I usually don't agree with the whole "omg you don't like FFXI you want easy mode" stuff, and pulling the "everything in FFXI is a timesink, not a challenge" card is cool too, but when you bring CoP into it then someone better slap a bib on you right now.

You wanna know why no one helped anyone else? Cause that shit was hard. Most of the missions involved traversing through one of the new (at the time) areas dodging true sight mobs that used "death" abilities (remember that?). Not only would it take a decent amount of time to manage your way to the actual mission fights (in which most were instances, if I remember correctly) but you probably weren't going to win the first time... or the fifth time. That right there was 10x as "challenging" as any of the content at the endgame.

There are about 1,048,456,500 posts about people protesting time sinks and demanding "challenging", "skill based" content. Look at CoP. That is it right there, no doubt. And if you think about it, if there is content that people will do once and never touch again, and you know for a fact that it didn't revolve around time sinks, then I'd say you made some pretty damn challenging content. The only thing that annoyed me when I did it was that I remember buying all new gear to fit the level cap. That got aggravating.

Now even if this all became real and there was a level cap, who's to say you still couldn't solo it at the forced cap, or duo? I'm personally stuck on the R25 GC ifrit ONLY because it requires a party to enter and I can't find anyone who either needs it or is willing to help. In what universe is that not exactly the same tweaked concept? Whatever. If it was me and I was working hard making a game and people blew through the new "mission" arcs or whatever on their maxed ranks I'd feel foolish and insulted. And by the care and time they seem to be putting in 2.0's release, I've been put under the impression that they take some pride in what they create. But hey, that's just my 2 cents, throw it in your piggy bank.