New player inputs on "the grind" and save scumming, potentially useful before Ragnarok

I have about 30 hours on the game and currently finishing some last few proud quests before unlocking Proto Bahamut. I learned that the game is really grind heavy with a lot of RNG with bad drop rates and that the save scum strats for overmastery and sigil transmutes not only help you save potentially hundreds upon hundreds of hours, but also seem to be very openly accepted within the community unlike cheating for example (even in the discord community the rules state cheats as a prohibited topic but specifically state that save scumming is "more than welcome" so to speak), and while I understand the semantic difference, I don't really see any difference practically from player's perspective, as both things are overcoming game design with unintended progress acceleration.

First of all as someone new not only to Relink but to the whole IP in general, I would like to confirm that I am not the only one who thinks it's an absolutely terrible way to balance the endgame grind? Hopefully I am not alone in thinking that? Like, I am someone who personally hates even AFK farm but even I wouldn't put it into the same bucket with save scumming, as save scumming is a waaaay more uninspired, tedious and a totally unattractive process. I tried doing it a little bit with overmastery for my current main, only lasted a few iterations and didn't really achieve great results, only maybe above average, which indicates that I'll eventually have to do it again... And on other characters too... And for sigils too... Sounds very unattractive, and I feel like if I ever decide to bounce off the game, this will be probably the #1 reason why. I want to progress by playing the game (and feel rewarded for it), not by managing my save files.

Clearly, the fact that save scumming is a known and widely used way to play the game shows that the expectations\preferences of the playerbase when it comes to grind length did not meet the vision of the devs, people are not willing to grind in the "intended" gameplay loop (repeatedly obtain currency and keep rolling until the desired outcome naturally occurs) which would have required an absolutely ludicrous time investment. So, why not just patch the endgame systems, improve RNG or introduce pity into everything? This is a full-price release, not some p2w title, and yet it feels like to align my experience with what I'd expect out of a full-price release I must engage into save scumming, otherwise I feel like I am playing a p2w game without a cash shop (so just simply being a masochist at that point).

Was there feedback on this topic? Was this topic ever a big one within the community and just got ignored by the devs, or did people historically tolerate it? Are there any significant changes to this coming in Endless Ragnarok?

I am generally noticing that a lot of the endgame stuff in this game has a very weird anticlimactic structure such as miserable RNG, the aforementioned save scumming, also the fact that in a game where character variety is one of the pillars of endgame motivation, the most common advice you get for recruiting characters is to NOT recruit characters because if you do - terminus weapon grind for the ones you heavily invested into will be artificially extended.

I've heard and seen many comments about this game being underrated, from all kinds of people starting with regular community members and all the way to top content creators such as Asmongold, and I clearly see where that opinion is coming from because there are SO many amazing things in Relink, but at the same time - would be strange to put on surprise pikachu face when you tell an average gamer that they will have to abuse RNG by manipulating the save\load system to progress and expect them to continue expressing interest in the game, but all of a sudden they don't. Hell, doesn't even matter if it's an average or a hardcore gamer, the tolerance for this stuff is not measured by that at all, it's generally unattractive. It repelled a lot of people away from the game if I had to guess, and I don't really see any justification nor reason for these things to function as they currently do. Hopefully it gets changed. I would rate the game very highly if it did. I want to continue playing, and I want more people to play as well, not only the new story or do the new bossfight once and bounce, but actually play endgame long term, because it's always more fun when the community is larger and more active\lively. With ER there will be a new wave of new\returning players and it would be better if they saw a more polished version of the game. Thanks for reading my opinion.