Im not sure if Pagos' set up is due to issues that Anemos had, or if they didnt think things through. For example, an issue I saw in Anemos was Low level drag behind. You couldnt participate in the train essentially until you were at least 5. This meant a ton of grinding, most likely by yourself, because no one was gonna run with you. You could tag along in the train anyways, but fact was youd be more likely to die than have much luck.

The second issue is people standing around waiting for NMs to spawn. They spawned frequently enough, sure, but ultimately you had 20 people or so actually killing stuff while the rest of the train afked till the monster showed up. Also, I do wonder if it was an intended design for the train to exist anyways, or if the devs had envisioned multiple small groups doing it and spawning bosses of their own accord.

Because of the aforementioned issues, I feel like Pagos is the actual INTENDED version of Eureka. What the devs actually wanted. An island mass with monsters you just grind, ala old MMO style like RO or MS or similar ones.

I think the big trouble however, is it doesnt feel like youre making progress. The exp grind is brutal in teh sense that it takes a lot of time/effort to kill regular mobs. They hurt, and the have huge HP pools, but they arent difficult or interesting. Its like beating away at brick walls, one at a time. The interesting monsters are the NMs, but theyre not spawning (as the OP points out). I think the Devs realized this issue and subsidized it with the challenge log rather than increase the spawn rate to make sure its not "train moving from place to place." It shifts emphasis to groups just grinding mobs for ridiculous periods of time. Now your exp is from the challenge log, not from NMs, making the train less a thing.

As the OP points out, it just feels...unrewarding. I cant even zone out to the grind cause of the damage monsters do. I wouldnt notice the slow exp rate if the place was more interesting. Perhaps were doing it wrong. Maybe we're missing something, like the bunnies spawn NMs faster (god that awful lvl 20 fate in early area is teh worst NM thing ever. It is so god awful, and it gives 0 exp...FFS, no one no one does it.) I dunno, but this Pagos feels...off.

the only advantage compared to teh old lines was I can now grind any class on my DRK, and dont have to start from scratch.