the normal content is too easy

[Ronduwil]

It is a difficulty choice in the end though. It does make things easier in the end. It’s two in one lol. But a friend of mine brought up how WoW’s WOTLK expansion was the peak of mmo history and it’s casual content wasn’t nearly as streamlined as 14’s currently is…so if they can do it and retain a peak number of players then 14 can too.

I'm trying to understand what you're saying here. Like Xirean said, some aspects of trusts are easier (the NPCs usually stand in safe spots, so if you stick with them you're generally safe), but others are more difficult (your death is an instant wipe with no second chances). What do you mean by "streamlined" in the context of WotLK? You could literally level from 1-80 without touching a single dungeon in WotLK, and it's not like their quests were super difficult. The dungeons themselves were so easy even by those days' standards that players often claim (falsely, IMO) that they caused the game's downfall by "dumbing it down." The typical rotation had about four buttons that were usually hit in a repetitive manner (hence the term, "rotation"). Specs that had to worry about timers (like shadow priest) had even simpler rotations that consisted of one cooldown, one filler skill, and a couple of dots that had to be managed. As you said, they somehow managed to retain a peak number of players despite having all the flaws that the OP is calling out: mechanics that are "telegraphed, repetitive, and predictable." So in what sense are you saying that FFXIV's content is streamlined? To be clear, I'm not disagreeing with you. I'm just trying to understand where you're coming from.