By Fenrir.Schutz 2016-12-11 16:15:18
I remember they had classic timed-spawn NM's back in FFXIV 1.xx, and there were even related over-world quests targeting them as kill-goals.
They'd even drop (on a %-based chance) items unique to the NM, which were scaled to its level-range, much like the old-style FFXI timed NM's. To my knowledge, though, they didn't have lottery place-holders and just appeared (rather frequently and dependably) at their spawn areas making camping less of a chore. On average, from my experience the chance they'd drop their special item was about 1:3--owing to SE's desire to make 1.xx FFXIV more accessible to new players, I'd imagine.
They later (around 1.20) introduced super NM's (along with quests to kill them) as part of later city missions, but did away with that in favour of the FATE system and mission battlefield instances/spawned-quest NM's in 2.xx I think.