Why is the Manipulation skill locked behind the crafting quests?

[Vickii]

Yeah, I do remember that. I also got all the useful cross-skills back when they were a thing (expect for ARM and BSM(?), I think, since their skills weren't that useful). But when I hear people talking about crafting being dumbed down so much, what I understand from what they're saying is that crafting even with all the cross-skills at your disposal used to be tough. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

I’m not too sure on the actual crafting being any harder than it is now. It was significantly more time investment, there were fewer efficient ways to level up and to get the skills you needed you needed to clear all the jobs.

As for the crafting itself I ‘remember’ it being harder. But that may just be less macros being available to get HQ even when you have bad RNG.

Majority of people claiming that crafting is too easy have a one/two button macro that they press and I’m not saying they didn’t exist before but I don’t think they were as common. It’s a shame that crafts have a solution such as this. I like the expert crafts, you can max quality them with luck but you can’t do it every time. You’re also destined to fail with bad procs. For me it’s a lot more interesting.

[Eclipse12187]

The skill “Manipulation” used to be the GSM 15 skill, the skill “Manipulation” we unlock at 65 quest used to be “Manipulation II” before shadowbringers. The skill at 65 was always locked behind the quest, same with the 70 trait. These are the only crafter skills ever locked behind quests and they were never changed from their inception. This is why Manipulation is still locked, it was never not locked.

[Eien713]

The skill “Manipulation” used to be the GSM 15 skill, the skill “Manipulation” we unlock at 65 quest used to be “Manipulation II” before shadowbringers. The skill at 65 was always locked behind the quest, same with the 70 trait. These are the only crafter skills ever locked behind quests and they were never changed from their inception. This is why Manipulation is still locked, it was never not locked.

I see. I didn't know that since I didn't really craft seriously in SB, so thank you for supplying an answer to my question. And was Manipulation II the only crafting skill we get from the quests back in SB?