Before you shut this idea down hear me out.

The recent SP changes in the Feb patches made SP grinding much more tolerable but there is still a huge amount of SP needed to rank up, which in turn delays the rate of story content a player experience in a timely fashion.

I made a comparison of XP needed in FFXI to get to certain levels VS SP needed to get to certain ranks in FFXIV.

Heres the break down:

In FFXI to level from 30-31 you need 5,800 EXP

In FFXIV to rank from 30-31 you need 38,000 SP

To reach max level (75) in FFXI you need 42,000 EXP (pre 90 cap)

In FFXIV max rank (50) you need 100,000 SP.

I use these figures of lv 30-31 vs rank 30-31 becuase thats where i'm currently at in FFXIV.

Now I'm not concerned about rushing to rank 50 to max out. I'm concerned about the tmely access to story driven motivation.

another example is this:
in FFXI level 30-40 it takes a total of 62,500 EXP
now back when FFXI first launched a good XP PT could xp ~5kxp/hr
a bad PT would get ~3kxp/hr
so simple math:

(@3kXP/hr = ~20hrs of pure exp, @5kXP/hr=12.5 hrs of pure exp to go lv 30-40.

now in FFXIV: for ranks 30-40 it takes a total of 543,000SP
Lowend SP/hr i guess is 10kSP/hr?
highend ~20kSP/hr?
so simple math:
(@10kSP/hr = 54.3 hours of pure SP - or @20kSP/hr = ~27hrs at High end figures

I think if they reduce the amount of SP it takes to rank up post 20's the flow of story would be much smoother, and players would be eager for more. Not pounding their head against the mountain of SP they must over come just to reach the next story arch.

What is everyone else's thoughts on the amount of SP required to rank up and the timely intersection of story along that line?