I've played FFXI for several years as well, but I must say that I Did not enjoy camping HNM's with a respawn window between 6 to 48 hours while battling a group of 15+ non-ls players.

Since I work full time, I can't sit around for a few hours, hoping that the HNM spawns within 15min to 2 hours and hoping I could get the claim with my party.

But, calling FFXIV "noob" friendly and say we want to have everything handed out to us is going a bit too far.

So far, we've only played content up to level 35, so we Can't say that we will not be able to have the same experience as we had in FFXI. But, if we will have that, I sincerely hope that we will not have to camp HNM's with a spawning window of 2 hours and a respawn window of 48 hours or more.

Also, catering a MMO for both casuals and hardcore players is not a bad thing, as long as both type of players have enough challenging content to suit their needs and generate loot according to effort they've placed in obtaining it.

I'm currently at work, so I can't explain in detail why I do not agree with your OP, but I can later today (if you wish to hear my opinion).

Cheers.

75 RDM/SMN/BRD/DNC/DRG/BLM