Yes, What I am getting at is that the system needs to be either more fun, or quicker. In either case it needs to be less grindy.

To Ethir: I don't really care so much about easier, I just want a system that doesn't feel as much of a grind.

An example camp that is dangerous, is for a level 30 weaver leve, that requires you to go to camp Blue fog. The camp has many high 50's mobs on the way there. I nearly died several times getting there as a level 50 cnj, riding my chocobo.

As far as experience per kill, you can get 800-1k exp per very fast kill in a good 8 person party, where you kill many mobs in a short time frame. This is very often the case in level 40+ parties. There is no way in crafting to get that much experience in such short order, for better or for worse.

I too craft above my level, but mostly resort to spamming standard, and half paying attention for light color, but this is hardly fun; especially when you have to do this dozens/hundreds of times to get a single level. Both these points are compounded by the fact that a single craft takes much much longer to perform than killing a monster in a party.

In short, what I am asking for is not necessarily faster levels, but barring that, more engaging leveling at least. All I want is less of a grind to get to 40+ so I can meld materia.

Less of a grind could mean faster levels or less repetitive levels.