Critical issues that need to be addressed

=== The Level Sync System ===

We are at level 100, yet for playing most of the game's content we have to basically give up half of our skills. I have long stopped doing most of the roulette since I simply don't wanna be able to only use a small part of my skills on my level 100 jobs. Almost all other MMOs manage to offer a better system. An example would be World of Warcraft. During timewalking you can do old content that automatically scales to your level and still do appropriate damage. Even open world content scales to your level to a degree. Timewalking content is automatically synced and you can have people at level 15 playing with a level 80 player and the damage is somewhat appropriately scaled. For a level 15 player they can level with this and a level 80 player instead can sometimes get rewards like special gear or upgrade materials during events. FFXIV needs a better sync system. While unreal exists it is not actually a sync but just content completely rebalanced. It is a bandaid that is starting to bleed through.


=== Regional Cross-Datacenter Partyfinder ===

I play on the Light DC in Europe. As soon as cross-DC travel dropped, EU party finder was a battlefield. And Light won. When a new raid tier drops Light has hundreds of parties, while Chaos might have a few. For Chaos players this means no retainers, no FC buffs, etc. It simply is not fair. Other games can do it too. In most MMOs you can simply queue up with anyone in the same region, sometimes even cross-region. This needs to change in FFXIV.


=== The Gearing System ===

Gearing needs to change. It is uninteresting and pointless. You need to be able to gear multiple jobs on your character at the same time. Examples: More gear sources, variety, augmentation, or upgrades. There are many ways of approaching this, but we need one of them either way. Currently gearing just means do roulettes or hunts for tomestones for a bit during the week and then do the raids. Then you can only do the raids in one specific order even if you have cleared it, you can only do it once on a character even tho you have different jobs that you might want to gear, and once you get the gear what do you do with it? Flex in limsa? You need it for ultimate, sure. But other than that? It is basically pointless. I am not calling for gear to be mandatory by the way. I do not want a situation where casuals now need to do hc content. We just need something different than now. A total rework that actually makes gearing fun while making sure that a new player does not need to do hc content just to progress.


=== The Glamour System ===

Make it a collection system. Plain and simple. Literally every other MMO has this because it WORKS. Once you pick up something you can glamour it. And no glamour plate amount restriction. This also ties into adventurer plates. They need to just work. Display the gear you wear now instead of being bound to the plate.


=== Content Replayability, Rewards, and Motivation ===

This is probably one of the biggest problems this game faces. Why should I do content if all I get from it is materia? Or a mount? This is bad. Most content in the game currently is just a one-off for most players. An example of how WoW handles this: Almost ANY content gives you upgrade items for your gear. Then they select specific ones randomly that are buffed so you can do that content for even more rewards like better upgrade mats or good gear. You can also get random recipes for crafters that sometimes sell well or can get you money if you use them yourself.

In FFXIV, why would I do a dungeon for gear that I don't need? Why do a criterion if all I get is materia or a mount? Sure you do them once because they might be fun to prog and experience. But then for most players they are dead. They feel just like a waste of time. Instead we need content that actually gives you something to do that actually progresses your character. The entire system needs to be reworked and the progression needs to be changed from purely vertical to a mixture of vertical AND horizontal progression. Things that indirectly increase your character's power. Bring in weekly or daily things that motivate you to do specific pieces of content that are not just raids. Make sure that content actually rewards you with things you want, and not just materia. Materia is cool, but I don't need to do a 20min dungeon for 5 materia and the chance for a mount. That is simply not what people want to do content for.


=== The Housing System ===

Nothing I can say other than look at the new housing in WoW. Your guild gets an entire instance where EVERYONE gets their own house! There are ~1000 items from the start. Everyone gets a house if they want one. We have to draw lots to have a small chance of a house that is taken away in one of the 6 month content droughts if we don't sub.