Magnificent anecdote, chum.

Impart it to us once more.

Wait...dash and shield bash aren't noteworthy?

you mean you don't use dash at all? you really mean that you don't see dash being used? dash influenced the dodging aspect of the game. practically everyone adapted their playstyle to that.

bash, yeah, that's minor. still useful but the drawbacks makes it not worth it.

Skepticraven: "Can you explain why non-permanent events are a bad thing?......Did you not play events? Did you not enjoy events?"

Non permanent events are bad because for the ridiculously short time that they were out it, gave us players something else to do other than mindlessly run FSC 352 times a day or play the most rage-inducing, most unbalanced PvP game ever created. It actually brought some variety to the game other than spamming Voltedge and Blitz Needle charges at less than 5 different enemies. Or in LD, getting destroyed by people who play with less than 5 ms ping, have triple max UVs, use Auto Target and Acheron and on top of that watch them laugh at you and call you a noob and that you suck while at the same time displaying atrocious typing skills, no matter how basic.

Before I go off on a rant on LD, I enjoyed the events when they were out, but it ticks me off that they don't stick around. Reason why is mentioned above.

As for the reskinned armor/accessories, I'm not sure what percentage is "new" but I'll list what I know off the top of my head, we've had:

Hunter prize boxes (Puke-colored shades of green and yellow generic accessories and costumes resembling most basic armors and helms)
Surge prize boxes ( Same as hunter but the colors didn't make me gag as much)
Dangerous prize boxes (some new looking stuff and a Grey Owlite Shield re-model, meh)
Gourmet Prize boxes (Battle Sprite food and remodeled versions of the two slowest weapons in the game that deal pitiful damage, Sudaruska and Triglav, big deal)
Elite trinket boxes (Why? When we can just craft them with the thousands of Krogmo coins a lot of us have collecting dust)
Solstice prize boxes (These actually contained something decent for once but still...)
Rose Regalia boxes (Yay the same costume only recolored once again for like what, the 4th time?)
Year of the Horse boxes ( Ew, no... just... no)
Ancient prize boxes (Same generic accessories and costumes with moss and flowers on them, whatever)
Equinox boxes with a 1:2364584795664209 chance of getting something original AKA the Celestial Shield.

There's most likely more than that. That dates back to the release of Compound 42 or somewhere around there. The only permanent content we have gotten since then was compounds (which suck), battle sprites (more of a player buff than actual levels and missions besides the ones introducing them)
Shield dash and bash (another player buff) and the gorgos that appear in existing levels anyways. The only temporary events I will excuse are the Dark Harvest and Winterfest as they're both associated with Halloween and Christmas respectively.

@Skepticraven
Compare these to the updates made in the game's first year, and the degrees of impact either made.
In fact, I made a thread regarding them at the time.
Any changes brought on during the following years simply haven't reached the same scope/aid/usefulness/etc as most of the updates made back then - those that do have become few and far between, losing the frequency of strong updates as well.

(If one wishes to be further specific and only include '2011' updates, you can cut it off after the Drones patch. As it is, both the implementation of the mission system and Crimson Hammer were and remain controversial, easily taken either way, so it doesn't particularly matter where these would be included.)

I feel the Dash and Bash techniques would've left a better impression if they game had enemies intelligent enough to let these abilities truly shine. As it stands they merely add another layer to a thick hammer that we use to smash them into the ground with.

