Bye bye Materia in dungeons and hello to farm crystals.

[Darki]

Exactly. I'm just now on the cusp of finishing Animus and this only tells me materia prices are going to be even more ridiculous.

It also ruins any chances of successfully SB'ing AND gathering tomes outside of hunts. You can either SB in a starter dungeon, and get squat for tomes, or the opposite. Since most of us aren't going to craft ilvl70 stuff to SB in on a regular basis, this leaves about 10% of the playerbase still able to utilize the old method.

I think there is a misunderstanding. What SE did was make it so if you want to SB at the pre-update speed, you need to pick a duty that matches the level of the stuff you want to SB. If you have a ring that is say...level 49, A duty like Castrum Maridian would be a good choice. What the update did is discourage someone with low level or stats irrelevant gear from using them in high level duties.