A little rant

In case it is not obvious at this point this may not be the game for you. You seem to have a casual attitude. This game has been around a long time and most of the people still playing are perfectionists.

In my experience story content is casual friendly. You and your casual friends can clear it and a perfectionist may party with you even if they've done the mission before. Grinding, on the other hand, is not casual friendly. That pursuit is to get the most currency units per hour so only top achievers are going to be included.

The problem is that most of the content released in the last few years has been grind, not story. So some of the casual players have drifted away rather than fight monster X 100 times to get item Y. Sure, there is still the old content available and you can solo that if you'd like but don't expect to play with other people.