Season 2 - Relics of Malice - is almost here! If you want to read more about what the Season 2 update brings, check out a more in-depth overview here:
Relics of Malice Website
And as usual we are releasing patch notes ahead of the release of the update! See the patch notes by clicking "Patch Notes" in the header, or by clicking this link:
Relics of Malice Patch Notes
Jytal
Servant of Mallok
Platform
iOS
One of the changes made in the patch notes were increasing the amount of levels required for each raid tier.
To the more casual players, this change makes raids even more inaccessible to them. What was a minimum of 15 raids for bronze is now 50. With players already dreading the grind for platinum in season 1, how are players going to enjoy raiding at all if getting to bronze is already a dreadful grind. It states in the patch note that copper and rarity of items increase with raids but, considering the livestream raid, inferior and uncommon equips were the only ones dropped. How is this resourceful or rewarding if more gold and better items can be found just from doing a bounty run in less time and with less resources. Increasing the amount of raids by three times for even bronze seasonal rewards eliminates the opportunity for many new or casual players because they simply don’t have the resources to dedicate to something unrewarding and grindy.
If this change was made to reward players who go far in raid levels, this can be done without taking away the opportunity of rewards to a large number of players or dividing the player base further apart from each other.
Please put back the raid tiers to 5/10/15/20, increasing the number of raids is simply furthering a grind and to state it simply, grinds are not fun and we all want raids to be fun. To reward players who go further in raids, goodie bags similar to elder levels ever 5 or 10 raid levels can be given along with additional ducat coins. This reward system will keep raids fun, challenging, not completely grindy and still rewarding.
No player wants to grind all day, make raids fun not a grind
- None -> 0 (was 0)
- Bronze -> 10 (was 5)
- Silver -> 20 (was 10)
- Gold -> 35 (was 15)
- Platinum -> 50 (was 20)
To the more casual players, this change makes raids even more inaccessible to them. What was a minimum of 15 raids for bronze is now 50. With players already dreading the grind for platinum in season 1, how are players going to enjoy raiding at all if getting to bronze is already a dreadful grind. It states in the patch note that copper and rarity of items increase with raids but, considering the livestream raid, inferior and uncommon equips were the only ones dropped. How is this resourceful or rewarding if more gold and better items can be found just from doing a bounty run in less time and with less resources. Increasing the amount of raids by three times for even bronze seasonal rewards eliminates the opportunity for many new or casual players because they simply don’t have the resources to dedicate to something unrewarding and grindy.
If this change was made to reward players who go far in raid levels, this can be done without taking away the opportunity of rewards to a large number of players or dividing the player base further apart from each other.
Please put back the raid tiers to 5/10/15/20, increasing the number of raids is simply furthering a grind and to state it simply, grinds are not fun and we all want raids to be fun. To reward players who go further in raids, goodie bags similar to elder levels ever 5 or 10 raid levels can be given along with additional ducat coins. This reward system will keep raids fun, challenging, not completely grindy and still rewarding.
No player wants to grind all day, make raids fun not a grind
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I think it's worth noting here that these Seasonal rewards are still considered optional - and in fact, we've added a ton of more rewards for running raids in general! Reaching these levels doesn't have any actual mechanical implications but rather just offer various thresholds for nice bonus rewards that you might get for reaching particularly challenging levels.
Our intent behind the Seasonal rewards is to provide a range of different rewards, with their requirements going from "I sometimes play raids casually" to "I want the absolutely greatest challenge possible", and make sure that at both these points (and inbetween) there's something unique to aim for.
The point of the current setup is that if you want to engage with raids in a more laid-back fashion, you can aim to get the Bronze reward. If you want more of a challenge, you can aim to get the Silver reward. If you want a big challenge, you can aim to get the Gold reward. And if you're the kind of player who seeks the very rarest of challenges that few people would succeed at, the Platinum reward exists as the grandest of prizes. This way, no matter your preference, there is always some reward that you can aim to receive.
In no way do we require or expect everyone to receive the Platinum reward or run through the raids hundreds of times. It simply exists as an optional, additional reward.
There's also a ton more you can play raids for than just these rewards! You can farm for rare relics that will make you stronger across the whole game, you can get a bunch of XP while not at level cap, and item drops are more common across the board so they're a good source of loot as well.
The bottom line is, I'd suggest not viewing the Seasonal Rewards as a single, necessary step to complete in order to enjoy raids. Rather, pick out which challenge level you personally think feels fun to aim towards, and play with that in mind!
