First page after OP's rather rambly and hard-to-follow post was half full of comments by "hardcore" timesink players who hate the "casuals" who only want to play an MMO for 1-2 hours every day or two. Please stop it. Square wants to cater to both because they've realized not all players want to play a game that requires you to spend hours upon hours on timesinks just to get to anywhere decent. XI was notorious for this - Square's trying to get away from that part of XI's "hardcore" mentality because they've realized it drives away more players than it keeps.