I used to be like you.

Then I realized how to not suck.

I used to blame every loss/death on lag, then after realizing how to do the fight properly and how to recognize stuff, I will die maybe once out of every 10 fights now. I very rarely fall into yellow HP on this fight now. It's not lag. It's rarely lag. Sure lag will get you killed, but there are some things to keep in mind.

1) Don't look at the ground. Eyes on Ifrit at all times. You are not looking for cracks or plumes. You are looking at his pose patterns. If he begins to crouch, start running, cracks will appear. If he bends over and reaches up, plumes are appearing. Plumes are nothing anyway because if your tank is doing his or her job, you will never be hit by them no matter what anyway.

2) Never ever use a job ability or weapon skill until Ifrit does.

If you can follow the above two, it doesn't matter how much lag you have you'll be fine. I am playing on a laptop at like 8 FPS at times and have a shitty university connection and again I rarely get hit by anything. If I can do it, anybody here can do it unless you're on dial-up or some shit.