Malevolent
While Destiny 1 had some game mechanics that were not particularly popular such as the switch to an endless gear grind for light level, there is one area that the game knocked it out of the park. Halloween (festival of souls) exclusive masks. The event included common “paper masks” which were easy to obtain and were recycled each year. In addition, each year there was an exclusive legendary mask which had a particle effect and was rare compared to the paper masks. These exclusive masks were fun to try to obtain and collect as each yearly Halloween event came around.
In my opinion, we could draw a fair comparison in the Realm with the jack o lantern masks (grumpy, etc) and the purple drop masks (orc and mino). If on an annual basis, the jack o lantern masks were recycled, but one or two new purple masks were implemented and exclusive to that year only, this would create a fun new collectible to grind or trade for. For example, 2019 Halloween could contain all the previous jack o lantern masks and a new purple fenris or banshee mask, but no orc or mino. I believe the system would be better suited to Realm as trading is a function (which wasn’t on Destiny 1), so previous year masks could still be obtained through trading with players.
As the game stands, exclusive event items already exist (2018 jack o lanterns, 2019 NYE flowers, etc), but I believe this would be a good area to create interesting cosmetic exclusives. Any thoughts?