I think they understand it fine but it doesn’t affect the point they are trying to make. Let me try.
Masterworking or not, there is a power level at which your current Torment feels too easy to be fun or exciting, yet the next Torment up feels too difficult in comparison to be worthwhile.
Whether we include Masterworking or not just gives one more lever you can pull alongside Glyphs, Paragon, GAs, Runes, Gems, Boss Powers, Tempers, Enchants, etc.
So let’s say both myself and MFPF are at that power level where T3 is easy and getting boring, but T4 is still a dangerous unproductive slog. We both need to get stronger, pulling on all those levers I mentioned, by doing easy T3 content.
Maybe that takes me… random guess let’s say 5 hours. I’m doing a bit of everything including Masterworking and after 5 hours I’m now strong enough to comfortably play in T4.
MFPF has the same issue, but without MW let’s grant that it’s maybe the most powerful lever at that point and say 30% or my progression came from it. So for them it will take 5/0.7 ~ 7h.
So not using MW will magnify the issue, but as someone who played normally it was something that bothered me also. So MW or not I think they have a valid point, which will bother at least some people myself included.
It’s not the worst thing ever, I just remember having a few hours or maybe sessions thinking it would be nice if I had another difficulty setting between the two I had.
I also don’t know that adding another difficulty would be better overall - as I said previously, there is satisfaction in making a big jump. There are options to smooth it out and have a challenge - trying to get the best possible Aether score in IH, doing Pit runs, running the hardest Tributes.
So I think it’s a valid point that did bother me a bit. I’m not sure I feel strongly enough that it needs a solution, and even less sure about the solution being adding another Torment level. But it’s certainly the most obvious one.
My hope is that next season’s Dungeon Escalation will add something else that we can juice to give a smoother progression. Then Dungeons (whatever that includes, presumably NMDs at least maybe more) would remain more relevant as you are getting towards the next Torment level because you can juice them to your preference.
I think that would be a better solution, and hopefully is roughly what Blizzard have in mind. We will find out on Thursday I hope?