You do realise if you don't raid it can take over two weeks of farming for enough shards / energy for one piece of gear? I don't think what they did this time round was that bad, as you state the only broken part is with regards to raid validity. I don't think vendor gear level will stop this - if the current method of lvl increase is followed the prev two raids (CE & VoG) will be irrelevant anyhows as all higher lvl gear will only be attainable from the current raid - creating the same problem you are blaming vendor gear for. As I said, it needs to be raid gear that is addressed.