Our intent behind the Seasonal rewards is to provide a range of different rewards, with their requirements going from "I sometimes play raids casually" to "I want the absolutely greatest challenge possible", and make sure that at both these points (and inbetween) there's something unique to aim for.
The point of the current setup is that if you want to engage with raids in a more laid-back fashion, you can aim to get the Bronze reward. If you want more of a challenge, you can aim to get the Silver reward. If you want a big challenge, you can aim to get the Gold reward. And if you're the kind of player who seeks the very rarest of challenges that few people would succeed at, the Platinum reward exists as the grandest of prizes. This way, no matter your preference, there is always some reward that you can aim to receive.
In no way do we require or expect everyone to receive the Platinum reward or run through the raids hundreds of times. It simply exists as an optional, additional reward.
There's also a ton more you can play raids for than just these rewards! You can farm for rare relics that will make you stronger across the whole game, you can get a bunch of XP while not at level cap, and item drops are more common across the board so they're a good source of loot as well.
The bottom line is, I'd suggest not viewing the Seasonal Rewards as a single, necessary step to complete in order to enjoy raids. Rather, pick out which challenge level you personally think feels fun to aim towards, and play with that in mind!
It seems to me that this is one of those cases where there is a mismatch between what players want from a game and what developers want in the game.
Players want new content which is fun, challenging and rewarding and which allows them to move quickly on to the next new content.
Developers want to add new content that players will find fun,challenging and rewarding and that will keep players occupied while they develop the next new content.
I am not talking about this game in particular here. The same issue applies to pretty much every game out there. The problem is what players want and what developers need from new contnet are mutually incompatible.
Sadly, all too often the solution adopted to attempt to square the circle is to make the challenge equate to time spent.
Just for the record, time consuming is not challenging, it's just time consuming (and it's not fun).
Players want new content which is fun, challenging and rewarding and which allows them to move quickly on to the next new content.
Developers want to add new content that players will find fun,challenging and rewarding and that will keep players occupied while they develop the next new content.
I am not talking about this game in particular here. The same issue applies to pretty much every game out there. The problem is what players want and what developers need from new contnet are mutually incompatible.
Sadly, all too often the solution adopted to attempt to square the circle is to make the challenge equate to time spent.
Just for the record, time consuming is not challenging, it's just time consuming (and it's not fun).
Jytal
Servant of Mallok
Platform
iOS
How can bronze be considered a laid-back fashion when it requires a minimum of 50 raids, just under what it took to reach platinum in season 1. Has season 1 been considered not hard enough or too easy to reach because many people would disagree with that. Season 1 platinum was a challenge and the with the new setup it is not creating a big challenge, it is just extending the grind.
The reality is, challenge is being confused with grind. The challenge of higher level raids should come from new mechanics or objectives but that stops early into the raid levels and all that comes after that is stat inflation. Stat inflation is not a challenge and is part of the grind instead. Looking back at the new setup, there is simply grind and more grind.
This is just unrealistic, no one expects everyone to receive platinum reward. Not everyone could even get bronze in season 1, roughly only 1% achieved platinum in season 1 and only a sliver of a fraction went beyond that. It is hard to imagine more people raiding than before when they could spend time in zones for bounties or event zones to earn more rewards, faster, and with less resources.
Lalocat
Adventurer
Characters
Lalocat Vla Laniss
Platform
Android, PC
I completely agree with these sentiments! That's also something I often see people talk about during event zones - event rewards are in no way challenging, they are simply time consuming. But that's not an inherently bad thing - it simply exists as an additional layer on top of the game to give you something to gradually work towards. Whether it's "fun" or not entirely depends on whether you find the core gameplay fun for extended periods of time, and that'll completely vary from person to person. Some people love to just run event zone content for the entirety of the event and there are rewards to acknowledge that particular preference. Others run events for a few days and then move onto other things (or other games for a while) and that's completely fine too! The point is that there's many different things to strive for, for different people - not everyone necessarily needs to have the same goals.
Now as far as challenging vs. time consuming goes, for the raids, this is different. Yes, you do have to run the raids many times so there is an element of time consumption to it - but there's also an element of actual challenge, since higher challenge levels directly makes combat more difficult and requires a greater degree of strategy and game knowledge to complete.
