Maybe the athletics nerf to WPF of archers IS the right answer, but you should really let people respec if that's the course you want to take. And if you have any other major gameplay changes to skills/attributes, make them at that time as well.
Moving riding of horses to higher requirements was the right answer, so was removing the lance angle...but to not let people get a free respec who were long time players, who never wanted to retire again (level 32 and above who were stuck with their riding requirement and a loomed horse), was a real dick in the mouth.
Also massively nerfing equipment should automatically allow anyone with looms in that equipment to get them back...I didn't have it, but black armor was one of the heavier armors for the longest time and then in a ninja patch it's relegated to medium/heavy armor...
I'm not against making the game better and trying out what the dev's believe to be the right course to take c-rpg, but don't alienate your player base at the same time. Most of the whine about the patch would have been avoided if you let high level players have a free respec (or all players).
Hell making massive changes and then resetting c-rpg would be fine with me, but probably not a lot of the loom/level grinders.
