XIV was broken at launch. Lot of it was fixed about just a year and a half ago.

ARR is taking that to the extreme and is most likely going to be an even better game.

/Still have my FFXIV installation on my PC so I can carry over my character into the new benchmarks/character creator :3

As far as sub fees, if you were a veteran by a certain point you get ARR sub fee's cut by 33% and you only have to pay 9.99$.

FFXI still requires subs and is doing fine. ARR will too probably. I'd rather pay 15$ a month for a game that is well maintained than one that isn't. FFXIV while it was FTP has a LOT of updates