SE has been releasing bad content - VW is a prime example, and my favorite thing to hate - for quite some time now. It's all filler until SoA, so it would seem.. but what happens when the expansion drops?

My guess is SoA will be almost entirely unfinished (as is the norm with FFXI expansions) so SE can trickle the story to us every 3-6 months for several years, just to lengthen the life of that stuff.

Though, my hope is that Matsui really brings this game up to speed, listens to the players, and actually makes FFXI fun again..