Difficulty of normal content.

[Novarius]

Another variable is a lot of people joined during the latter half of SHB where most content was already outgeared. They haven't known difficulty in FFXIV, and their bar was lowered even further with EW content.

I definitely fell victim to this, I joined in 5.2 and thought I was impressive cleared synced ARR EXs and then got a very rude awakening and was quickly humbled when I jumped into Eden’s Verse Savage. Difference is I gradually worked on my shortcomings, improved my fundamentals and game sense and now I’m definitely reaping the benefits. If you put in the groundwork early on in FFXIV it pays off massively in the long run…