I have only ever been on Asura, is there no middle ground servers with active enough player base to actually do stuff but not so highly populated it’s flooded with Exp Bots?
I wouldn't set the bar at "are there exp bots?" Because people bot everywhere because nobody has morals. I think the difference between Asura and other servers is the lack of mercs. And yes, most non-Asura servers are exactly as you describe, enough people to do events with, but not filled with gil buyers and mercs so everything is transactional.
I do Odyssey every day (used to be 2 groups but one recently broke up), Omen twice/week, Dynamis twice/week, Vagary once/month, I've done like...7 aeonic runs. On smaller servers you have to make friends, join linkshells, and schedule events with your friends, rather than just farming (buying) gil and buying whatever you want.