Idea: Merit system

[Nalien]

It's simple enough to grasp and not as grindy as it can be or as other systems can get yet still useful but optional at the same time.

In what way is it useful? What content does item level actually help out with?

Perhaps I should clarify, when I say item level, I mean something you'd actually have to put effort towards getting. You can sleep your way into a full set of i440, heck even a set of i460 given enough weeks. So what purpose does i470 serve in this game? Making the content you just beat to obtain it even easier? It's a non-reward. Just compare the rewards people actually care in this game, to the gear rewards; Mounts. Something like Trials exist almost exclusively for mount farming. The item level from the weapons? Redundant pretty much at release. Relevant item level is something that requires absolutely no effort, and as such the "relevant" item level from raids/etc. offers absolutely no purpose IMHO.

Like I said, the thing to work on and improve in this game isn't your item level, it's learning the mechanics of encounters. That's it. Like I also said, that's not necessarily a bad thing, but it does leave an itch thoroughly un-scratched for people who expect RPG elements in a MMORPG. People want a progression system in their RPGs, when you're basically fully geared by default? There's no progression there. You hit the level cap and the thing to work on isn't your equipment, it's learning a set of scripts for boss encounters. That's great for some people, bad for others.

Again, I think Relics are the solution, but SE has casual-ified Relics to such an absurd degree... Not only that but it seems they get pushed back each expansion, too... A Realm Reborn released with A Relic Reborn, and when that content was relevant it was IMO the best piece of progression content this game has offered. Anima weapons took a while to get going in comparison, and Eureka took almost half of Stormbloods lifetime to even get released to lukewarm reception... I wish they'd go back to A Relic Reborn style Relic quests, the whole idea to make Relics a casual reward is absurd to me; Isn't that exactly what tomestone weapons are already? Instead now we get Relics that you can upgrade largely without even using... It's such a pathetic state of progression... Anima was the worst IMO, simply because for the vast majority of that process I was not using the weapon, or even doing Lv60 content... Eureka was at least Lv70 content, if you can call FATEs content, but it was level capped, so the weapon was largely irrelevant until they had the admittedly rather good idea to add Eurekan Effect stats, but that was basically right at the end of the process... Heck most of A Realm Reborns process was awful too, the initial quest was only good because it (mostly) carried over from 1.x, it was the closest this game every came to offering some mid-core content though, now it's Savage and Ultimate for hardcore players, and literally everything else for the super casuals... No inbetween...