I didnt start the ARR quests until about 3 months. Titan HM was all I needed. Tried continuously at the time of release, and kept getting kicked due to known lag issues that affected ability to be credible to whatever party, then gave up for a long time because I didn't want to waste my time by continually getting kicked, fast-forward to 3 months ago and the DF for this was so long. But now have reached the Atma stage for my first weapon, of which the mechanics are totally unclear and the drop rate discourages continuous attempts, I think I will be part of the group OP mentioned where we are somewhat artificially held back due to this perceived imbalance of which I am nowhere near yet in-game apparently.

I don't know if this happens in other games, but the casual vs end-game player divide seems to be a planned design feature, because it does not help casual players progress at all. As OP states, makes Relic more unobtainable the longer yu don't do the quest line.