Your post left a sour taste in my mouth.

A full chest of iron? No I don't think this was ever considered. Backup gear, easy access portals to the area you are in (as well as possibly the ability to repair in that area) I totally agree with, but farming out a full chest of metals ESPECIALLY black metal is overkill (although play long enough and the box will fill up eventually). I've got probably 10 portals and five or more stacks of all the metals but I also have a "get back quick" box with spare gear of CURRENT mistlands gear, meads, food, spinesnap, 100 frost and 100 needle arrows. Deathsquitos taught me this stuff was needed as corpse runs naked became totally unrealistic if not impossible at that point (shoulda done it earlier, 2 star drauger archers were pretty bad as well). I think one spare set of gear on hand at any given point is more than enough to reobtain your tombstone/gear.

I think maybe YOU are missing the point of gaming in general. There is no one way to play. Some people rush to the next stage and yes, they will struggle. Some even enjoy the struggle and living on the edge, I have a rl friend who rushes and enjoys blocking/parry mechanics vs targets he would have a much easier time sneaking up on or kiting to death with a bow (which is what I do). The edge of death, the fact that one false step can cost you, that's part of the thrill. Some people overestimate their "skill", if you can call it that, and then get sore when they die (usually to worldsave lag for my friend because he ignored the 30 second warning).

The only thing I agree with in your post is that there are a lot of complaints, but not all games will cater to all player appetites. I tried playing a public server and found the other players speed running the content and killing bosses as fast as they could then other players getting frustrated when world difficulty ramped up and made building nearly impossible. Everyone is different so throwing people into the game expecting them all to have the same strategy and game experience is massively short sighted.

All things said, I am probably finished with mistlands till ashlands releases as all I have left is the queen and maybe skill ups for elemental magics. I might give her a try or two but last time I waited to kill yagluth until mistlands released so I could keep horde raids around and I very much profited from that choice when seeker raids wiped some friends meadows bases out totally and mine was unaffected.

TLDR : Bad post. I had fun in mistlands on my own, with my own playstyle but not everyone will and that's to be expected.