How many would boycott the game?

[lackofwords]

It's more of initial anger and then meh

Yeah, I rather indifferent about it too.
You could get a Draught Chocobo for sort of free-ish from the recruit a friend program.
http://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodest...riend_recruit/

I could see the cash shop being horrible for the late adopters of the game. Such as if a new player were to join now, and wanted all the previous annual event items, I'm expecting them to spend well $100 just in vanity items when the other seasonal event rolls around.
The previous set of Halloween items cost $19 in total for all of them. In a way, this is penalizing late adopters to cough up extra cash in terms of monthly subscriptions they would have been paying earlier, while not actually obtaining any value out of it but its vanity items.

For me, forgetting to grab the two anniversary minions, Wind-up Minfilia, Wind-up Thancred, isn't that bad. I'm a lazy collector, so it isn't like I need to have everything. I'd just like to grab and experience whatever is offered to me in the game.