Why wasn't the game designed like this?

[v_jones]

However, this is a huge wasted opportunity. The uniqueness of having a Miner or Carpenter with their own mine or workshop or their own 'missions' - or forming parties of DoH/L is something that would make FFXIV way more attractive to a large audience.

How would this even work?

The market is completely screwed up with many low level materials costing twice as much as higher level ones: velveteen > linen!!!???

This is how it always is. People spend more time at the higher levels than lower levels, and most don't want to waste time gathering in low areas, so they'd rather just purchase it.

Even the materia system with stat caps vs some of the higher leveled gear is extremely disappointing. It used to be that materia was greater than all - but with an extremely high price. Now the materia system is so watered down that of course they had to water down the stats... this doesn't really benefit anyone - its a lose/lose.

I'm very disappointed with Materia. I have had to get two Materia melded for my relic weapon... and that's it. Why are there no slots on dungeon/dark light gear? Why are there caps? I should be able to min/max and provide some diversity in how characters are built. It's all very vanilla right now.