you still want me to go out and kill wildebeests till I get 5 horns.
Lol, no different than killing "Wildebeests" till you level 5-7 times, Where are you getting at here? Weather or not the Quests have a compelling story or not, your still doing the same thing kill X monster so many times :P.

Just how I see it, I'm playing Aion currently, and it still feels like I'm mindlessly grinding mobs ( if you minus the quest givers story).

If all you got from the Quest giver was kill 10 of these Bees for 5k exp in total from the Quest giver, you could get the same amount If approach to level was to level at X camp for Y Levels, and those 10 bees could give 5k exp as well if you just killed them minus the quest.

To me it's the same thing.