General concerns, some of which need to be addressed:

[CannedToast]

I agree with you completely on all points.

I'm coming from a year spent on Guild Wars 2 (which I'm still playing, but not as hard as I used to). I loved leveling in GW2. I have SIX max level fully geared alts. I had all the crafting disciplines maxed before the most recent patch that bumped them up a bit. I did full map complete TWICE.

This game world feels small. I don't feel adequately rewarded for anything I do. The dungeon loot system is atrocious. The only way I'm guaranteed armor is if it drops? And then if I'm over-leveled it doesn't scale? LAME. The only thing keeping my interest is the story and crafting (and even now its waning due to the ridiculous amount of grinding necessary).

In GW2, leveling was an adventure. I wandered around and did what I pleased when I pleased and somehow gained plenty of exp. It didn't feel like a grind even though it took weeks and I loved that... and its F2P! At this rate, I won't be subscribing to FFXIV after the free period.