I am OK with the big gather quests because, when I do start them with my team, I'll be spending the time going from quest to quest gathering up materials like herbs and ore nodes. This morning, when I was running through that water zone with my druid, I collected a bunch of stuff just swimming along from quest to quest; there will be even more opportunity with the grindy quests to do this, which will lead to even more materials gathered, which I can then sell for even more outrageous profits (or, at some point, actually use to improve my professions). And green drops, and cloth drops... More kills means more loot to sell!

I think I also am immune to gather quest badness because I have leveled a team to 80 through questing, prior to the new-old world. Some of those gathering quests were so brutal that when I see someone complaining about spending an hour on a gathering quest I laugh because I once spent 3 days getting one done on a team due to RIDICULOUSLY bad drop rates, spawn timers and competition.