Anima Weapons. Putting things into perspective.

[Berethos]

This would be correct, if the new steps would be also a big grind. But it is a baby grind, not big enough to replace the ilevel 210 grind.
So the ilevel 210 grind still exist to make it not to easy to get a ilevel 230 weapon. It also reward those who don't wait first for a nerf before beginning the relic quest.

The new step doesn't need to be a big grind, the whole process just needs to be somewhat comparable in terms of effort to the alternatives of the same ilevel. It's certainly closer to the 230 alternative, so any adjustments do not need to be severe (more tweaks of the level of removing the specialist requirement), but I don't think leaving it as it is now is the answer either.