In all honesty, why need they be connected though? I can think of no reason that CoP in any way should actually be a requirement, I know that it is and I know its important to do, I fully agree, but if someone wants to complete this content without doing the majority of CoP first, why should we be against that? To me, it seems like a random and pointless requirement in my opinion, just like the VW requirement for unlocking Empyrean WSs was a random needless requirement they just threw at us out of no where.