Overreliance on cosmetics as a reward

[Shistar]

What do you guys think? Is there room for such rewards in the game? Would you even want them? What rewards would you like to see from future content? Or is the way it is now just fine for you?

I like your ideas! I will begin by saying that I will 100% decide to engage in content based on the rewards most of the time. Unfortunately I just can't spare the time to do random content for the love of the game anymore, so that motivator is very important when time is my biggest frustration.
... With that said, I did ASSS because I wanted a singular earring, I'm doing the World-Class Troller achievement because I want the adventurer plate backing decor and I'm doing UCoB because I think the Legend title might be fitting for one of my alts. I would not say I am particularly sane when it comes to deciding what kind of content I get involved in lol.


Stuff I would go absolutely insane for, in no particular order (tons of ideas for more cosmetics but there's a little bit of everything in here hopefully):

• Different idle stances/animations/"personalities" for our basic idles or even job-specific ones. Could also be from different races, like midlander being able to use elezen idles, specially if you can mix and match. Lots of potential for roleplayers, GPose and final fashion XIV enjoyers!
• Different skill VFX, preferably inspired by the fight they're unlocked from
• Love your idea about movement speed in towns, so I'm absolutely stealing it and putting it in the list.
• Summon/faerie/avatar customization (animations, model, etc.)
• Mounts obtained from difficult content would be faster than others in the areas they belong to lore-wise (example: Pandaemonium mount rewards are faster in Elpis compared to other mounts. This should likely be added with a function to auto-equip the fastest mount for each area if you own any that meet the criteria) and/or the option to upgrade mounts to become faster in certain areas (Manacutter in Sea of Clouds, Magitek-related mounts in Garlemald, etc.) bonus points if they are multi seaters so people aren't left behind in hunts.
• More multi seater mounts. Love carrying my friends in multi seater mounts. Love being lazy in a multi seater mount. Gimme 8-player multi seater mounts where I can actually see the people in it!!
• Housing related upgrades and customization, specially for easily accessible housing such as apartments. Think alternative retainer/crystal bell designs, windows, doors, NPCs, etc. Stuff everyone can flex regardless of their home size.
• Alternative gearing up paths, if you hate the savage then maybe you could use Criterion to gear up or switch it up every week, etc.
• Emotes, especially looping ones!
• HUD skins (think Omega-themed, steampunk Alexander-style, moody and gothic Ishgard from DSR). You interact with your HUD all the time, so this could be huge.
• Something to breathe some life back into Companion Chocobos would be fun. Not sure what it could be though...
• Higher bicolor gemstone gain from expansion/lore-related areas.

I see a lot of cosmetic potential they're not exploiting yet. With gameplay rewards, I think it's very cool but you need to be careful about them since it can be very difficult to balance content around them, specially skill upgrades, but I like the idea!