The glaringly obvious part about this is that the game has been consistently billed as "Play as you like." We were told specifically that if we wanted to be full time gatherers or crafters, we could. And by and large the gameplay compliments this. Even to do the storylines you get a companion and non-combat options like Parley to progress through the game. It is silly to not allow dedicated crafters and gatherers options to get chocobos without having to level a fighting job. It is contradictory to the spirit of the game.

It doesn't matter if it's easy to level a combat job or not. You know what else is easy? Walking instead of using a chocobo. But everyone complained about not being able to use chocobos, so those telling crafters to STFU and level a combat job, kindly take your own advice and let people voice their understandable grievances with this oversight.