I get what you're saying.
Even with the duel arena gone, players are pretty much left with 2 options:
1. Stake their death fees, or ~210k with a Ring of Death (forgoing RDT) to fight a boss you already know, and hope you don't mess up, for the
chance
to earn an amount comparable to what you could have bought from working that hour instead...
-OR-
2. Do something safe, like frost dragons, crystal warriors, or capsarii, and be guaranteed to make roughly 1 bond every 5-8 gameplay hours($1.00-1.60).
Of course, to do the first option, you need to learn that boss to begin with, which, let's be honest, is going to probably cost you at least
$16
before you start to consistently make money. Potentially much more, if you are wearing T92 gear and forget to swap back to your ring of death.
And let's not forget, the cost of upgrading from T90 to T92+ gear to begin with is a pipe dream without bonds. The things you can kill with lower-end gear would take over 1k hours of safe grinding to afford it, and said grinding doesn't produce enough money to maintain it.
So, what else to do but buy more bonds?
Go play the critically acclaimed MMO, (redacted), where your time is valued, and you can spend 30 hours to make near-BIS equipment for any class.
...But I digress. I'll also be gone after my Premier Club membership ends. Between the price hike, the lack of Platinum tokens(or equivalent) making many items unbuyable at the GE, thus vulnerable to the sort of price fixing that would get you a prison sentence if you tried it with real commodities in my country, and the recent
defiling
"improvements"
to Treasure Hunter, I could do better.
Can you guess where I'm going?
I hope the same people at support who I used to email my suggestions to, that used to care, see this and better understand the state of the game. But with my luck...