Any chance on classic XI-style "pull camps?"

[Yves]

That said. I was disappointed when they were repositioned and nothing was left to take their place but undisguised grinding.

Final Fantasy games are known for their amazing storytelling.

Don't take this the wrong way because I'm not doing it to be a jerk, but FF games, all FF games are known for a handful of things and at the top of the list are

1. Gripping storyline
2. Amazing musical scores
3. ...tedious hours upon hours of grinding levels in the same areas over and over and over...

Go all the way back to the Hall of Giants in FF on NES for the proof of number 3. Look at the tower in FF3/6. Look at grinding away in VII to beat Emerald Weapon. Or even obtaining the god weapons in X. There has always been a grind to the FF story. The grind is actually one of the bases of the RPG genre. In 1992 the big thing was how many hours you could get out of a game. Sure, Battletoads and TMNT were fun for the whole three hours that they lasted but that was why it was a rental. People rented action games but bought RPGs because you could plan on sinking a few weeks or months into them.

If leveling via killing mobs wasn't the main driver behind an RPG's length then we would have even more people with all R50 jobs sitting around with nothing to do. Battle has to be a major time sink and it also has to engaging. Again, I don't see why there can't be both roaming and pull camps but my two cents says its just plain better to have some form of strategy and skill when building parties and killing mobs. I keep referencing XI merit parties because those were a very nice hybrid of both systems and would fit incredibly well with the XIV system.

Somebody even supported this in trying to make a counterpoint that you had to wait around for pullers before starting a party. That's really not true considering you could go out with a garbage puller at the expense of exp - you just had to wait for a puller who was good if you wanted great exp. Hell, even unconventional pullers could support good exp (I have Dia pulled on WHM far too many times just to keep a party rolling!)

And the last reason that I really support either pull camps or hybrid camps is because the community needs it. Not many people talk while fighting which really drains the social aspect of this game.

I'm not saying that the game needs to be centered on battle (we really do need more content like quests and side-story) but it is a huuuuuge chunk of any RPG. In fact, if you look at it, I would wager more than 70% of any RPG (MMO included) is spent in battle (excluding the time you sit around staring at your moghouse wall on LVL45 DRK or MNK seeking and crying.)

Like I said, I'm not trying to be a jerk by expanding on your quote in favor of the opposition - it just fit nicely with the point.