I'd like to discuss why the same treatment of Abyssea VNMs should be applied to those in regular zones, as well.
With the latest crafting changes, this content is more relevant than it has been in years. Yet it remains exceptionally counter-intuitive. As irritating and time-consuming as the Abyssea VNM system was, this one is actually far worse. While home points and survival guides have helped with navigation, we still have massive maps to traverse. Unlike Abyssea, we cannot use a flux to teleport to specific locations in order to find our NMs.
Then, when they are found, we need to rely on luck for upgrades. While writing this, I am currently 0/24 on clear abyssite NMs for an upgrade on this specific run. Another issue arises once the T3 is finally attained. Unlike Abyssea T3s, the item drop is not guaranteed, which can lead to a large amount of frustration and wasted time (currently 5/14 in the past 3 days, 10/26 in the past week for befouled silver).
Once you've killed the T3, the process begins again. However, depending on your previous luck with upgrades, there is a very real chance that the T2 NMs have still not respawned due to their 1 hour cooldown.
With the massive amount of materials necessary to attempt to HQ the hexed gear, you can see how this punishing system is hurting players. We desperately need some quality of life changes to this content.
Either increased chance or guaranteed upgrades would be wonderful. Perhaps lowering the respawn rate on T2s and especially T3s. Maybe add a chance for T3 pops to not be consumed upon use, allowing us to effectively gather materials. Or, if nothing else, allow the crafting materials to be a guaranteed drop. Any of these changes would do wonders to improve the enjoyment of this content and stimulate the crafting economy, particularly on lower populated servers.
Any suggestions or feedback are much appreciated. Hopefully SE will consider this to be an important matter to address.