Quote Originally Posted by Omedon View Post
Ok, while I'm sure these are all viable directions, what is truly mindblowing for me (and I absolutely concede that this is clearly just a difference between games, but, man...) is that all of this... is to advance the story one step! Like, that doesn't strike anyone here as being a little nuts?

"Run dungeons for the week"

"Go make a fortune"

"Unlock this other convoluted world boss zone"

... To have enough gear to advance the story... a questline that has provided gear here and there... that is on its own not good enough to advance the story.

There are multiple degrees of community interdependence (roulette, market board, mass FATEs) to advance the story!

That doesn't strike anyone as a little crazy? Maybe it's my WoW brain haha!
FFXIV is story-driven but it's also an MMO so it was neccessary for devs to set certain requirements to keep players from (consciously or not) griefing other players. So we have a min ilvl for dungeons.
You expect to leave and return at any time and whenever you come back, you will be able to play the whole story in one go - that's not a realistic expection. Story patches have often months between them. Months even the least active players had time to something occasionally like once a week to bring them way above the required treshold to advance with the story.

You have multiple ways and people spend time and effort to research and explain what you can do. None of those ways are particulary complicated or time-consuming because all of them are casual content that is meant for players who play very infrequently and only for a short amount of time when they do. WoW also has min ilvl requirements for dungeons, just as a side note. And you don't just get it by doing the story either, you also look for other resources for gear.

A hunt train usually takes around 30-45 min, they get announced in the Centurio Hunts discord aswell as in LS, although discord is the easiest way because they ping everyone that signed up for it. Join, set a role, done.
You can hop on/ hop off any time you want during the train and you don't even need to be able to fly in all zones. You can either "skip" that particular zone by just staying at the aetheryte after porting so you see in chat which destination is next or ask someone to give you a lift. I often see it with freshly 80 players and it's no problem at all.
They reward tons of tomes and nuts, done on a daily basis and at various times on all servers of your DC. Very quick and easy way to get gear and something that people always do, no matter the patch.

Eden normal raids offer a nice side story, if you're not interested in that you can always skip the cut scene and just do all the bosses you're eligible for with your current gear/ story prog. You have already unlocked the quest for the 1st tier by reaching the end of the ShB core story, so it only takes talking to one NPC.
1st tier rewards needs 425, rewards 450, accessories/ belt cost one token, boots/ hands/ helmet 2 token, pants/ chest 4 token. Since it has been unlocked ages ago, you can need on all 8 token that drop and will most likely even get all of them because only very few people still need them.
2nd tier rewards needs 455, rewards 480, same rules as above.
3rd tier rewards needs 485, rewards 510.
The boss fights usually take aroun 6-8min, depending on the fight and party, mechanics are lenient, no prior knowledge required. Going in blind, regardless of role, is completely fine. Doing normal raids is a great way to quickly get current gear and catch up with alt classes, so I'd keep an eye on that for the future.
Thanks to your own first timer bonus, you'll also get bonus tomes for each boss in addition to tokens. Doing the 1st tier gives you enough tokens and tomes to get above the 2nd tier threshold, which in turn gives you enough to easily continue the MSQ.

Those two options are the cheapest, quickest and most reliable ones that require almost no effort (like long unlock quest chains etc) or otherwise significant time investment. It's a hop on/ hop off thing you can do anytime you feel like it.

Getting gear though dungeons or alliance raid is a matter of luck because not only does it have to drop, you also need to win it. Less an issue on a tank because you're the only one there, but it's not guaranteed that even a single tank piece drops and you might leave the raid/ dungeon empty handed. They still give tomes, which is nice because you get 490 and ilvl is an average - so you can buy multiple cheap pieces that boost your ilvl for the same amount as one big piece (like chest).

Buying crafted gear is an option, but best thing to is being selective and do some server hopping. Overall it's probably a matter of 20min tops to check all servers and buy only a select few pieces of current or last tier crafted gear. Some last tier crafted pieces (ilvl 480) are sold for 10k in HQ because nobody really needs it anymore and they just forgot to sell it on time. Current tier crafted depends on the server, but they generally don't go below 50k.
A few pieces easily get you above the required threshold though.

Leveling crafters so you can craft gear yourself is probably one of the most time-consuming and expensive ways because you can't craft 510 just because you hit 80. Even crafting 480 requires some gear you need to at least get through scrips first. Then you still have to acquire mats, some of them are still fairly pricey.
If you want something that is time-efficient, fits your budget and is still done long after the content came out for the first time, I suggest sticking to hunt trains, normal raids and doing the occasional expert/ 80/ trial/ normal raid roulette. Whichever tickles your fancy. Just remember you need to do trial/ normal raid roulette at 80 to get tomes.

But honestly, none of this is "convoluted", you're making it into a much bigger problem than it really is because you have unrealistic expectations. It doesn't take nearly as much time or money to do most of this than you make it sounds.
You don't need to farm a dungeon for a week straight just to do one quest. You don't need to be filthy rich to get some nice deals with server hopping. You don't need to a crazy-long quest chain for a single boss.