The token system is the only thing that keeps people playing TBH. The pull of the first game was buying the same gun over and over in hopes to get that god roll. Now that guns are set in stone in their perks, if you could buy everything as you wanted, even casuals will run out of things to do. Maybe they should have kept random rolls? They should have made more weapons that's for sure. Once you have Better Devils and Nameless Midnight, you basically are set for kinetic weapons. There isn't much better in those slots besides MIDA.
I think its more of the lack of gear diversity than anything else. I mean once Prestige Raid comes out, how much less content is there to do for hardcore players than D1? Unless I'm missing something, its about the same at this point in the game's life. D1 had Raid Hard Mode and Nightfall. D2 will have Raid Prestige, Nightfall Prestige, and Trials of the Nine. Essentially one more piece of content since Trials came out half way through D1's lifespan. Maybe a lot of hardcore came in half way through when there were more raids to do and Prison of Elders. I dunno.
Bungie hurt themselves with PvP as well. 4v4 should have been reserved for Trails, and they could have made it a regular playlist mode, but when you raid with 6 people, and then can only PvP with 4 of them, it ends up being pretty bad when you have to leave 2 people out. I enjoyed PvP when it was 6v6. Now running around hoping to flank someone for an easy win or hoping I don't get flanked for an guaranteed death isn't as enjoyable.
I think the game could fix a lot by bringing out 6v6 maps for PvP, having the Raid and Trails drop 300 gear, and giving Xur better stuff. Xur seems utterly pointless. His currency is super easy to obtain and he doesn't have anything special you can't get farming Public Events. They also cap at 270 regardless of your power level. That also goes back to the gear they launched the game with. Grenade launchers are shit, but we get 2 exotic ones, and no exotic sword or linear fusion rifle? I'm glad to see some old favorites return as weapons and armor, but they should have been extra on top of new ones that took their spot. I also find a lot of the exotic perks to be underwhelming.