As for permanent content (not necessarily listed in chronological order), there's been the Ironclaw Munitions Factory and the Roarmulus Twins, Quicksilver gear has been converted to a token reward and given a progression to 5*, Pulsars and Catalyzers were added alongside those, Blackened Crest being converted to a token reward making Crest of Almire accessible to your average player, the introduction of Piercing Swords in the form of the Flourish-line, Gloaming Wildwoods and the Snarbolax and with it the Barbarous Thorn Blade/Shield and Dark Briar Barrage bomb, Candlestick Keep and with it the haunting Grimalkin, Scarlet Fortress expansion (Grim Gallery), the introduction of Polyps and Howlitzers, the Shadow Lairs and their six armour sets (Snarbolax, Ice Queen, Heavenly Iron, Mercurial Demo, Arcane Salamander & Almirian Crusader), the all-powerful Brandish-line expansion (Glacius & Combuster), Operation Crimson Hammer DLC and with it the Mask of Seerus helm, Rocket Hammer and Dark Retribution bomb and the Darkmane Stalkers and Mortafires, the introduction of Wisps and Shankles, the introduction of Gremlin Knockers, Shard Bomb rework and expansion (Crystal, Deadly Shard, Dark Matter & Splinter), the addition of the Coliseum (Blast Network & Lockdown) and its four weapon-line expansions (Plague Needle, Electron Vortex, Stagger Storm & Voltedge) and trinket expansion (Quick Draw/Strike, Slash, Trueshot, Boom, Sword/Handgun/Bomb Focus and later Heart Pendants), the Guild Hall expansion, the Missions system and with it the Lost Souls and Battlepods, three Danger Missions and with them the introduction of Bombies and Almirian Crusaders, Compound levels and with them the Dust Bunnies, Glop Drops and Scarabs, the addition of Gorgos and finally Battle Sprites. The rest are recycling events.

Summing it all up there's been a total of:
- seven Boss-areas, four of which are reworks in the form of the Shadow Lairs
- three Clockworks levels
- thirteen Monsters, three of which cannot be found in the Arcade
- eight Helmets
- seven Armour
- one Shield
- three unique* lines of Swords for a total of eight types
- three unqiue* lines of Bombs and one** expansion for a total of six types
- two unique* lines of Handguns and one expansion for a total of five types
- nine types of craftable trinkets
- one Arcade-killer
- one Guild Hall expansion
- three Danger Missions
- three Battle Sprites
... over the course of three years in 21 patches. The rest are locked behind purchasable packs~ and recycling event-content. Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong and/or missed anything.

As far as permanently accessible content goes, I would've liked to have seen a few more actual Clockworks level-types, maybe create a whole new area (á la Scarlet Fortress, Aurora Isles).

*determined by swings/bullets and charge attacks
** technically two, but I count the Shard Bombs rework/expansion as creating a new equipment-line / I also do not count Scintillating SS/Shocking SB as part of the type tally
~ although OCH would initially count for this, it is now possible to obtain OCH through in-game means, even if it still is an indirect purchase

Double standards. TF2 providing updates (weapon balances or even remotely new content) about once a month, whilst selling keys to boxes containing cosmetics (not to mention providing event boxes too (halloween boxes, iron boxes blah blah blah)), and Valve gets praised. SK does about the same and get complained?

But TF2, while purely multiplayer, is not an MMO with everything locked behind devs decision, like Spiral Knights. Pull enough shenanigans (which Valve call mods) and you can have different enough experience (like Saxton Hale mode or TF2x10 or even just fresh new maps) that can drive you away from thoughts "wow, game stands still and there only hats". Even through last events in TF2 were only hats.

I was thinking about writing this thread a week ago. I decided not to, because it'd been said so many times before. Then someone else goes and does it anyway.
OP, Read.

Cosmetics in SK are very one-dimensional in that they exist for the sole purpose of pushing money about; apart from earning crowns then there is usually no connection to the gameplay at all, except for a handful of event related items (Hallow, Frosty, etc). This is in stark contrast to TF2 where a lot of the cosmetics are integrated as part of the drop and craft system - wearing a hat in SK is effectively destroying it, it can not be recycled or recreated.

One size does not fit all. If cosmetics are a big part of the game experience to you, then having new fake gear to collect every 2 weeks is something to look forward to.
But if they are not, then the new fakes every 2 weeks adds very little to your game. Hence the core issue of this discussion - the disconnect between the gameplay process and non-gameplay items. Perhaps the non-gameplay items are meant to fill the gaps between gameplay vacuums, certainly they are a lot quicker and easier to implement as they have no abilities to think up and can be delivered via boxes, but it would seem some people are getting frustrated that fakes don't give them anything new to do in the mean time.

I wouldn't expect anything to change, at a guess selling expensive fake gear is probably far more lucrative than selling cheap real gear.. and cheap fake gear would probably sell even less - its fake after all.