At the end of the day, the main purpose of these sort of rewards - "run raids 50 times to get a custom icon" and so on - isn't to be something that you have to try to get no matter what. We want raids themselves to be interesting to play, and the rewards be a smaller set of acknowledgements rather than an end-all goal. If the raids aren't fun to play for anyone, that's a concern, but not one tied to seasonal rewards. If they are fun to play for a while but you then want to move onto other things, well that's not necessarily a bad thing since how much repetition you like is very subjective.
This is why we've added a lot of rewards besides these cosmetic seasonal rewards. You now get a lot more XP for completing raids, you get in-raid item drops, you get the Relics that boost your character throughout the whole game - we've introduced this whole patchwork of raid rewards, and these 10/20/35/50 rewards are only a small part of it meant for a particular sort of playstyle. Even if you just want to run raids 10 times throughout the whole season, you'll get a lot more rewards than you did in Season 1.
(my emphasis)
The problem is that both event zones and raid seasons are time limited, so instead of "gradually working towards" a target, players have a choice - try to reach the desired goal, in which case you are forced into constant mind numbing grind day after day for the duration of the event or raid season, or accept from day one it's not for you and skip the event or raid season completely,
Having long term targets that players can gradually work towards makes perfect sense. Having short term targets and saying they can be achieved gradually doesn't.
Halleebell
Squirrel
Characters
Hallee/Freyra
Platform
iOS, PC
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I don’t mind a challenge I even enjoy a challenge. But there is no way in h*** I’d ever come close to completing 250 raids in a 3 month period(if that’s how long a season stays). Not only that I can only see a very very small number of players who Would each that amount. I’d probably be lucky to even get to bronze tier.sense I don’t know what the rewards are I can’t say if the amount of resources needed would be worth it. Anything dropped like loot will most likely be null and void for 90+ players. And how much currency are we talking about per raid? And does currency stay after the season is over? Cause that’s the only way I can actually see currency being relevant to the casual player. I like most of the changes but I honestly feel the amount of raids needed to reach a tier Is unrealistic for most if not almost all of your player base and I’m not saying drop it to what it was before. I just think the number is too high. But when every slot of the pyramid is filled that’s a lot of work in such a short amount of time cause if I remember the picture correctly we still have a slot to fill? I could be wrong. Just my opinion though.
Also I’m seeing a flash back to the dungeon arguments again.
Also I’m seeing a flash back to the dungeon arguments again.
ripcord
Wizard
Characters
ripcord
Platform
iOS
Ivan, can you clarify that relics make you more powerful across the whole game? My understanding was that relics only affected stats within raids.
I also disagree with the large number required. I would think that you would leave at least Bronze and Silver where they were, so that anyone could have a hope of getting some reward to say "yes I participated in raids."
Also, if this season is anything like the previous season then Ice Wizards can forget about getting the platinum reward. I'm no slouch (9.0/7.2) and reached Platinum tier last season. I had to ask for runs through Palace as it was (I could manage to solo the other raids) and on US2 there were 2 warriors who really were willing to run me a few times. I can't even fathom asking my experienced warrior friends to carry me through 40-50 raids (and I assume Palace is returning).
Perhaps it would be better if you only had to reach a tier on 4/5 of the raids for rewards? This way someone could drop a raid they can't solo because of class.
That is correct - as of Season 2, Relics give you bonuses and abilities that apply to the entire game. Some are simple stat boosts whereas others are entirely new, unique abilities (as you can see a preview of here) that you can use anywhere in the game.
Because of this, running raids - even if just a few - is far more rewarding in general than in the last season! Yes, this does mean that if you don't want to run raids you are missing out on unique combat bonuses, but that's no different than not wanting to partake in say, crafting. Raids are one aspect of the game as much as any other, and come with its own unique benefits! If you do run raids, you'll start to build up a reliquary of bonuses that you'll find very useful in the rest of the game as well!
Sumi
Arch Wizard
Characters
Sumia, Sumie, Sumii, Sumio, Sumiu
Platform
iOS, PC
Hello! I have a quick question, similar to what ripcord talked about above. How will this new system of raids be suited for each class? I main a wizard (hybrid, on rebirth back to lvl80) and am very worried about this raid season.
Also, this upcoming season will take so much time and time and time to get a bare minimum bronze or silver reward. Last season I managed to solo woods up to 15, rook to 10, and palace to 1, when I was in the lvl60s and got help to get the gold reward. Fortunately I'm in school and will be for 4.5 more years, at least. Unfortunately, the new raids means that I can give up on my dream of getting the platinum reward this season a symbol of my progress on allll my toons, and instead will have to settle for the bronze reward. I loved raids so much- they were so much fun! But now? I'm very worried that I'll have to make a choice between real life and raids, and I'll have to choose the real life meaning all that prepping with resources, gear, planning with guild, will all go to waste because I can't play all day like many other players.
