I'd love to see the numbers they compared it to on Aetolia/Achaea/Imperian when they said it takes as much to make a character there. Keep in mind weaponry isn't even required on most other IRE's now, as they separated it to guild skills only to LOWER the cost.

Some things to consider:

1. Combat, while creating a new and fun dimension for systems and combat, is a trans skill effectiveness ratio thingamajig. Compared to 100% effective weaponparry 56 lessons into Weaponry... You need stance + parry and their effectiveness is dex/skill, yes?

2. Planar, while neat, doesn't exactly scream "optional" to the majority of players. Praying off-prime, where piles of good exp and a lot of conflict takes place? Not really an option if you value your sanity. Teleport, tesseract, even the ability to survive on the Planes requires you to invest in an extra skill.

3. Resilience versus Evasion, which is about as close as you can get for "comparison" since it theoretically mitigates X damage. Usually when you die to physical damage on another IRE, people's first question isn't "Trans evasion?" and here what is it? "Trans resilience or magic? Gtfo if not." Etc.

4. High/low magic, green/gedulah are necessary, period.

5. Tats replaced by enchanting, pretty much same deal though. Someone else has a trans skill everyone benefits from if they have the "inks".