As a new player that really likes this game ...

[Claviusnex]

I hate when people share their opinions and immediately get shut down.
Game is not perfect. Like, whenever someone says something even the slightest negative
about this game, you best be in Shield Oath. All the aggro coming your way!
OP even stated he like the games story, and other things on it but the end-game
is bad...I can't speak for the thousands of players but I am sure a lot think
end-game isn't all that great. :/ It really isn't...It's missing something.
Also sucks gear is obsolete within a patch so you don't really feel accomplished
by your work. It's just a treadmill that dies out in a few months, just get another
treadmill that'll die at the same time frame.

The lack of end game is common across the genre. Same for the gear grinding and obsolescence. Let's face it after you've completed any dungeon or raid a few times it's pretty repetitious regardless of which game you are playing. I left WoW after Warlords so don't know if Legion changed but Warlords was pretty sparse as far as end game content when it was released. Blizzard was also pretty slow on getting content updates out as I remember wishing more than once that they would hurry up and get the next out. While it doesn't appeal to a lot of folks crafting/gathering are much better as end game content in FFXIV than a number of other games, WoW in particular. It fills a fair amount of time between resets after having leveled my main combat job and at least has some story line. I still prefer the combat systems I've played in WoW and other MMO better than FFXIV with its GCD however the serial story and highly integrated nature of instanced combat far out weighs the few negatives I have.

I want to add I was well aware of how FFXIV was highly gated before I started the trial version. So I had a good idea of what I was getting into. I didn't cut over right away because of concerns about being so far behind and whether I could catch up or not. Obviously I decided to stay but a lot had to do with the way SE has managed to keep old content playable with duty roulette and sync'ing. If on the other hand things had been like WoW I likely would have quit as why move just for the sake of moving?

If you don't raid, what do YOU do once you've hit the end of the MSQ?

The real end game, glamour, crafting and gathering.

In all seriousness I do normal level content to max out my gear, gather or craft, go after mounts or minions, etc. I am planning on leveling another combat job so I left a lot of the side quests from SB. In fact these were some of the major factors that caused me to decide to quit WoW. To me harder levels of the same content isn't running new stuff and isn't important. I like all of the ancillary things that can be done at level cap to allow for some variety. I'm not saying hardcore or even mid-core raiding isn't a legitimate pursuit it is just something many of us don't see as a priority. In fact that was another contributing factor for me leaving WoW that a large part of the player base considered this heresy and that there could only be one end game in raiding.