I think many people who play MMO do not like long-term progression.

Interesting to think about in the context of relative success of MMOs. WoW is the most successful MMO to date, there's really no question about it. If you look at their approach to content, every expansion is basically a massive reset event. Every content patch to a lesser extent. Being a top raider, doing all the faction grinds, etc, in Shadowlands doesn't matter in Dragonflight when 99% of the top gear is replaced by trash drops and quest rewards while leveling. Long term progression isn't really a thing in WoW which may correlate with its relative success, even though it's a valid turnoff for many people who don't want their efforts from the previous content completely wiped out by a reset event.

I think WoW does a lot of things better than EQ, but it's kind of beside the point, because EQ is not WoW and overhauling anything is not going to happen at this point in the game. Like they can't even get their server lag under control. Things like that, small expansions, and TLP launches are filling up the roadmap, not massive changes to content design philosophy, level squishes, easier pathways to current content, AA teardown and redesign, scalable class balance as a function of gear level, facilitating easier group formation, eliminating wasted downtime, class soloability, backfilling old expansions with useful content, encouraging alts, eliminating boxing. I could go on but I'll stop there. EQ is EQ and it's not going to be WoW no matter how many great ideas or insights people have about the game or genre.

I'm personally on the TLPs with the hope of one day experiencing the ride to current content with a group of likeminded players. It's not a lobby mentality for all of us. Unfortunately, I haven't found a guild to stick it out with yet, they all tend to collapse and I tend to fade out when they die and say "oh well try again next time or next next time" as opposed to jump into a new guild and start playing catch up on DKP while not in an established "in group" within the guild. I do find a lot of the players do see it as a lobby though and are there for the nostalgia of the first few expansions, complaining about "new freeport," and just to reset for the next one and do it again.

I had not done much progression because there is to much after more than 20 years. They are a big hill for returning and new players and they are one of the reasons why the game is getting harder with each new expansion because their difficulty does get adjusted to finished progression power rewards. I do like the stories but progression is work and not fun and without the help of external sites like ZAM frustrating. Often even with the help of ZAM as they got designed for full player groups and not for boxers. And I do not play games to have (more) work. Especially when playing several PCs where progression has to be repeated over and over.

I like LDON and DoN instances and basically also monster missions but only doing lobby content is boring. They are nice additions for more variety but some of them do also include long-term progression.

I love long term progression. I wish that it was more quest based and less grind based.

What's not to like about that?
DPG has done an excellent job of thinking through most of expansion progressions. Farther one goes through them - bigger and better rewards, meaningful and desirable. All those Heroic AA's, unique clickies, loot, gear. And it is usually worth to repeat for various alts and friendlies.
And great Anniversary season with awesome rewards, and then Summer season with a series of extra exp bonuses. Good annual routine. I enjoy it year throughout.

Viewed superficially it is nostalgia that keeps TLP servers alive. But under that emotional surface there are other more detailed reasons. My theory is that all those players had experienced traumatas by expansions and events that made them lose friends and where they had lost the connection to the game. Where they also got overstrained by content and didn't understood what the lore of the expansions was about. Old expansions do grant those players safety as they are well known areas where they can relive the experiences from their memories together with other players. The community feeling which has gone lost on live servers is definetly an important TLP server aspect.

There were several events that caused those traumatas:

1. Constantly ongoing split servers during the early booming years where players suddently lost friends from one day to another. It might look like a minor problem but it is something that also happens during wars where families do get divorced. The emotional effect is nearly the same as for many players EQ and other online games are an artificial family substitute.
2. Raiding: It had a similar effect by divorcing friends. However raid guilds also united players by creating new communities but those communities are often just partnerships of convenience for achievements.
3. Shadows of Luclin: It was a world by itself with its own lore that most players did not get or had access to. It was the first expansion where the links to old word Norrath (Classic, Kunark, Velious) got cut.
4. Gates of Discord: It definetly splitted the players further and was an expansions for raid geared players only. Just like Omens of War it had a weird story and weird demonic mobs with practically not many connections to old world Norrath.
5. EQ2 and WoW releases: Those were the coffin nails that did led to a player exodus.

I'd argue that most people playing MMOs like MMOs or else they'd be playing those other lobby-based games you're referring to.

The title of the thread...

This is EverQuest.

Long term progression is fine and great, for groups and raids.

What EQ is missing are catchup mechanics and solo activities for people who are not max level.

No thought is paid to "what happens when today's content is yesterday's content?"

The franchise does lack a long time strategy and disposable expansions are not very clever. Returnable expansions would be an evolution. Has someone ever thought about how cool it would be if every zone could be used as an instanced zone with a wide dynamic level range just like it was done in LDoN ? It might work if the mobs there would randomly drop an alternative currency, and some additional named mobs and kill quests could be added.

I prefer the progression to just mindless grinding. I am a goal oriented person sonprohression works for me.

There's a ton of game dev theory on vertical vs. horizontal progression. There's skill involved in MMOs to be sure, but before that even matters, you have to sink massive amounts of time into a character for skill to start factoring into your gameplay

Hopping into something like League of Legends/Apex/whatever, you're ability to win is significantly influenced by you, the player. Skill development primarily accumulates with the player.

Hopping onto an MMO means grinding out months of RL time to hit the basic level (level cap + gear, thousands of AA and progression) where you can start to show your skills in raids on that character. If you start a new character, your skill won't translate much to affect your gameplay until you sink time in again. Skill development primarily accumulates within the character you play.

Some people enjoy one, others the other. Vertical progression seems to mostly be a single-player mechanic and ironically MMOs.

I think one issue with EQ is too much character progression, hear me out here.

For on going players, all that progression adds cumulative value, however, it makes a huge barrier to returning players and main changes.

Think of the eye aug from TBM affected Healing and Damage output for several expansions. Players missing this aug were significantly impacted by not having it. Such powerful items remaining so powerful out of era cause a lot of problems for many players.

However, If for instance, instead of heroic stats, we got expansion bane bonuses, then when we beat RoS, we would get a RoS bane that increases damage or healing in RoS zones. This could be accomplished with a song aura or something. Anyway, these bonuses would add a lot of power in RoS but no value after RoS. While that seems bad, it makes for a much more balanced gameplay. Raid tuning could focus strictly on the available gear and not include such a wide range of modifiers, including heroic stats. Etc.

This would address a significant problem for returning players where a large amount of power comes from places where there is no meaningful XP, Coin or, most importantly, company.

ACHs should still have value, and there should still be some value to old unlocks, but making the playing field a bit more level at the expansion launch wouldn't be a bad idea.