Sorry. Your lack of sincerity, rubs me so much the wrong way.
First of all, i agree that the server and the server community would benefit from the right changes.
Making gear FFA, isn't one of the right changes, in my opinion. Making players feel rewarded, was one of the things, that made the game so succesful originally.
Not just succesful, but one of the most succesful game-production companies of all time and in the world (blizzard, for anyone who wouldnt know), and that company still has wow running some 14 years later.
FFA and PTW is not motivating. Just like, removing rating (one of the rewards OR the opposite) would be a catastrophe. Anything that is FFA and PTW (which blackrock is partially atm), is in my opinion, a bad idea.
I think you're right about some of it though. The meta rotation, is a decent idea, only i think it should only be certain items being added/removed and those should not be FFA. For example, next season, they could add 277 trinkets. I think it will be a human-fest, even more than it is already though.
It could also work if all meta was changed every season, but If you acquired the best gear pieces (e.g. wrathful atm) it should be converted to the best gear pieces of the new meta, exactly so that people wont have to re-farm every single season.
I'm not sure any of it is the right changes for the server though, if what we want, is more activity and engagement.
But.
I think these changes (whatever they are) should be made for the players who are invested in the game as they are the force driving the server and it's community.
Dismissing the validity of the importance of the lower rated players and their opinions is therefore wrong, as those players infact are the majority of the server.
Without them, rating inflation wouldn't be what it is, and a player like yourself could have been competing on 2000 rating instead of on 3000 rating, at the end of every season. 3k rating - Something i believe a player like you prides himself on, as progression is of importance to you. But players like you, are not representatives of the majority of the server population, which i'm sure you will agree on. Only a handful of
people compete on that level of yours, every season.
Forgive me for sounding like a hippie, but the difference YOU can make for the server, isn't by insinuating that you need change or by improving your
skills. You are already a top player, when it comes to the playing of your character, you will do fine regardless of the meta probably. The difference you can make, is by attracting more players to the community, and
help contribute to making the place, a place that appeals to people. Being called autist, virgin, dog and bad isn't very appealing to most people. Speaking on behalf of the people who wants to improve and ruling a guild like you do it, at the same time, where people are kicked for slightest mistakes in their play isn't very beneficial to the server either. Before i left your guild, i saw several people a day, getting called names, kicked and afterwards, usually some cheering and badmouthing in the guildchat.
I know that most people, (99,9% probably) will never admit or realize that they are offended or affected by these attitudes on the server. But as a student of psychology, i can ensure you, that it does affect people. - Which is why we all see them everyday on the server, calling others autists, virgins, hores and so on. So when others don't adjust their attitudes, they will, and they will adopt that very same abyssmal-loser attitude themselves, making sure that the 3 most common words of blackrock prevail (autist, virgin, dog).
You are a topplayer of the server and the guild with some of the best players of the server is yours. The names seen on the ladders are the names of the people in your guild, the streams watched are of the people in your guild (and yourself). If you want to change the server and make it better (attracting more people is one of the most important things as of now, or Blackrock dies completely) then APPEAL to people, and show them how good they can be (or make them believe it at least), be nice and helpful. Who knows, maybe at some point, only 5 out of 10 caps lock's "VIRGIN DOG" to their teammates, instead of 9 out of 10.