I tried posting this on other areas and mostly met with negative feedback from a vocal minority, so I thought to bring it here and hope developers see it.
Bottom line upfront, there is too much of a disparity between ultimate weapons in terms of time to make them and power received.
Over the course of my FF11 career, I have made 3 mythics, 2 empyreans, 2 ergons, and 3 aeonics. I wanted to start with that as a way of saying, I have done the processes and am not just whining.
I really feel like some of the multi-month grinds to make endgame weapons are a bit too much at 15 years into a game. I know they have become easier with time, but some of them are still sooooo time consuming. Not only that, but some of the longer quests create inferior weapons to those that can be done in a week. The reward to time ratio for them just isn’t right.
Additionally, many of these ultimate weapons are needed or at least highly desired to clear endgame (here defined as T3-T4 Reisen, Ambu VD vol1, and Omen). Which means that, if a new player wants to play one of the jobs that needs the weapons, and do endgame content, they can expect a many month delay before they can start content. Weapons I consider in this category are Idris, Relic and Empyrean bard instruments, Aegis for Pld (though I will admit, it is the fastest REM to make to a useful level).
Assumptions I make: On my server, Asura, farming alexandrite in salvage 2 is the most efficient way to make money for new players. I average 85 alex per run and a run takes 20 min. I time it to get 3 runs in an hour every morning. If there is a better way to make money for the average player, please share as this is the limiting step for time for my math/argument. This also means veterans with leveled crafting who make millions in a day are not the people I am aiming this at.
VD Intense Ambu can be more lucrative if 1. It is beatable. 2. It isn’t congested because it is beatable. You need circa 3 VD intense ambu per hour to beat alexandrite farming. I would argue the people that can do more than that per hour are already well geared and thus not a good comparison for new players making their first legendary weapon. The average new player will not clear VD intense ambu 3+ times per hour. Additionally, when VD Intense ambu is beatable, the waits are often 20-30 minutes, making it not profitable.