The current materia system needs to change

[Niqote]

If there is one thing I truly dislike about FFXIV, it is the materia system.

Firstly, inventory.
Many different types of materia are a waste of space and time. This is significantly influenced by trends such as the 'Gambler's crown boom', the 'Garuda BLM burn boom' and most recently the 'Relic boom'.

Many materia are ignored because it is far more effective to stack raw stats (STR,PIE etc) instead. Many other materia are ignored because they are simply useless at this time (Chocobo down, Trent Root etc)
All in all, the lack of necessity for most materia lead them to be nothing more then NPC fodder. They clog our inventories, retainers and the Market ward.

Equality
I main Whm, so my first relic would need mind IV materia, lucky me right? That's all fine and good but there is an obvious difference in how often a Savage Might IV materia comes along in comparison. This is terribly unfair to certain relic seekers then it is to others. Having a different rate of conversion probability for very important materia is a complete disaster. Why were the rates not adjusted? Why does two weapons require the same materia? Actually... why do we even NEED 2 x IV's?

Double, triple melding and beyond
Keeping on the topic of the relics mentioned just now; would it not have been wiser to assign a number to the relic meld? For example; requires at least 32 points of MIND.
This way the other materia in the category can be used to contribute towards the meld, allowing us combinations of Mind IV, III and II. We would have been able to use more of the materia we are spirit bonding.

The whole melding system is rather stressful. We are able to create equipment (with either enough luck OR a huge wallet) that outshines all other gear in the game. Tell me what is the point of going on adventures and hunting down excellent pieces of gear when you can stay in Ul'dah and triple meld STR to your gloves, which btw do not match any of your other gear. My that raptor skin looks fantastic with your hard won darklight body ... not!
Melding is pushing away so much wonderful looking gear (BRD and PUG...I am looking at you!) ... its a crying shame that we obtain AF, only to throw it into the amour because we have double meld pants that are better. Maybe it is the fault of the AF stats, maybe they will be up gradable... who knows, but it is another example of waste.

RNG
A hot topic for a while now and the source of frustration and stress for many players.
We all know supply and demand are user driven, but this is only to a point. As mentioned above the RNG for materia creation is unbalanced at best. Now I know there is a lot of 'In 2.0' for RNG fixes, but I have not seen mention of changes for materia in 2.0.

Final Fantasy
Not everyone will agree, but I would like to see the melding system changed. The system is far from being 'Final fantasy'. If we could implement a system that was more along the lines of FFVII or FFXI (Buy, find spells/materia and learn/equip them to pre determined slots) or FFIX (Equip a weapon until you 'learn' the ability from it) it would feel more like... home?

I mention the previous titles as examples because of the continuous comments that this game will be feeling progressively more 'Final fantasy'.

(tl;dr)
In closing, I personally feel that the current materia system is to our detriment. It is more time consuming then it needs to be, very unbalanced and for the most part; wasteful, stressful and over all no fun. There is no skill needed and it actually encourages people to be gil greedy and consider RMT.

We know that stats are being adjusted, and I really do hope that with this, comes a significant decrease in the demand for double, triple melded gear as their impact will be decreased. I hope this leads to people being able to wear III+IV melds, single melds, or dungeon gear and not have their DPS effected so radically.

It would be wonderful to see peoples views on the materia system as is... I will try to secure the second post, to quote good points and ideas from others.