IMO - If this game is to stay relevant - the gameplay needs a massive overhaul

[Alahra]

I wouldn't be playing the game if the combat was more like an action game. Honestly, I wish the game's combat were *less* "actiony" and more like it was in FFXI.

But to each, their own.

There is no such thing as BiS items in games with horizontal progression, new competitive items are constantly being added to the game and drop rates are very generous allowing players to gear up in a timely manner (just look at the history of FFXI for proof of these).

None of this was true for FFXI. Best-in-slot items certainly existed--every physical DPS class had a "best" set for TP, each WS had a "best" set for maximum damage, and so on. Gear added was also frequently worthless compared to pre-existing items that were extremely good. And FFXI's drop rates were hardly "generous" in any respect. Just as one example, the best Hands piece for MNK and SAM at 75 cap had about a 5 percent drop rate on a monster that spawned about every 2 hours. Drop rates in general were so unforgiving that players started latching on to items that mentioned "lucky" in their tooltips out of the wishful thinking that they perhaps affected drop rates.

That being said, I do want more horizontal progression, but don't argue for it via falsehoods.