The Hunt - a game breaking feature

[Geist]

The problem is not only that other people get their gear faster. This is also a problem of course, because an MMORPG is always about competition and SE always tried to balance the game for people with a life (or work as you may call it) and people without in the past. Right now people who play the game 24/7 are rewarded more for just being there and clicking one button over and over again like a zombie.

Verun, let's agree to disagree, at least on some of these points.
There's no doubt that the Hunt system needs further tweaking, and that the situation might be ameliorated by curbing the amount of Marks one can tally in a single istance (I'd suggest a daily quota on the elite targets, not unlike the Beast Tribe quests) and other adjustments, both to the mechanics and the creatures' prerogatives.

Also, simply mashing on a button doesn't take skill, and it's just dull. We're on the same page on that.

What I think isn't helping in this context is the slant on competition disjointed from cooperation. I'll elaborate further on it.

The reason for this is the main problem of the hunt:
The marks are not weekly limited. People just go on with their mindless, stupid, no skill requiring, game ruining mark farm. Which leads to another big problem:
All other parts of the game come short. Duty Finder queues take extreme amounts of time to pop now. FATE's are mostly empty. Even the Coerthas FATE people are almost absent now.

The game is not for skillful people anymore. Only silly childish trolls that want to get everything fast and then move on to the next MMO.

Just trolls, I wonder? Just a problem with the new bloods?

I'm on Excalibur, so that might also be a server thing - but the hordes (they've been slimming down during the past two days) I've been occasionally running into are also comprised, more often than not, of people already boasting their high-spec gear.
Welp, I can even make out (when the client isn't buckling before the massive input) a few familiar faces from Mor Dhona and other supposedly elite areas of the game, not to mention players I've been familiar with since 1.0 -- at least some of them are undeniably organized, prepared, and in some cases outright excellent at anything Yoshida and Komoto might throw at them, Coil(s) included.

So what they're doing there? I don't know, honestly. Unless speedrun-crushing the top ranked Marks until they literally disappear into light amounts to skill, too.

There we have a problem, and I think RunaRunagar and Arctic have a point in asking that at least sometimes, we all get off our respective high horses and think beyond raw stats and ranks. What makes me willing to issue a recommendation isn't just how good Person A is with cooldowns and skills, which might be awesome in itself, but how they resonate with other people. Teamwork, a sincere willingness to help, learn (or teach); being assertive while also practicing humility. And a little kindness even to complete strangers.

Gear should be a commodity and a tool first and foremost, IMHO, something that allows us to get further into the game.

You're correct in saying that good rewards should come through effort, but that shouldn't undermine fair play and diversity. Just my two gil coins.