The main problems of FFXIV

[BlisteringFrost]

Naoki Yoshida.

[Dikatis]

The end result is the game feeling like chores at times, and one where neither the developers or a significant part of the playerbase even wants me doing them. I can certainly take my time and money elsewhere, but I fail to see how that makes anything better than how I left it. Even the "nice and friendly community" thing turned out to be a complete lie, so I can't even use the "I'm staying for friends/FC mates" reason that others have going for them at least.

This... honestly sounds like a you problem than a game problem. Since you're actively refusing to engage with any part of the game that offers a modicum of a challenge and are writing off your investment in any form of content BEFORE YOU EVEN PARTICIPATE IN IT. At that point, it's not the devs' fault, it's yours. You can develop skill. You can learn the nuances of content to find enjoyment in them. You can challenge yourself and consult the tons of resources online or other players in-game for advice on how to clear it.

Sorry about your bad social experiences, but the community as a whole is fine and it's fairly easy to find friends to play with if you try. You can check the Community Finder to look for FCs recruiting on your server and report instances of toxic behavior for the GMs to sort out. But as it stands, you kind of just sound entitled at this point.

[Remember_The_Name]

I think if I had to sum up 14’s issues in one singular point it’s that DT’s relatively high content density but low attach rate and negative opinion shows that just releasing more content isn’t going to fix the issue; something is fundamentally wrong that means even content that should have high interactions rates doesn’t; I’d posit this core problem is the fact that the jobs aren’t engaging

And this is damn right. Jobs are prysms through which content is perceived. If jobs are dull, they make even the most carefully fashioned content dull.
In previous expansions, we did not had such breakneck speed of mechanics, but fights still looked more exciting, because we had to do the "plate spinning" part with jobs while solving mechanics. And the rewarding feeling of maintaining high efficiency output was pushing us to do our best.

Nowadays the jobs looks like they are on autopilot. Just press the buttons when they are off cooldown. The rotation and burst windows are tailored to align at the exact same moment with barely any player input.

Sigh

[Striker44]

I also can't do anything about the fact that I'm on a dead data center, can only play much later in the night/early morning...

Yes you can. You can make a character on a different data center, or transfer your character if you feel you've invested enough time in it that you don't want to "restart" with a new one.

or that every FC I've ever been in on Maduin just felt like I was invited to help farm company credits.

It's not entitlement to realize I was lied to with regards to the game's content or community, and that ultimately FF14 has been the most anti-MMO I've ever played.

You weren't lied to. As you yourself just pointed out, you picked a "dead" data center, which means you're interacting with the smallest of crumbs compared to the entire community. I play on Aether-Gilgamesh, and I've had the complete opposite experiences. The FC's I've been in have been hopping, plenty of FC-run fun events, people helping each other with roulettes, and so on. We get Hunt trains going with over 100 people fairly often throughout the week, which I haven't experienced in *any* other MMO I've played.

You can change your experience.