Also, this upcoming season will take so much time and time and time to get a bare minimum bronze or silver reward. Last season I managed to solo woods up to 15, rook to 10, and palace to 1, when I was in the lvl60s and got help to get the gold reward. Fortunately I'm in school and will be for 4.5 more years, at least. Unfortunately, the new raids means that I can give up on my dream of getting the platinum reward this season a symbol of my progress on allll my toons, and instead will have to settle for the bronze reward. I loved raids so much- they were so much fun! But now? I'm very worried that I'll have to make a choice between real life and raids, and I'll have to choose the real life meaning all that prepping with resources, gear, planning with guild, will all go to waste because I can't play all day like many other players.
Argus
Servant of Mallok
Characters
Argus Jessengith, Argus Shadow, Argus Skyhawk
Platform
Android, PC
The relics will give new combat bonus true but if i remember correctly it was mentioned on livestream that it will reset when season ends. In that case i am going to spend almost all my time to grind and progress the level just to get relic bonus which will be reset again after season ends. There should be some permanent stat bonus because i am not seeing myself grind to get those relics only to get it reset again and back to square one.
Please correct me if i am mistaken on the relic part.
Please correct me if i am mistaken on the relic part.
Lyrra
Huntress
Characters
Lyrra, Lythe, Livelie, Chicken Little, xFURIx
Platform
iOS, Android
So they know these raids will be a grind... realize people do not like to grind... but think that, in this case, grind is good, because it gives something for people to work for...
Excuse me?
Grind is NEVER, ever good.
Puzzles are good.
Challenges are good.
Teamwork to figure things out is good.
You know... something a little more creative than having us do the same thing over and over and over again.
Do you realize that nearly everything after Level 80 is a grind?
And in every case, there is a reward at the end of the grind. It doesn't make anyone any happier. Believe me... I've heard the grousing... from folks who love the game... and I am one of those.
I love and support this game, but I have to ask... where's the creativity to keep people engaged?
Seriously!
What are we? Mice in a maze? At first it is challenging and fun, but then we learn the maze and must do it over and over and over again... ad infinitum... just to get fed.
That's what I think of when I read about these raids... lab mice.
Sorry... not excited... at. all.
Excuse me?
Grind is NEVER, ever good.
Puzzles are good.
Challenges are good.
Teamwork to figure things out is good.
You know... something a little more creative than having us do the same thing over and over and over again.
Do you realize that nearly everything after Level 80 is a grind?
And in every case, there is a reward at the end of the grind. It doesn't make anyone any happier. Believe me... I've heard the grousing... from folks who love the game... and I am one of those.
I love and support this game, but I have to ask... where's the creativity to keep people engaged?
Seriously!
What are we? Mice in a maze? At first it is challenging and fun, but then we learn the maze and must do it over and over and over again... ad infinitum... just to get fed.
That's what I think of when I read about these raids... lab mice.
Sorry... not excited... at. all.
Lyrra
Huntress
Characters
Lyrra, Lythe, Livelie, Chicken Little, xFURIx
Platform
iOS, Android
I completely agree. I find that, lately, I have no time to play the game! You absolutely do have to make a choice. Events and raids should be in addition to the game, not replacements for it. But in the last few months, the game has gotten very little attention from me. No time for game, EZ, and raids, Very little time for game even with just EZ. I got my golden name plate for raids and all the nice mounts etc for the last two events... but 95 elders was about all I could manage regularly. Leveling my alt has been spotty at best. These new raids are not calling my name however, so maybe I can get more done on the game itself.
Lyrra
Huntress
Characters
Lyrra, Lythe, Livelie, Chicken Little, xFURIx
Platform
iOS, Android
Jytal
Servant of Mallok
Platform
iOS
In season 1, 3 new mechanics were added between raid level 1 to raid level 99 the rest of it was stat inflation. Are you saying that there are new mechanics added every 5 or so raid levels now which creates an actual challenge or were the 3 mechanics moved accordingly along the raid levels due to increasing the raid tier levels in which case no new challenges were created, just moved and added stats.
