Quote Originally Posted by sharknado View Post
For one you have very old content while all new games like Lost Ark, Elder Ring do not have legacy content so players get straight into current new content. Both cases aren't always good or bad. New World is fresh yet it failed to retain players. WoW lost large amount of playerbase yet alongside with FF14 and other long lasting MMOs is still here and in constant development. Old content will always degrade to some extent. WoW just gives a level boost with each expansion and ignores anything prior to current patch exists. FF wants the story to not be skipped and to be continuous. If someone doesn't want to play a game that focuses on telling story then FF14 will never please them realistically and the game should not try to cater to them in some weird way.

If someone wants challenge early on then there are EX ARR trials or Aurum Vale with random sprouts. If that's not enough then nothing in this game will be enough and they just should play more competitive game vs more story/RPG type game.
Challenge should not be something to endgame players, that doesn't make sense, specially because we have the Level Sync feature that was created to balance the game, including the old contents. They could just ajust the level sync for trials like Ifrit, Garuda, Thordan, Shiva. Oh, do you remember when was the last time you heard the full soundtrack of Shiva? Right now, new players have to listen to the music on Youtube, because her second phase ends in less than 1 minute.