Ok, I basically just deleted this whole post I made which ended up being alittle to angry, so here goes again.
I still feel these discussions are pointless considering the game is basically made but I/we agree, FF11 had plenty of force spawn NM's (see Sky/Sea), just like HNM's, it had everything but I do agree with you.
HNM's did NOT require you to sit at "kings" for hours, or ever in fact to get the majority of their gear, or if you count the useful gear, any of it. There was einherjar, which is a point me and many others tried to drill into your thick skull sense before the game went down, for months. FF11 had content designed for everyone, not just for you, I know this is hard to understand that a game might have content based around a different demographic than you, but it happened.
HNM's are not designed for you, its filler content, something to do when there was no ein/dyna/limbus/sky/sea/others, it was a very small bonus chance to get gear that was very rare in ein.
I really am not sure how to handle you trying to decide what is healthy/unhealthy for other people based off of your personal available play time, most responces would likely get me kicked off of the forums. /em disgusted
Garuda/Hard Rivenroad were not difficult just like Ifrit Extreme, people just lack the ability to deal with lag (which came from server structure not the distance from the servers).
You have got to be kidding me... by the time those NM's were made force spawn wasnt the game lvl 99 and the gear 100% worthless? When i quit at lvl90 i remember the gear already being a joke, so the fact that it "became more rare" supposidly is because it was worthless. The fact that the majority of the population are running around with relics like they are Onion Swords should tell you something about FF11, the game/endgame is a joke and you should really try to avoid using it as a defence.
Now to the rest of the people in this thread- They will never get it, we tried, these fools will never understand that content that takes more than 30min's is still accessible to them, they just refuse to put in the work to do it and that all content cannot be based around a single group of people with virtually no play time and expect it to survive aslong as FF11 did. You need all of it, the casual content (see einherjar) and the hardcore content (see HNM's), both were valid ways to get the exact same gear.
I promise you I hate the direction ive taken this post, it is not the full purpose of this thread but this guy...
To end on track, yes, a very large portion of people from FF11 loved HNM's but people advocating for the same system is basically off the table, as I have explained before without gear swaps to keep gear relevant for 10yrs like in FF11 you cannot have such long respawn windows atleast mixed with low drop rates, it just cannot be done, would your HNMLS still be killing Nidhogg/faf/behe/KB/aspid every day if gear was replaced every 1-2yrs? The sheer size of HNMLS on average made a waiting list for items like E.body/D.ring very long and took years and years to clear out people.
People need to continue coming up with real ideas that sadly do not involve exactly what FF11 had for HNM's to work... personally I think the loss of gear swaps make true HNM's impossible in any real form, but feel free to try and make it work.