Shadowbringers you'll largely just be in Norvrandt. There's a free way to get there from Mor Dhona, but I'm not sure if/how you can get back without teleporting as the travel to get to there is one-way.
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You can get back to Hydaelyn inside the Crystal tower in the Crystarium in Norvrandt.
It's actually not that bad, when you do have to leave Norvrant, the story mostly will take you to Revenant's Toll, and with the Crystarium being considered, for teleportation purposes, the same place as The Crystal Tower, teleports between the two should be very cheap, possibly only 100 gil, which is actually much cheaper than it is right now.
I think that's plot unlocked, though? I feel like we were "stuck" on Norvrant (teleportation not withstanding) until the Exarch figured out how to help us travel back. Though you are right, I forgot you can go to the Exarch's chamber to travel back to Mor Dhona
Nah, we were fine to come and go because we were summoned correctly. It was the other Scions who were summoned to the First who couldn't leave. The Exarch didn't have the spell completely figured out for them, which led to some unforeseen consequences. They were his guinea pigs, more or less, though largely out of desperation on his part. He needed help asap.
Then you aren't reading the right guides. Retainers are great for making gil if you level and gear them up. That is a non combat and non crafting equivalent. I'm no hardcore crafter or raider, but I've got more gil than I currently know what to do with. There is no need to punish crafters for their leves.
It's unfortunate that you had to take up the role of being the voice of reason and most importantly, facts but thank you for doing it anyways. As I've said in-game regarding this topic, not only you make more money naturally the teleport fees themselves by the time you reach these areas but there's also the local costs that drastically lower if you teleport in-region.
I feel like those complaint threads are people who immediately thought of going from Limsa to overstate regions 10 times in a row and they're afraid of the hole the costs are gonna burn in their wallet.
In terms of raw-gil creation, treasure maps are a combat equivalent. They give hundreds of thousands of gil getting to the bottom floors. That and dutyfinder dailies are pretty effective. You get 6 leves a day which translates to about ~108k gil created so if you did all your dailies you'd make that as long as you're in-need (and about ~70k if you weren't).