From my PoV the problem is if you're not willing to deal with potential social drama and weeks of practice, there isn't that much PvE content for people who like PvE more than the theme park stuff in the game. There are deep dungeons, which ShB lacks, Bozja, which has a roadblock in form of Castrum, and extreme/unreal trials which are more like moderate difficulty compared to savage/ultimate.
Personally I used to enjoy dungeons before Heavensward. They're definitely much easier than extreme trials, but I liked when not every run was the same because sometimes I'd queue with groups who wanted every treasure or explore to fill their maps, or new players had trouble with specific dungeon gimmicks, even if that struggle was brief. Now every dungeon is essentially single hallway with 2 pulls between bosses. Gorgeous hallways but single hallways nonetheless. IMO they should have made a few harder dungeons with rewards isolated from the tomestone race that wouldn't be part of roulettes, so that they could be designed less faceroll driven.
Alliance Raids can't accomplish this because they're designed for 24 players, and if you get too creative with them, the experience gets simply frustrating (just look at how many people avoid Castrum Lacus Litore). Pre SB raids were bite-sized versions of this sometimes, but since they're also roulette content people started complaining when a raid wasn't just a boss fight.

Those are things that have been seriously bothering me about XIV since I finished leveling all jobs in my main. Coming from playing jRPGs and other FF games, I don't come with the mindset that "glamour is the endgame" and minigames were more than a side diversion. I like PvE and being rewarded for doing it. It's the main thing I look forward to in jRPGs. If this really is a FF first MMORPG second I wish ShB hadn't been such a departure from what I was used to. I just wanted some mid-tier difficulty content to cycle through, since ilvl sync just makes savage rewards pointless to me.

I'm not a fan of the job "balance" either but that ship has already sailed. You have no idea how much I miss needing to manage enmity and having more utility actions that weren't designed to be just another step in every boss dance.