I've bitched previously and extensively and in multiple forums about my disgust at the drastic changes wrought in FFXI around the time of the Abyssea expansions. It boils down to two things, which I'll try to recap briefly. First, it became possible to gain XP at 3, 4, maybe 5 times pre-Abyssea rates. Everyone who had slogged through endless hours to grind multiple jobs to 75, hours during which their role skills were honed, now watched as a surge of incompetent nubs flooded endgame.

Second, level cap restrictions were removed from many key storyline bottleneck events. Where we had previously struggled for months in highly structured fashion to complete, say, Chains of Promathia, suddenly it became possible for bumbling pick-up groups and solo- and dual-box artists to plow through previously difficult quest storylines with minimal planning or skill.

The latter rankled me perhaps more than the former, and here's what I think SE should have done: open up endgame content (Sky, Sea, etc.) to newer players in the declining fanbase by creating easier versions of the bottleneck events - but ALSO, offer those events at their original difficulty level, and either remove the gear rewards from the easy-mode wins, or at least nerf the gear rewards for the nerf-mode win. Exempli gratia, CoP's Rajas Ring, which modifies STR, DEX, Subtle Blow and Store TP on a sliding scale based on user level from +3 to +5. For an easy-mode win it should cap at +3 in each modifier. Still quite a useful and flexible item, especially at level 30 when it becomes wearable, but veteran players could rightfully smirk and polish their "pro" Rajas Rings.

But what would have been really cool is if, instead of scaling difficulty DOWN, they ratcheted difficulty UP, rendering the final battles in each expansion impossible under level 90 or so and still non-trivial to level 99, and pin reward upgrades to the new difficulty levels. Instead of depreciating veteran player effort, add (re)play value to the old expansions.