A question on gear progression

[Ninster]

First, I've never really cared much for Coil. My linkshell drags me into it nearly every chance they get, and, while I'd really love to experience the story, I'd also like to do so when I'm prepared for it.

So if we say that I'm on the casual side of things, where do I go from here?

Not sure if my Lodestone reflects this, but I intend to play SMN to the fullest extent that I can (until I become a load and then I may have to learn BLM a little more). I understand SMN has its limitations (Spell speed is a negative, right?) so what should I look for in gear?

At the moment I have mostly Evenstar gear (with one or two unweathered) from Allied Seals and I've been working on my Animus (5/9 books done). I don't have access to Final Coil (obviously), and need to gear up to meet the requirements for Turn 8 and 9.

I'm not looking to gear up fast necessarily, but I just need a direction to go in gear from here.

[Tex_Mex]

So the best place for you to go and continue your gear progression is a mixture of poetics gear (ilvl120 ironworks stuff) and the new 24man raid World of Darkness. 24man raids in this game are meant to be casual content (and they really are because they tend to be faceroll easy).

Gear Options:
Ironworks gear (all ilvl120 stuff) : trade in tomestones of poetics
WoD gear (all ilvl120 stuff): do the 24man raid WoD (only get one piece per week)
Augmented Ironworks Accessories (ilvl130): Do the repeatable 24man raid weekly quest to get one carboncoat per week (transforms ironworks accessories into their augmented versions which are ilvl130)
Augmented Ironworks Gear (ilvl130): All ilvl130 augmented gear is now accessible through poetics and the hunt system. Carbontwine and carboncoat can be bought for allied seals now (3k for a twine, 2k for a coat). Allied seal drops from hunts have been increased so hunting is now the only viable way for a casual player to get 130 gear.
Weapons: This area is still tough for casual players. The best weapon you can get without any coil/extreme content is the ilvl125 rellic weapon, however this takes a massive amount of time, so I tend to avoid it when I can. The next best weapon you can get is the ilvl110 soldiery weapon that you probably already have. The other weapons available come from FCoB (ilvl 120, 130, and 135) and from shiva extreme (ilvl115)

And yes, spellspeed is absolute crap on SMN, unfortunately, there is very little way to avoid it due to the stats that SE put on all caster gear.