But please leave out the money part because you are comparing apple and orange.
How do you quantify quality?
Also:
I believe quality of diving is what most divers after.
How many divers would prefer to dive Shark Point over Richelieu Rock?
You pose an interesting question, especially if not considering costs. Even then, however, I can see plenty of reasons for preferring Shark Point over RR...time and distance being two of them. RR has to be done from Khow Lak if a day trip or otherwise as a liveaboard, which is usually a 5-7 day commitment of time. Shark Point can be done from Phuket, where most visitors are likely already staying. Even if the diver was in Khow Lak, I believe the day boat to RR takes over 2 hours (or 1 hour by speedboat). The comfortable "slow boats" from Chalong to Shark Point take about an hour. If the vis is good, Shark Point and nearby Anemone Reef are beautiful dive sites, covered in hard and soft corals and huge sponges, with a lot of marine life. While not as dramatic as RR...a large pinnacle in the open ocean, it's nothing to sneeze at. I've dived RR a few times from liveaboards and sure it's great site but the PITA factor to doing a liveaboard is high. Also, my back doesn't fancy a one hour speedboat trip to and back for 2 dives at RR in a day. As for seeing pelagic at RR...it's the same as anywhere...maybe you will and maybe you won't...I never did. But I have seen them recently at Racha Noi...and one was spotted in Bay 1, a shallow "easy" divesite at Racha Yai yesterday (Harambe Wreck)
So what is quality will be defined differently by each diver taking into account their prefered type of driving (shore, boat, liveaboard), interests (macro, open water,photography, drift, muck, etc., time available for diving, etc. Everyone has their own metrics and how to weigh the options. At this point in my diving, I like shore and day boat diving, with the sites around Phuket being just fine in terms of accessibility and comfort. Later this year, I hope to make my way down to Ko Lanta for Hin Daeng/Muang and Ko Haa and then after that go further south to Ko Lipe. When international travel opens up again, my first foreign trip will be to Banda Aceh and the island of Pulau Weh in Indonesia. I'm sure I'll find plenty of quality diving in all these places.