So the thing about Bozdja, DR and Zadnor is you have to remember who the content is designed for. So just like Ultimates are designed for a more hardcore raid focused min/maxer DR is also designed for that audience.

There is nothing that actually requires essenses or grinding but it does cut off a large amount of time because they content is designed for people who like to grind something and see a big power gain. That is the entire point of it.

Outside of a glamour most will use the weapon from the Weapon Extreme to get that max ilvl reward. The community is there but yes I agree it falls apart quickly when randoms all meet up in content designed to be optimized but that applies to any raid in FF14.