Hilarious things you've found in RAW?

[Tzardok]

WDYM?

The equation for magic items squares the value. A square is a literal exponent.

Exponential means that the variable is in the exponent. For the equation to count as exponential, it would have to be 2^x, not x².

Edit: To give an example why exponential growth is bad (at least in this context), let's look at a table:

x	x2	2x
1	1	2
2	4	4
3	9	8
4	16	16
5	25	32
6	36	64
7	49	128
8	64	256
9	81	512
10	100	1024

Sooner, rather than later, an exponential function will overtake anything else.