I remember a lot of trolling in 1.0 Rokien but i'll put that aside.

(I should state now that these are my views and I do not expect anyone to agree with them nor anything to be done about them. I am purely saying how I feel about the game. These are not to enrage people or to have people throw them in my face. )

I agree with you on nearly every point. To me, even when it was a pile of turds, 1.x had a lot more potential than 2.x. I feel like there hasn't really been any new content added since 2.0 and that it is mainly the same content with a different skin. Which when you think about the complaints for 1.0 where it was "everything is looks the same" it is kinda funny.

The sense of community that was around in 1.0 is almost completely gone and I don't think it will ever come back. You can now do all the content without any grouping as such. Before 2.0 if you wanted to kill HNMs you needed to get a group together (lets ignore the THM sololing everything :P) and go out and do the content. So it became a community game. ARR is a solo MMO now.

I wish it would come back but that is not the game XIV is anymore. But the game is successful so this is the path it is going to keep. I am happy for SE that they have a game that is selling and doing well for them now but I will always remember 1.x as XIV and hope that another game comes out in that style!