This game has multiple avenues for gear. There are loot drops, weekly token drops, weekly savage book tokens, tome gear and crafted gear. If we had only rng to rely on for gear OP may have a point, but this isn't the case.
If OP's buddies want to quit over loot rng then they should stay away from mmorpgs in general. Those games are riddled with rng and FFXIV has less of it than most without having any pay to win perks.