To be fair, though, those realms were frontier realms when they were created or settled. I know there has been a large break since then... but still. I was in D'Hara for a huge chunk of its existence, since its founding, and it was a frontier realm for almost all of that time, until the west just got completely blocked out, I'd say. Even when the west was wholly colonized and the rogues were no more of a concern, there was still the Zuma to come and stomp us, or at the very least threaten us, every now and then.
Candiels was the site of numerous battles. It took a fairly long time for Madina to first colonize it, and then maintain it. And when the rogues were no longer a concern... Aurvandil. The time Candiels was part of Madina accounts for a minority of its history, I would reckon.
Astrum played a huge role in the initial colonization attempts, it's fought its share of rogues.
I would say that PvE is very much part of those realms' DNA. Though the problem with turnover is that probably very few of those players were even there for any of it. I know when I recreated my account, I looked at the nobles of D'Hara, and barely recognized the place. These realms were created specifically to be border realms, and their unique geography should make this fairly apparent, but unfortunately perhaps most of their nobles had nothing to do with any of that.
