Is it worth my time to return?

[Khajit]

The people claiming you HAVE to pay to exp from 30-99 are idiots too stupid to simply shout and make thier own exp pt. The real problem with 30-99 exp is that most of the people left aren't very good at their jobs so one competent person can solo exp for you faster than an entire alliance nowadays from what i see.

[Mirage]

It's really not that hard to level up from scratch to 75 without using abyssea. I did it recently, in fact.

[Khajit]

You can also skillup your weapon to cap while afk/asleep on fortilaces in Castle Z in the past. Just bring a dmg1 weapon and engage.. preferably while not wearing any +str or +dex gear. that gets you to around where the lv 75 capped skill was.

[Saefinn]

It's still a good game, it's a lot differet now, but still a lot of fun. Much of the content can be solo'd now, but there's still plenty of reasons to group up and you'll be doing it a lot no doubt. There's good linkshells out there and groups of some pretty decent people to play with. I would say having a linkshell is pretty important, because this game isn't as half as fun if you're not enjoying it with other people and making some kind of social connection.

Now, as for levelling to 99, it's actually a lot quicker than it used to be. I think there's certains pros and cons, the pro is that it's quick then con is that I think it's boring. The only way got boring when it got too repetitive, but my ideal situation would have been a massive EXP boost, but that's me. You DON'T need a level 30 to 99 leech party, I don't know if it depends on your server, but generally there are 'book burn' parties going on, where generally you turn up, if there's a group with a space, you get an invite. Book burns are pretty much "the more ther merrier", so no more setting up 6-man parties with 3 DD, 1 DD/Support, 1 healer and 1 tank or some variation of that set up, you can have a full 18-man alliance. The reason this is, your bonuses are based on repeating pages and not on your exp per kill, so the quicker the enemies die, the quicker the exp.

Since returning myself, I've only been at 2 of the book burn/GoV areas and found I've been getting invites: Gusgen Mines (15+) and Bostineu Obilette (60+...I think). With Bostineux Obilette the enemies give exp to even level 99s and I see people party there instead of Abyssea. But once you do hit 75 and 220+ skill in your weapon/magic and you'll get invites to Abyssea and you will burn through your levels fairly quickly.

If you want to leech in between levels 30 and 75 (or 99) in Abyssea then you've got 3 choices. Start your own Abyssea party and lead. Pay somebody to let you leech, usually these are Fell Cleave/FC parties, which are pretty much designed for charging leeches. Or become a Keywhore, you'll need Cruor (Abyssea currency, easy to come by) and spend in on keys to open chests, which help with gaining experience points for Abyssea parties. Most parties will have at least one key whore so the fighters are focusing on fighting instead of opening boxes themselves.

As for endgame content, which the game is pretty much about now you've got plenty of different endgame zones, the only ones are still relevent and some have even had changes to make them up-to-date. There's of course newer endgame content to check out, like Abyssea, which is pretty interesting and a bit different - or at least by the fact you get to use atmas to boost your own stats and become pretty powerful. Cruor farming in Abyssea isn't a bad way to make money either (get lots of cruor, exchange for stacks of Chocobo Blinkers from NPC and then trade to another NPC for gil).

Sounds like a lot, I'd say it might feel very alien once you reach a certain point in the game, which could make or break it for you. I guess it depends how much you were set in the game in pre-Abyssea times. I think SE's made some good decisions in the updates, but also some bad ones, some folk will have you believe that it's mostly the latter, but it's all very subjective anyway.

[Ritsuka]

You should prob wait if you don't want to buy exp now from RMT party. Not alot of exp party going on and when the new disc base expansion comes out there be alot of people leveling again.

[Mirage]

There's plenty of ways to obtain experience points without having to resort to RMT parties. Come on.