The only way to combat gear inflation is with lateral progression. The simplest way to do this is to implement new statistics related to a specific content release that is needed for that release and possibly future releases, but has no effect really on past releases. Essentially your character does t really become much more powerful relative to old content, but you are actually able to do the new content. Ideally, underused old world locations would be updated with content releases to include new drops with stats for new content. Keep you pushing that button since none of it actually matters anyway :3
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