in other older content that drops better gear but those drops are not happening on a TLP server.

In the end the devs already have issues putting out content that will keep players busy for an entire year and having them spend time on low level content when there is already lots of that around is a waste of time.

You are more than welcome to join the discussion there: https://forums.daybreakgames.com/eq/index.php?threads/lack-of-content-for-cov.276087/

That's entirely due to complexities around a completely new loot system having been introduced so a really bad example.

The principle is identical no matter when it was added.

Eventually that will be current content for a TLP player that reaches TBL, as it was for Selo & Phinigel players recently, in exactly the way Veksar was.

And how does that change my point about new TLP content not being aimed at live players in any way to begin with?

Legacy of Ykesha added new zones that were not intended for max level players of the day and I am sure a lot of complaints about that were from live players who felt tha they had been left out of getting new content, that expansion didn;t even have teh TLP servers to justify its creation, it was experimental & was aimed at testing the waters for mid-expansion content & it largely backfired at the time, were it not for a new race & the cartography system it would have been viewed as a complete waste of time I am sure.

But that was EQ then, not now, and TLP players are as big a population as Live players are, if you want to keep ignoring them that is not good for the entire game, there's a balance to be struck & I'm not suggesting 50/50 content for TLP/Live its more like 5/95.

I entirely disagree with you and already made my case why I think it is wrong for live players to think they should have the monoploy on having any & all new content being created exclusively for them after already saying sacrificing an expansion for live players to make TLP content would be entirely wrong.
I don't think it's an either/or equation at all and I have said repeatedly "if resources allow", so I am clearly saying that new content for TLP is conditional and that I don't know if the team is big enough right now to make a bigger expansion in 2021 than we had in 2020 or 2019 and to be able to add a new zone for TLP, but it could be in the future and when it is then it absolutely should consider it.

That is a forum, a thin section of the actual players and typically the most vocal of complainers, I don't say that in order to diminish their concerns but to put them in perspective, plenty of players understood that CoV was going to be impacted by Covid 19 mid development, along with losing 3 experienced team members so, yet again, allowances should be made for that.

Proof?

Cause what I see is Project 1999 having a very small population compared to TLP which has

Cash shop/Krono/EXP Pots/P2W
Different damage values and early game balance (player DPS is higher than during era, healing spells are better)
Melee Augments
Translocators
Parcels
Soulbinders
Shared Bank
Money weighing 0
Revamped zones (admittedly everyone hates Freeport)
Pick zones
DZs
Faster expansion unlocks
Concentration Potions
LFG Tool
Not dropping items on your corpse
No EXP penalties
No Hell Levels
Maps
Pets don't disappear when you log or zone
Origin

Back when P99 launched their new servers the populations dropped fast because without features like pick zones and DZs too many players just had nothing to kill and couldn't play the game. That is why TLP continues to take players from P99 all the time. Frankly, TLP isn't even remotely the same game it was back then. But it has the same spirit. As long as people can group and level with strangers and guildies alike and kill rare spawns for loot that has appropriate stats for the expansion and have long quests like Epics and such, people will be very happy.

I often say this in regard to Classic era servers: These types of experiences aren't just a way to go back in time and re-experience the past. It is an opportunity to also make that experience even better than it was the first time.

Quality of Life >>>>>>>>>>> #NoChanges.

If 50% of your income comes from one thing and 50% comes from another, how do you decide which is more important? The answer is, don't ask stupid questions like that.

Live is important. TLP is important. They need to keep both happy. Some percentage of players on every TLP eventually become Live players. They may still reroll on new TLP's also. The system itself blurs the lines over time.

Do you think people are happy that CoV wasn't what it could have been? Are they saying, "that expansion was so bad they shouldn't make anymore?" Or are they saying, "they need to do better next time?" I've seen people complain about recent expansion packs in the VL plenty, this is the first time I've ever seen somebody say they shouldn't make any more. You may see that thread as evidence of your point, but it's not. It's evidence that players expect more, and will complain when they don't get it.

The issues with CoV have been covered, what has not is the other expansions. Many of them were great. HA scaling issues aside (CoTF/TDS/TBM), these expansions were quite fun. I've gone back and hit them up despite coming back to the game in EoK, which was also a great expansion. RoS was pretty good too, difficult, but similarly good like EoK. I can't speak to TBL or ToV, I just haven't been there yet. I left during RoS for reasons unrelated to the game, and came back in February of this year. I subsequently bought CoV on two accounts so I could catch up on what I missed. So now I'm finishing RoS, and will hit TBL soon.

In the end you should advocate for what you want, new content in different places, or whatever. But it's just silly to suggest they stop making new expansions. There are a lot of raiders on Live, spread out across the servers, even PvP server guilds have been raiding again. Raiders need the new content, even if casuals like me consume it much slower. The year that doesn't happen is the first year the attrition will start to snowball.

They could do a compromise: A "reverse hardcore heritage", where they take an existing modern "stand-alone" zone that would fit thematically(and geographically) with the usual TLP expansions and make a downscaled version to fit TLP levels, with new itemization but keeping the quests/story lines.

Examples could be Plane of War and add it to PoP a few months in, or Plane of Shadow(or should that be added to Luclin rather than PoP?) Chapterhouse would also fit(it is basically befallen 2.0)... You get the idea... CotF ond RoF had lots of stand-alone zones, that would fit...

I should also add that before they develop new content for TLP's, they should spend a little time assigning the new content they already have to the proper era's. Veksar and the new Cazic Thule get mentioned a lot as things that come too late to really be at their peak usefulness. Not sure about new Splitpaw, somebody else will have to comment on that.

We're all unhealthy, bud.

Swapping out EQ for different games doesn't change that.

Whether you intend it or not, your posts are vitriolic.

What a ridiculous analogy.

Still not sure what your point is with GMM, it was released during the TBL expansion as current content for that expansion so it is in era when the expansion is released. GMM is completely different than making a new zone and adding it to the game on a TLP server on launch or when an expansion such as kunark opens.

That's exactly what GMM was. It was released as part of the 20th anniversary celebration. You can't claim it is part of TBL because it is nothing like TBL. TBL is hard. GMM is like Disneyland and Candyland rolled together. Super easy mobs with group gear drops better than TBL Tier 2.

Did I say it was part of the TBL expansion or that it was released during the TBL expansion and tied to it? My point has been and still is that GMM was released during the TBL expansion and had current level gear for both raiders and groupers. On a TLP it is also released during the TBL expansion so that they end up experiencing it in the same time frame as it was originally just that it is open with TBL unlock instead of waiting for it to unlock later.

A TLP getting GMM in the same expansion that live servers got it is different than the devs making new content that would be tied to early expansions in the game.

You are side stepping the question.

GMM is exactly the same as making a new zone and adding to the TLPs.

How is GMM which was added during the TBL expansion, tied to the TBL expansion and unlocks during the TBL the same as developing a new zone and adding it during classic or kunark? It would only be the same if it unlocked with the same expansion it released with (or was the current expansion when it was released) which would make it kind of pointless.

GMM is a zone that was planned for during the development of TBL and you could see this as vendors had the items during beta for TBL.