These most recent changes are meant to restore a modicum of strategy and challenge to the game, to shave off a tiny bit of inflation, apply a limit to how easy it is to level-up from max level to the new cap, and evaluate the general player base's preparedness for the Arcane Catacombs and the upcoming Level 86 expansion.
Potion changes are meant to restore a bit of strategy and provide a little headroom for future difficulty. I'm sure you are well aware of this already: monsters' damage abilities and decision-making speed have to account for auto-potions and potion effectiveness. Highly effective potions / auto-potion shrink the space we have to manage difficulty and yield monsters that aren't fun. They're either super tanky and not dangerous (i.e. 'boring'), or they're super tanky and able to insta-kill you (i.e. 'frustrating'). Adjusting the potions makes the game a tiny bit more interesting and gives us space for more challenging content in the Arcane Catacombs and the upcoming Level 86 campaign.
Difficulty changes to elite Zodias content were applied to make a minor adjustment to inflation and to encourage class cooperation. On the first point: we prepared another 'gold loot nerf' - but decided against releasing it because gold loot nerfs tend to be seen as unmitigated catastrophes. We decided that it would be more fun to adjust difficulty so that you could still get that gold if you had the gear, the team and the time to spend chasing after it. And on that second point: making endgame monsters more dangerous encourages groups to include Warriors. I do realize that it's not you here on the forums who exclude the ever-useful Warrior, but the general sense among more casual endgame players is that monster HP is the big focus and thus DPS and only DPS should be your party makeup. As an alternative to difficulty we considered making the portals require three players, one of each class - but this is also one of those things that (at least our forum) players tend to hate. Thus the difficulty change.
Quest XP changes were made to ensure that the race to the Level 86 cap is a tiny bit less cheesy than previous caps. It's not everything, of course but disallowing 100% XP reward from quests that are way, way below your level is going to trim off some of the cheese and add a little tiny bit of competition for those who want to collect the exclusive Level 86 'fast cap' rewards. This change also adds a lot of value (and potentially excitement) back to the "Levlar" event.
"What about new players (who farm elite endgame content)?"
I say this: if you stick with it, you will eventually max out all of your gear on every toon in every account you own. You'll have all the Arcanes you want, with all the best Awakes and Jewels, and more gold than you could ever spend on wildly overpriced vanities if you keep after it. And yeah, I realize that making any adjustments to the game will risk your disappointment and possible departure... but I assert that these changes come from a place of optimism and respect for your capabilities.
Best wishes!
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