Heavensward zones are beautiful, and the music is draws me into the game. But these side-quests are just poorly designed IMO. I would have liked side-quest to be made in a way that the player wants to do them, instead of having to do them.

Fetch quests are the worst offender, sending you across the map to gain some trivial items, and to come back rewarded with fate-level exp. Barely, if any, lore, nothing connecting it to the main story (most of the time), most characters not memorable. Now compare this to moogle postmail quests that explain why things like Fates happen or backstory to characters met in the main scenero.

At first I complained about there only Teleport Crystal in the Western Highlands, or Flying being walled by sidequests/traveler quests, but now I see the real problem is that the side-quests are not engaging enough, so I want to get them over with as quickly as possible.