I think those are very good points from both sides of the fence.

I've played during beta launch and after that kept a 4 month break to wait for the changes.

Last time I logged on I didn't really notice anything significant. I was excited about quests but after doing some of the companies quests or pre-companies I dunno they just felt like leves to me. Content wise I haven't felt like anything has changed. Only the menus seem a lot nicer now because they load faster but the terrible UI for a controller user like me makes this nearly unplayable still.