The instant SE decided to make a farmable source for 210 gear, but crafting was stuck at 185 spiritbond gear only, they declared pretty darn loudly that crafting is irrelevant to them.

Crafting, at a minimum, should be green 190s, with materia slots. Alexander Normal can get you a complete set of gear in a day now if you put together a group to farm it. It's a non-issue to get 190s, other then needing to find people to farm with you. It's a minor issue to get 210s, because there's a lot of RNG there, but it's still not difficult.

I stopped believing the story about balancing raids a long time ago. I stopped believing the story about materia changes because tanks had to spend too much gil when I started thinking about it. Both have just enough truth to pass the first glance, but neither makes sense unless you also consider crafting to be not worth consideration. As for the "raid gear is special" ... 1 day to get full 190s. 1 day.