People always credit GW2 with those dynamic events for some reason. RIFT made them popular, not gw2.

As for comparison to wow. Most mmos are just evolutions of other mmos. People see the holy trinity and go "Omg wow clone". While the games are similar, ffxiv has enough to differentiate itself IMHO. Wow is an EQ clone, if you wanna get technical.

Try the free trial for wow before buying if you've never played it. I think it let's you play up to level 20.