The mods they made in this patch are actually later than I expected. They commonly lower the "barrier of entry" on content. Look at hunts and updates to ST. It pretty much gifted every player i110 gear and an i110 weapon only a few months after the big patch 2.2 that introduced i110 content.

That same patch is what brought us artisan tools. I'm surprised they waited 7 months to lower the requirements. And the master materia from specs was always unbalanced. It still is. At least it floods the market with cheaper/faster master materia now.