I say it's not necessary.
The Dunes have been perfectly fine the way they are since the game was released. All of the JP players did just fine without a Nomad Moogle. All the NA players to date have done fine without a Nomad Moogle. All the current players could do just as fine without it.
The problem, to me, seems to be that new players are becoming more and more impatient and want more and more "faster and easier". Seems to me people need to change their attitude toward the game, and stop trying to change the game to suit their attitude.
I don't mean this to become a "when I was your age..." type post but, it really bugs the hell out of me, as it is, to see new players being Power-Leveled.. now some parties by *two* PL's? Good grief. New players really have no idea how much they're hurting themselves for later in the game and, by extension, any parties they wind up in.
"Succeeding" in FFXI is not all about how many levels you can get in a day without dying. There's *much* more to it than that. There's important things you are *learning* while earning those levels (note I said "earning" not "being PL'd through").
The Dunes (or anywhere at those levels) are your first real experience with learning how to play your character, how to work in a party, what you can and can't take at a given level - fundamental skills that you will use and build on for the rest of the game. Not being able to kill a mob means you fight something closer to your own level, or figure out what you're doing wrong and correct it. This translates, over time, into *learning how to play your character and function in groups*. It does not mean "Oh, we need to find a power-leveler so we can fight these mobs".
I swear, the popular mentality toward this game has gone so far into the weeds, in so many ways, I'm damn glad I started back when I did.
Someone mentioned the Dunes being a really far run from Windy. You're absolutely right. That's why people from Windy do best to level up through Sarutabaruta, Tahrongi Canyon, Maze of Shakhrami and Buburimu Peninsula. Sound crazy? It shouldn't. That's where people from Windy, most anyway, leveled up back when the game first launched in NA on PC. Shakhrami maze was always populated. You'd see parties camped out in Tahrongi Canyon and Buburimu Peninsula. People did their SubJob quest out of Mhaura, not Selbina. I, personally, had never even been to Selbina before I reached level 20 on my first job; the mob I dinged 20 on was a Dhalmel. It was right near the path heading to Meriphataud Mountains in N. Tahrongi. Those areas are not useless. People simply don't use them.
So, no you do not have to go to Valkurm Dunes from Windurst for those levels. I wish people would get over that concept - because it's flat wrong. Yes there are options much closer to home. It's very do-able. Valkurm is not the only place to level from 10-20 in this game - no matter what the online guides, or whatever, say.
People just need to change their thinking about this game. Stop following the same cookie-cutter process as everyone else and use your own heads a little. Guides are just as useful for researching areas to find out what level mobs spawn in what areas as they are for quest/mission walk-throughs.
Sorry for the rant, but so many of the complaints I see about this game are derived from players who have been misinformed and misled into following the same exact routine, level by level, job by job, area by area, thinking it's the "only way" to play the game. Yet none, or at least so few, ever stop and think "There's *gotta* be another way to do this..."
Edited, Wed Oct 12 14:57:31 2005 by wsimike