^
lol, as all answers over there, everything has solution that you couldn't see, but then you chose to just "make a thread for rant" instead of "making a thread ask for solution"

Want to do main story quest ?
>> never need crafter/gatherer to begin with, you can just trade material melded by key item. it written on your journey in english.

Want to get cotton ball ?
>> it is really cheap from NPC vender, cheaper than the worth of time for a gatherer to find it. As level 50 gatherer myself, I always purchase it from NPC too.