On the one hand, I love completing gear sets. Running Satasha, Tam-Tara, and CBM over two dozen times to get the full Foestriker's Set was well worth it in my opinion (even more so since I can get good mileage off the set when I begin to level Lancer). Even though I didn't complete the set until a 29 Pugilist, I was enjoying the hunt. Same goes for when I completed the Cavalry set after about 30 runs of Brayflox (although I never saw the damn Marauder's Ring drop!). Getting the full set, and then running dungeons or leves or FATEs--whatever it is--and looking damn good doing 'em feels great. Even if I have a slight stat deficiency over my party members, I'm confident enough and clever enough to know that my skill will cover me in that respect.

However, I will still recognize when I can't both look good and play well, as well as when skill just ain't enough. Having recently run Stone Vigil as a Warrior in full Cavalry Set, plus the axe from Sunken Temple, it was much more difficult than I anticipated. I'm not sure if the healer just wasn't keeping up, or if it was due to my armor (especially since the NQ Mythril Armor set has lower defense than the Cavalry pieces, I'm inclined to believe it was the healer), but I recognized the possibility of a shortcoming and covered it--with a HQ set of Mythril gear, no less. Am I a bit miffed that I'm not gonna be wearing the set anytime soon? Definitely. But I would much prefer to make everyone's jobs easier, even if it comes at the expense of looking silly.

What I'm trying to say, if any of this made a lick of sense, is that if you can look good AND kick ass, good on ya! But should push ever come to shove in a real way (as in more than a few points), then it'd probably be best to focus on wearing gear with better stats.