This is another big issue. The Green Crowies are essentially worthless. They can be used to buy materia but there are FAR more efficient ways to get them. You can trade excess materials for 3 of them but this obviously requires you to do nothing but gather gather gather for hours on end. As someone who has I can tell you the game doesn't care if you're getting only 3 crowies per material because it only ever gives you 1 or 2 depending on what tools and node you're gathering.
Time-gating and intentionally slow progression really bring this entire thing down...