Why do casual players seem entitled to cosmetic items added in game?

[Kaurhz]

It takes longer hard work to gear up to the latest pentamelded crafter gear and tools to even be able to reliably HQ craft the week one gear that the raiders would be interested in buying, than it takes to prog most savages. It takes dedication and preparation, so say nothing of unlocking advanced resource nodes. Can we talk about the definition of casual used here?

Uh I do think this is actually false, the amount of leniency afforded with crafters in the 'modern era' is just so massive. People put far, far too much pressure and expectancy on themselves. Like, you can get yourself at the entry point which is the gear with default melds, and you would not really have much deficit versus someone that would be literally decked out with tens of millions in melds. This is something that has been greatly streamlined with crafters over the years. Control disparities are not as great as they were due to Innovation reworks, and similarly since there is a greater emphasis put on HQ materials for everyone.

The amount of preparation and dedication required is also greatly lower now. Like, back in HW if you wanted a Grade V materia you were spending 200-500k per attempt, and you would have special concealed nodes which had further rare items needed like Dryad Saps for Astral Birch. As a result of this you would easily see chestpieces alone used for raiding go for a good 40M. These are things which IMO do need to return to the game, as it did give crafters and gatherers another dimension to their gameplay (I do absolutely think people would complain here though)

What I will say though is there is a lot more of a collaborative effort between crafters and raiders, so more often than not they will be paying a fraction of what a full set is on the market, and the supply/demand aspect for crafted gear is already very solid, so I don't think it is a fair comparison to make anyway.

It’s easy to pin all your problems on hardcore players when everyone you don’t like is hardcore

“Hardcore crafting” don’t make me laugh. Making 4-5 sets of gear in the savage sale window can be done playing 2-3 hours per day and barely requires any prep

If you don’t want to put any effort into this game just admit that, not try to exclude everyone who wants to put effort in to some “other” group you can loop in with the hardcore playerbase

Hardcore crafters? lmao. How hard do you think it is to do a few leves at the start of an expansion and grab a macro from Teamcraft?

'Hardcore' crafters absolutely are a thing. Granted, I do not think it is necessarily a hardcore endeavor in itself.