A good part of the reason I don't play frequently more than I do is because I'm not interested in spending a huge amount of time (like 50 hours) searching for wands with every character. There are a lot of fun video games that don't require that kind of tedium.

I think this is the reality of online multiplayer gaming these days, and CF needs to adapt or just accept that gamers have matured (and new gamers are coming in with a different mindset) and almost nobody finds it fun to hunt and hunt for things anymore. Every game that has items in locations, has a host of sites dedicated to people sharing that information, because 99% of people just don't enjoy searching for very much.

Also, because CF has permanent character death, there needs to be a minimum of tedious tasks repeated every character. MMORGS get away with an awful lot of boring grinding, because people can do it once and then put it behind them. CF has way less grinding, but what there is has to be repeated for every character.

Skill practice is quite an old horse, but it is an area where a (relatively small) amount of tedium is pretty necesary for many classes. but I think it would be to swap the use-based improvement system to a purely level-based system. e.g. you gain an int/wis-based increase in skill % every level. Imm rewards would still have an effect, as would quests. Frankly, the only thing the use-based system does is reward people who are willing to do a bunch of tedium. I suppose it also benefits the few rare people who know where the holes in the system are so they can max their skills easily even on low-int races.

Level-grinding is mostly okay, though I don't think experience-loss (via mob or WANTED) adds anything to the game. There are other ways to penalize these things without resorting to increasing tedium.