One thing I'd like to people to respond to is this:

the main staple people plug for grind parties is "better world immersion/exploration and stronger sense of community" but there are literally HUNDREDS of other ways a game can accomplish this and be ten times more entertaining than killing the same monster 100,000 times.

On top of that we can explore the world while being part of the game's story without grind parties. Plenty of other MMOs have you doing limitless exploring while taking you along a fun storyline.