Maybe I'm taking too literally what should be gameplay and story segregation, but the fact that crafted grimoires use special aetherial-conducting ink makes me think that that the actual contents of the grimoire traced by the arcanist matters just as much as what exactly they're tracing on. "Freedrawing" it without this aether-conducting ink doesn't seem like it would work very well, like trying to cast other kinds of magic without a staff or wand to aid the caster. It's not clear how it would happen in FFXIV but many fictions will have the cast be either very weak, unstable, or just not work at all.
