Reasons they made it easier to grind
1. They're lazy
2. It requires you to do Manderville questline, that itself can take quite sometime if u havent unlock it. So it also count as "grind"
3. For casual players

Here's my suggestion

For ilv 630 (or any relic that are -5 ilv from savage weapon), you can keep it with current tomestone grind. You can get glowing and dyeable weapon. And then, there should be an option to upgrade it to ilv 635 (same ilv as savage). You can adjust the weapon stats and have 5 materia slot. And the option to upgrade is that, you have to grind it like previous expansions, like fates, old dungeon, old raids, etc. And you dont have to do the optional one to go to the next phase.