Comparing exp to season 1 should not be done, a handful of bounties was well over more gold and exp than you would get from raiding the whole season. Relics are temporary boosts that from the livestream were not that strong, referencing the Relic of Mallok website to show the best rewards when reality would be much weaker for most players. By raiding "even if just a few times" would mean the low levels of mainly Rookery, maybe Woods and Palace in which case based on the livestream, there were only inferior and uncommon loots. Doing one bounty run in one zone will be far more rewarding.
I understand that this is something to gradually work towards, but this was already accomplished with raid tiers being 5/10/15/20. That would be 100 raids which would be gradually worked towards still and the 10/20/35/50 change is only making that more raids in less time.
I had suggested this earlier and I'll quote it for reference, we are still challenged at 5/10/15/20 which is what we all want, there's still effort put into raiding and strategy, and with the added bit in the end, still rewarding raids beyond seasonal tier rewards without excessive grinding. Is there any reason why this or anything similar would not be considered?
Halleebell
Squirrel
Characters
Hallee/Freyra
Platform
iOS, PC
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You can’t really say “gradually” for this. If I want the platinum rewards there’s nothing gradual about grinding 250 raids in one season(possibly 3 months) Especially if most things(I still don’t know if currency is staying after the season ends) let’s say it doesn’t and it disappears with the raids. Then I can’t even gradually work towards one of the mounts/toys I want to buy at a vendor with doing raids each season. So even if I wanted to gradually Make it to gold tier I truly can’t just like I can’t gradually make it to platinum. You either bust your butt to get what you want that season or you miss out on the reward you want. There really isn’t an in between.
Ildranach
Squirrel
Platform
Android, PC
Let me preface this by saying that I really do appreciate all the hard work that the Otters do with regards to making the game fun and interesting. I appreciate you engaging with us and also the testers in the effort to make content that's good for everyone.
However... this raid update misses the mark. Or, in particular, the decision to move the tiers to higher numbers.
In my opinion, there's a balance of fun vs grind vs reward in games.
Fun can be had by interesting mechanics, challenge, teamplay, any number of things that a player might enjoy in a certain piece of content.
Grind reduces that fun by requiring the player to repeat it for progress, meaning the interesting mechanics become rote and said content becomes boring/chore-like over time. Or, the content is too challenging and players are forced to repeat previous levels in order to progress, discouraging players from further engaging with said content.
Reward counteracts grind by encouraging the player to push through when the player isn't experiencing as much fun as previously, or to encourage them to pick up the piece of content in the first place, despite the challenge.
In my view, the problem with raids in this season is that there is too much grind compared to the amount of fun or rewards offered for the average player, and you may see much less player engagement than you would expect for a major patch like this one.
There are a lot more players who run the event zones than raids because there is pick-up-group teamplay, you aren't restricted to certain team setups or group numbers, and the rewards are much more granular than those of raids' tiered rewards. You can pick it up one day, drop it the next, go for the little toys or the big mounts. There is something for everyone, and a lot of opportunities to make new friends, build community, etc.
You don't need a whole lot of resources to run event zones, and the zones themselves often help to provide the resources for those who do need it.
Raids, in comparison, are a resource sink. You're locked into certain group comps, certain group numbers, and are forced to do things a certain way or risk failing/running out of time. There's plenty of challenge (perhaps too much at certain levels for certain classes) and the rewards reset each season except for the tiered cosmetic ones and whatever drops happen.
In season 1, the players who were able to get ahead were largely disincentivized from helping their less experienced counterparts, as they were not able to get much progress (if any at all) by helping their friends run lower tiers. This segregates the playerbase in a way that event zones and dungeons did not. Raising the number required for each tier is only going to exacerbate that division and fragment the community between the platinum chasers and the barely bronze.
Let's do some napkin math here.
5 raids x 50 successful completions = 250 raids run, at bare minimum.
Let's say you fail one raid for every one you complete (or have to re-run a previous raid for dungeoneering levels).
This is quite likely at higher challenge levels, so let's double that number to 500 raids. (Still a conservative estimate, since previous seasons saw players repeat certain levels much more than twice... it's more like 4/5 times later on, if not higher.)
500 raids x 30 minutes per raid (accounting for party-making, resource collecting etc) = 15000 minutes, or 750 hours.
That works out to about 8 hours a day in a 90 day season: equivalent to a full time job.
Assuming you are some sort of genius hardcore gamer and somehow don't fail anything at all, it'd still be 4h per day, which is quite frankly a ridiculous amount of time for people who have IRL obligations.
