Food Gripes

So, in my other thread about Accuracy, I mentioned my dislike for being asked to eat the same foods we were using back during Treasures of Aht Urhgan. Do we seriously have no new (viable!) food in, what, 8+ years?

Not only do we have 100-110 crafting tier now (we didn't back then), but we also have cooking ingredients from high-level areas, and for the example I will be using, I will talk about Warthog Meat.

Warthog Meat, as you should know, only drops off of one enemy in the entire game (according to wiki). I'm inclined to believe this, because it specifically says that it is Raaz meat, and those Raaz are the only ones in the entire game that is not part of special battle content (which normally doesn't drop normal items).

To GET Warthog Meat, you need to fight a Cicatricose Raaz. The one-and-only place those spawn is in Kamihr Drifts. To get there, you MUST have Watercrafting and Climbing. To get those, you had to have done some questing in Foret de Hennetiel and Marjami Ravine.

To put it succinctly, you need to do Level 105-110 content to get this stuff.

So, this must be used in some awesome food, right!? Well, let's look at the stats:

HP +10% (Max. 50)
Attack +10% (Max 20)
Ranged Attack +10% (Max 40)
HP Recovered While Healing +5

So, this is a meat dish. It has Attack+, Ranged Attack+, and.... HP While Healing (dunno why we're actually adding that stuff to items -- nobody rests to heal these days because it is just too slow, even in Signet areas with Signet). As far as the Max HP, 50 HP isn't even one incoming attack from your average mob, and this is obviously not for tanks (because a tank would want VIT+, Defense+, etc).

So, the "Meat" of the Dish (lol, forgive me for the pun) is in the Attack and Ranged Attack. And of course, it's a Stewpot, so it's AoE (which can be undesirable).

To make this Food, you need Level 92+ Cooking to make them reliably AND the Stewpot Mastery Key Item.

Now, let's compare that to a couple other foods:

Meat Mithkabob: Attack +22% (Max 60), Strength+5, Agility+1 Intelligence -2

This food gives you three times as much attack. You can buy them off of the Curio Vendor Moogle if you have the proper Rhapsody for 1,200gil, or you can make them yourself with Cockatrice Meat and some other ingredients, AND you only need Level 30 Cooking (and no Key Item) to make them.

But, hey, what about the Ranged Attack? Well, look at this:

Boiled Cockatrice
Strength +5
Agility +2
Attack +22% (Max. 60)
Ranged Attack +22% (Max. 60)
Resist Petrify

That's a Lv72 Recipe, and it requires a Coral Fungus (which is not hard to get at all, using your Mog Garden). Vastly Superior Food in every way.

There is also Sis Kebabi (+70 Attack and Ranged Attack) which is buyable for 2,000 gil in Al-Zahbi.

So, these other foods are so, so much easier to get and have better effects, why should a player care about higher-level ingredients, and harder-to-make food, then?

This just doesn't seem balanced, when we're still eating low-level foods and the higher level ones are so lack-luster in comparison.