Quote Originally Posted by kyuven View Post
How it's designed and how players end up using it are usually two completely different things. XIV:ARR's development team clearly realizes this. No game wants a repeat of the manastone debacle.
Uh huh... you never played FFXI did you? Most of the higher level gear had unique effects, and we rarely ever had problems with one person needing a specific equip. The reason why is pretty simple, it's because there was plenty of other OPTIONS available which were just as good.

Right now we have literally the most boring and uninteresting gear known to any MMO in the history of MMOs. Every single piece is identical, and there's virtually no benefit to having coil gear over Aug. Ironworks, for example. As long as the Ilvl matches, so do the main stats and the secondaries have about as much impact as a baby's kick.

In FFXI we had the following:
Gear which enhanced particular weapon skills.
Gear which enhanced cure potency
Gear which could give you an advantage over a certain type of monster
Gear which could refresh your mana
Gear which could regen your health

In FFXIV we have:
Gear

It's about as generic as it gets, and it gets boring quickly. Moreso because it removes the FUN out of upgrading. You won't notice any real difference between your level 120 and your level 130 aside from a little extra HP, unless you parse it.

Maybe you like every piece to be the same boring repeat of everything we've already had, but some of us like flavours besides vanilla.