Bronze tier only? About 150 hours, or about 2 hours a day.
Casual raiders won't even be able to touch tier 1 in a 3 month season. Not even tier 1.
If the barrier is that high, it discourages people from even trying. I know I'll probably be sticking to the villaging side this patch.
It is not fair to compare the rewards to season 1 since season 1 was technically a beta and rewards were flattened for that reason.
However... this raid update misses the mark. Or, in particular, the decision to move the tiers to higher numbers.
In my opinion, there's a balance of fun vs grind vs reward in games.
Fun can be had by interesting mechanics, challenge, teamplay, any number of things that a player might enjoy in a certain piece of content.
Grind reduces that fun by requiring the player to repeat it for progress, meaning the interesting mechanics become rote and said content becomes boring/chore-like over time. Or, the content is too challenging and players are forced to repeat previous levels in order to progress, discouraging players from further engaging with said content.
Reward counteracts grind by encouraging the player to push through when the player isn't experiencing as much fun as previously, or to encourage them to pick up the piece of content in the first place, despite the challenge.
In my view, the problem with raids in this season is that there is too much grind compared to the amount of fun or rewards offered for the average player, and you may see much less player engagement than you would expect for a major patch like this one.
A lot of players run the event zone for rewards. Is it challenging? No. It is fairly rote once you have run them a couple of times. Is it fun? Arguably the fun comes from the rewards you can get, which are a lot more permanent/impactful than, say, relics that reset each season.
There are a lot more players who run the event zones than raids because there is pick-up-group teamplay, you aren't restricted to certain team setups or group numbers, and the rewards are much more granular than those of raids' tiered rewards. You can pick it up one day, drop it the next, go for the little toys or the big mounts. There is something for everyone, and a lot of opportunities to make new friends, build community, etc.
You don't need a whole lot of resources to run event zones, and the zones themselves often help to provide the resources for those who do need it.
Raids, in comparison, are a resource sink. You're locked into certain group comps, certain group numbers, and are forced to do things a certain way or risk failing/running out of time. There's plenty of challenge (perhaps too much at certain levels for certain classes) and the rewards reset each season except for the tiered cosmetic ones and whatever drops happen.
In season 1, the players who were able to get ahead were largely disincentivized from helping their less experienced counterparts, as they were not able to get much progress (if any at all) by helping their friends run lower tiers. This segregates the playerbase in a way that event zones and dungeons did not. Raising the number required for each tier is only going to exacerbate that division and fragment the community between the platinum chasers and the barely bronze.
A flat increase in the amount of time needed to get to each tier of reward does not 'challenge' make. It just increases the grind. The challenge is not in the content, but the will to slog through. If this season is anything like the previous season, the challenge increases sharply at certain challenge levels, but otherwise it is a flat slope that goes up through stat inflation in both player and raid. It only requires greater degrees of strategy as far as new mechanics are introduced; rest of it is just grinding and hoping you don't get hit with an unfavorable affix.
I'd actually go as far as to say that it is not a matter of trying or not trying.
Let's do some napkin math here.
5 raids x 50 successful completions = 250 raids run, at bare minimum.
Let's say you fail one raid for every one you complete (or have to re-run a previous raid for dungeoneering levels).
This is quite likely at higher challenge levels, so let's double that number to 500 raids. (Still a conservative estimate, since previous seasons saw players repeat certain levels much more than twice... it's more like 4/5 times later on, if not higher.)
500 raids x 30 minutes per raid (accounting for party-making, resource collecting etc) = 15000 minutes, or 750 hours.
That works out to about 8 hours a day in a 90 day season: equivalent to a full time job.
Assuming you are some sort of genius hardcore gamer and somehow don't fail anything at all, it'd still be 4h per day, which is quite frankly a ridiculous amount of time for people who have IRL obligations.
Bronze tier only? About 150 hours, or about 2 hours a day.
Casual raiders won't even be able to touch tier 1 in a 3 month season. Not even tier 1.
If the barrier is that high, it discourages people from even trying. I know I'll probably be sticking to the villaging side this patch.
Relics reset each season as you've mentioned previously. I won't comment on item drops/gold/xp since I don't know how that scales yet and if it is a viable alternative to leveling via bounties, but from the previous posts on this thread it is looking like a straight port from bounties. Which... why not just do bounties? Those don't kick you out of the map on a timer.
It is not fair to compare the rewards to season 1 since season 1 was technically a beta and rewards were flattened for that reason.