All this talk and debate for the last several months throughout the community over the flea market has missed one major detail: Even if the flea market is entirely removed, once you hit lvl 40, you can just straight up buy some of the best gear in the game. MP7's, M4's, HK's, Vector's, VAL's, every attachment you could ever need, M61, M995, M855a1, BS, 7.62 BP, SPP, 7n31, FMJ sx, etc.
This hasn't changed since before the flea market was even added to the game in November 2018.
Let me reiterate since you can soak this up: The true economic balance that determines the gear creep in Tarkov has never changed.
Removing the flea market does not fix this issue. Its completely overlooking the fact that after a Couple months, a majority of the player base will be lvl 40 again, and we will be right back where we started as every wipe previously. The only difference is how long it takes for gear creep to take place.
What if that powerful gear had to be found in raid? You couldn't buy it off the flea, you couldn't buy it from traders, you couldn't craft it. You quite literally needed to farm it in raid. You wouldn't be able to just buy that same level of high tier gear after you die, you'd have to farm it. High tier ammo, armor, and weapons wouldn't be able to be sold on the Flea or bought from traders.
The most common retort to anything that restricts the flea market is, "what about the lower level players that need access to that gear to compete?"
You don't need access to that gear at the beginning of a wipe to stay competitive do you? Having killa armor and an Altyn at the beginning of a wipe has a LOT more effectiveness in the first week of wipe than a few months after, doesn't it? that's because its rare and very expensive. You don't run into players with great gear very often. If all players regardless of level had to obtain weapons and ammo 2 months into wipe in the same way as they did in the first week, it might change the gear creep and longevity of the wipe, won't it?
I understand a change like this would require a lot of time to implement with changes to the games loot pools to avoid abusing boss and raider loot, but I think this would be the single biggest change to the way this game is played that we've ever seen, and bring it a lot closer to the vision of what this game is supposed to be.
