I've only been playing since Feb 3 so my opinions do not reflect anything prior to patch 1.15a, or the original dev team.

1. The economy and market wards- FFXIV has the most amazing and fun economies of any game I have played to date. There have been days where I had planned to work on ranking up my pugilist but I never made it out of the market wards. I consider myself a crafter/ gatherer at heart, but the past month I have enjoyed the profitable role of trader more than anything else. I have no experience playing the market before the addition of a search feature, but I can only imagine the horrors and time wasted. System as it stands functions beautifully and warrents no major changes other than addressing underused LL and Grid wards.

2. The synthesis and gathering mini-games- FFXIV absolutely has the best crafting and gathering of any game on the market. Only system coming remotely close is from Vanguard, which was excellant as well. People have been making comments that without a netflix subscription, they wouldn't be able to work up their DoH skills. I definately agree the fun mini-game becomes monotonous after things slow down and the grinding begins. Once I realized mashing standard synthesis overcomes most of the obstacles the mini-game throws at you- grinding while watching a few movies didn't seem like such a bad idea. More challenge, and rewarding intelligent decisions are the key as opposed to making the process easier or faster.

3. The fatigue system- I watched the FFXIVTactics video explaing the system at least 4 times before I went out and bought the game. I knew what to expect. When I experienced its impact for the first time while playing my gimpy gladiator I hung up my weathered gladius and purchased a mining pick to go see what was inside those shiny red lights I kept stumbling across. After that I bought a cross-pein hammer and made some nuggets to repair my gear. I like this system as it encourages diversification which fuels the market. A month later now that I have found which classes I enjoy the most, reaching the first few levels of fatigue doesn't bother me in the least as I continue to do battle leves for guild marks or grind parties with LS mates. Players with tunnel-vision may not like it, but they would be wise to branch out and enjoy the ride.

4. The repair system- This system is great!

5. Frequent communication from the dev team- I was very impressed last month with the Letters from the Producer, as well as the Ask the Devs articles. When the forums were announced my immediate concern was that the quality of those front page articles would take a step down since they would be comfortably nustled inside the forums. If they remain greatly informative while becoming less flashy no harm done I suppose.

6. The player polls- I actually read in one thread that someone was complaining about SE wasting time with player polls. I missed out on the first poll, but was quite impressed with the second one and eagerly awaited its results. I would like to see more frequent polls.

...I too have run out after 6... I do however disagree with this point specifically from Origamikitsune:
I think there needs to be greater penalty to wearing cross-class and lower rank gear, but I like being able to wear what I want when I want!
I think there should be less of a penalty for wearing cross-class gear and a greater penalty for wearing higher rank gear.

Also, somewhat on topic- I don't want to see hordes of those RMT bots hasty handing fish into shards surrounding the aquarium in LL all day every day; as well as the fishing bots with no bait/lure equipped so all they attract is crayfish sitting at the fishing hole south of Nophica's Wells. Any changes to curb botting activity would be welcome and if it negatively impacted my experience I wouldn't mind since it would hinder RMT.