Current State of End-Game Contents - A Blog Post from A Japanese Player

[Scaevolicious]

I can agree to your points but then we have to consider what is also fun. Wouldn't you have more fun having to make decisions on the go or those decisions being made for you by a mechanic driven system? This is the defining question most people don't watch videos and depend on luck to get past a script that can be read which has a rippling effect through the community.

It's fun to move on to different, newer content once you've mastered a given fight. "Oh, this time Titan EX is going to use mountain buster THREE times instead of two! This is a completely new, engaging take on this fight I've already done 3 dozen times!"

The original poster claims the most fun he ever had in FFXI was camping sea and sky for years, so I am going to need some convincing not to just dismiss his opinions about what the people do and do not want entirely.

OP doesn't want to make the game easier, but more forgiving (which doesn't mean it will be easier).

Huh? Making it more forgiving will absolutely make it easier. Of those players he categorizes as "casual", the majority of them are most likely capable of clearing the content they're struggling on (EX primals, early Coil 2) and certainly with echo; the problem is they are perpetually stuck in runs with other casual players who are not. If a raid of mediocre players could lose two people and still beat an EX primal, even with echo, we wouldn't be having this discussion.