My response to the discussion so far would be this:

Why allow a level 1 player to diminish their stats in a R50 piece of armor? Why not just make a "minimum" rank and an "optimal" rank for each piece of gear so that you are restricted from equipping high level items until they are at least worth owning?

Does the freedom of being able to equip whatever, wherever, whenever transcend the feeling of accomplish that should come with finally equipping your "LEET" gear? I think not.

What FFXIV so clearly needs is an incentive to play. Leves are stale and boring, side quests are empty time sinks that grant the player virtually nothing worthwhile. Crafting is fun for an hour until you hit level 15 and the levels start getting longer and longer. (I understand that increased intervals is the basic foundation of any MMO endeavor, but I'm talking about playability here.)

In FFXI, my first time through the levels, I didn't know the first thing about Zilart missions, Promyvions, SKY, SEA, anything involved with acquiring the rarest end-game gear. And while FFXIV lacks an end-game to begin with, the game can become playable if it can duplicate the notion, present in FFXI, that leveling will make you stronger beyond just acquiring new abilities. Getting my conjurer from 35 to 37 should make me stronger beyond just the stat points i get along the way. I should get stronger at 36 when I can wear all my Velveteen attire without being below optimal rank. I should get WAY stronger at 37 when I switch from a level 27 NQ wand to a Walnut Wand +2. I observed a minimal increase when testing these things on my (currently rank 37) conjurer. No sense of accomplishment. THAT is what FFXIV is missing, and that is the ticket to saving the game.

As it stands, I don't CARE whether or not the MRDs in my behest are using the right gear. But I should! It should make all the difference if the player is wearing INT rings on his MRD. But it doesn't. It should matter if a player is wearing vintage scale mail at level 20. But it doesn't. This needs to be fixed.