There's definitely a lot of historical stuff going on here.


With Iconics around U18/U19, they couldn't reincarnate (especially True Reincarnate into a new race). They meant they were just left out of the loop. We fixed that with Update 20, adding Iconic True Reincarnation. This was something we didn't want to wait on, while also not wanting Iconics to reincarnate at level 20. Getting every class past life by only playing 15-20 is not a design that seemed good for DDO - just consider current discussions of "fair" vs. new and old players.
Since we were doing a fairly big overhaul to Reincarnation generally (including Lesser and Heroic, new UI, Kruz's retirement, etc.), it made sense for us to get Epic Reincarnation in at the same time. This saved us a lot of time and probably greatly reduced bugs. (Reincarnation is a bug-prone system, and the bugs are often serious business!)
In a lot of ways, it could have made sense to wait for level 30 for Epic Reincarnation. We decided it was OK to let players get a shorter/discounted loop for a while until we got to level 30. This was a strategic decision at the time of Update 20.
Introducing Epic Reincarnation sooner rather than later also meant that playing in epic levels could be more rewarding, including for players who liked playing through the reincarnation loop. Some felt that Epic was not "for them", since that progress was wasted and they might as well just stay in Heroic.
Level 30 got pushed later than the original plan, so it's been longer since U20 & Reincarnation revamp than expect (aka: not a "short period with a Reincarnation discount", but two years instead). Some of that was because we wanted to make sure we got additional higher level content out ahead raising the cap, instead of having a sparse end game. Now there's things like Temple of Elemental Evil, epic Necropolis, and this year's quests filling in levels 29 and 30 (plus some older raids), before we raise the cap. (We feel we didn't do this as well as we could have when we raised the cap to level 28, for instance. Lesson learned!)


With infinite time and resources we might have done things differently. The two year gap between Epic Reincarnation and Level 30 wasn't a goal, but at the same time DDO is probably better than if Epic Reincarnation had been delayed for another two years.

(As far as not doing an "Actual Reincarnation", we know some players had done so much Heroic Reincarnation already they were "done" with Heroics. We didn't want to punish them by forcing them back to level 1 even though they had all Heroic past lives already. Even for completely new players, it means you can pick and choose and spend time differently, rather than being forced to do the entire 1-Cap at once each time without as much variance. Designing reincarnation as two separate loops, for Epic and Heroic: No regrets.)

It makes for interesting fiction or justification after the fact.
If they had not introduced ETR, the game would be dead.
People would race to 28 and have nothing to do - no sense of progress.
We could all play TOEE for 999th time trying to finish that crafted not-so-uber weapon.

ETR bought them time to design end game.

I find it amusing that Sev thinks they have enough end game content now.
How many level 30 raids do they have?  How many quests do they have 28-30 to provide XP for the next of ETR's?

Nothing like talking with your head up your posterior.

Level cap raises always come with a lack of content in the new level range.

you must be new to this game...

I accept that will be a deficit in the short term, but they have had 2 years to work on end game, and the quality of end game is to be honest, crap.

By making incentives redundant, no-one seems to run MoD any more, and the Shavarath raid is still populated but people still grumble about lag mitigation.  What else is level 30 material? TOEE?  Gives level 26 loot after a stupid amount of grind.

I know they will bring Epic Vale and GS2 with level 30, but given the track record over past two years, who thinks they can actually deliver something good?  Their loot design is a joke, unplanned and incohesive.

They think they're ready for lvl 30, but I disagree.

you must be new to this game...

We both know that is wishful thinking. They 're gonna fuck up the loot table, level and design AGAIN. If they make GS 2.0 available in the early epic levels then all the previous loot would become next to useless (some packs like storm horn had almost garbage loot anyway). If they make GS 2.0 for level 28 to 30 then the grind to get them is simply stupid.

They will probably fuck up with something in between.

Regarding the exp for reincarnation, well.....that is another problem. Bear with me:

A toon first reaching level 20 with elite streak available can easily get to 28 with current content. The issue starts when ETRing and having to grind 8 epic levels again without first time completion bonus and streak. That is a massive PITA.

They are simply forcing us to run the usual exp train 3or 4 more times.

Why the fuck do we even need level 30 honestly? To get a new feat and run EE level 32 quests that we already solo at level 28?

I find it amusing that Sev thinks they have enough end game content now.
How many level 30 raids do they have?  How many quests do they have 28-30 to provide XP for the next of ETR's?