FFXI vs FFXIV Difficulty

[Noblewar]

Leveling speed =/= "difficulty". They are separate, so the number of 50s people have is irrelevant.

Partying is a joke however. I took a bit of a break from this game when P2P started and then came back a few weeks ago to finish leveling my THM in a group. I have never been so bored leveling in an MMO in my life. I needed that break to really see how pathetic the situation has become.
Exp rate? Fantastic and even a bit too fast. Well gee whiz you might be asking, if the exp gain is almost too fast what issues could I be having with leveling in a party that's making me bored, you might ask?

Because I only have to use Thunder > Thundara and the monster is nearly dead due to pathetic HP values.
Where is my enmity management? Where's the risk reward game going on? Pull extra hate and have to deal with the consequences of possibly dying? Some tension? It can't be done when monsters lose 80% HP in two nearly instant cast spells.

I had four (FOUR) separate Gladiators during my time leveling talk in the party saying they felt like they were playing the job wrongly, badly or just felt useless coming from other MMOs. And there's nothing they could have done about that.
Use more skills? Get better gear? No, the monster dies in two spells so they can't do anything and are having no fun. The damage dealing classes are having no fun getting in one attack on the monster, and I'm having no fun pressing two buttons with no other engagement necessary. I'm not in any sort of risk or making decisions based on my threat value. MP wasn't an issue because we spent more time running to monsters than actually fighting them.

Never been so bored in an MMO in my life. Soloing which I hate to death was more fun because I might actually need to worry about MP management or crowd control spells.

And before some slack jawed yokel pops in saying "Well if you increase their HP the exp rate will go down!"
Monster A - 1000HP gives 500 exp on kill
Monster B - 3000HP gives 1500 exp on kill
Result: I get to take more than one action on a monster so I don't fall asleep and still have the same exp rate, hurray!

Thanks for explaining it for me.

Its just as someone said, in FFXIV people are leveling everything because its easy not because its a challenge. In FFXI it was a challenge to level everything.

The problem with MMO's is that people want to solo them. If you don't believe that at least 90% of whats in an MMO should be done in a party then you really don't want an MMO. SOLO play should be an option for when you cant find a group to party or something but it should not be the main focus to any MMO game.

There is no party base due to lack of difficulty. The difference between a party and soloing right now is that you have 6-7 other people soloing a monster giving you free exp.

I'm not saying the grind is the only way to determine a games difficulty but the game as a whole is lacking difficulty hard! Not only can you get to 50 in two weeks but you can "finish" everything there is to do at 50 in another two weeks.

Part of what keeps people playing an MMO is the accomplishment on getting what they want. If they get everything they want in a month the game will start filling up with a lot of complains about how there isn't enough end game. Can you believe that? People already complaining about there not being enough end game! You know why? Because they obtained everything so easily already that they don't have to keep on trying to get it.