My main gripes with this game

[Jeeqbit]

The guides were sound. At level 30, BLM-BLM, BLM-BRD, and BRD-BRD were the only comps for which it would not be optimal

Optimal crumbles in duty finder though because they usually don't care about that.

Even now, in probably some 70% of my Leveling Roulette runs, my entire party is level synced down by at least some 10 levels.

Presumably that's just to make me wonder why the point in common between a 58, 64, 73, and 80 is... Dzmael Darkhold?

That doesn't mean they are not relatively new to the game and it doesn't mean a whole lot overall because if you have done thousands of dungeon roulette solo queues over these years then you have almost always had a first time bonus. If you have made alts on non-congested worlds then there have been new players everywhere for years, even in Stormblood.

[Shurrikhan]

Optimal crumbles in duty finder though because they usually don't care about that.

Whether people cared about it or not, those behaviors were the norm at the time, hence the difference between the level 30 experience now and the level 30 experience then. To say level sync lets one experience the given content as it appeared in a previous expansion is more than likely going to be just plain wrong.

[1] That doesn't mean they are not relatively new to the game and it doesn't mean a whole lot overall because [2] if you have done thousands of dungeon roulette solo queues over these years then you have almost always had a first time bonus.

[1] That a party member is nonetheless new to the game still has no reason to send a party who are at minimum half-way through Heavensward to an ARR dungeon (i.e., to content to which none of the party are new).

[2] I have done thousands of roulettes, yes. The slight majority of my 4-mans had no first-time bonus, and only some two-thirds of 8-mans (minus MSQ roulette, which have even then about 50/50) had such. That's precisely the point. Yes, roulettes help players get (inadvertently, their first) queues, but it's not as if the every time n people hop into a roulette that at least 1-in-4 players will be one such adventurer in need of a first run. That's precisely why we often end up randoming into dungeons no one matched into the roulette group specifically queued for.

It's just a reward system. Outside of Sprout surges, it functions to most players' satisfaction regardless of whether it picks up a bonus or helps someone actually in need.

[gotaname1]

I've played on EU servers and I have to agree with your last point, they are much much more quiet than the NA ones. Now, NA ones; especially balmung, mateus and zalera ime, are very chatty.

Isnt the reason EU servers are more quiet because the people on there are speaking way too many different languages? It would make a public chat a horrendous experience if 10 languages would mix all at once.

[Jin-]

Sadly your point 2 is there for rest of the game. With barely any changes and doesnt get better like someone suggested before.

Maybe it's the game engine they are using for needing those clunky quest mechanics or maybe the designer is incompetent. Or maybe it's both, who knows. I still 100% expect the same crappy open world experience in the Endwalker