this new game director producer does not know what he is doing.

[Aldaine]

FFXIV has always always been touted as a casual MMO. If you bought into it and totally ignored this thinking it would really be hardcore heaven then isn't that your own fault?

People seem to be playing FFXIV and expecting it to be like FFXI during it's hardcore years, this is not going to be what they do with a new MMO. Hardcore players are far less valuable than casuals, this has been proven time and time again. For people pining for FFXI, maybe you need to go and see what Square have done to FFXI lately.

FFXI now is 100% a purely casual MMO, XP is incredibly easy and fast to get, you don't have to group ever, endgame is among the easiest and most casual of any MMO, the top tier endgame NMs repop in a matter of minutes, can all be duo'd and have upwards to 90% drop rate if you perform the correct WS, players get massive buffs making all the fights easy for any player. If you want to see how casual endgame is going to go in XIV you should probably go check out XI. Casual & hardcore all wear exactly the same easy to get gear.

You just stated the problems though. I am not trying to bash on anyone or trying to insult the developers, because they are definitely heading in the right directions but just need more time. Yet, I think we can all agree on a few things. A casual MMORPG is great and all, it attracts a larger player base, AT FIRST, but you can't make it too casual. If everyone gets to end game in a few weeks or days or whatever and they have literally been everywhere and done everything and there is no challenge then guess what, that huge player base you accumulated from making the game casual is going to disappear because it will eventually get boring. You need to have challenges and incredibly difficult quests and mobs to be in any MMORPG no matter how casual you want it to be. And yea, a lot of people will compare this game to FFXI, but the truth is, there is a lot of stuff this game can gain from past experiences with FFXI, a lot of things that will make the game better. All in all, the game isn't the best but is definitely getting better, with a lot of room for improvement of course.