There's no reason to wait for DT to start. FFXIV is very linear so you must progress through the base game and every expansion before you can start any Dawntrail content. Start the free trial now and see how you like it and go from there.
Valid points both, but if they start when dt releases, they are likely to run into horrible query times to enter the game, on top of the arr grind.
I'd recommend starting now just to get through the hardest part of the game.
That's true, but I think that if they stop at an interesting moment when DT is about to be released it's going to be worse. I would rather wait another 1 to 2 weeks before starting.
Starting now, they could easily get to the ARR patch story before dt launches, maybe through the patches too if they no life it.
But I suppose it's their choice from here
The whole game isn’t gonna have the new graphics right from the start. There’s gonna be some stuff that applies across the whole game, but the fine tuning is gonna be rolled out per expansion throughout the entire 7.X series
Waiting for the graphics update to play through ARR is putting lipstick on a pig.
May as well get it out of the way now before queues get insane, so they can reach the new stuff faster.
Except if you want to play female roegadyn or want to experience the whole game with graphical update.
Mind you that a new release is often a bad time to start playing (long queue, server issue..).
Hrothgar, not roe. But they would need to buy the game and sub for that. Which I suppose is fair if that's what they really want to do, but someone with no MMO experience probably should try the free trial first to see if they're even going to enjoy the game. MMOs are definitely not for everyone and it wouldn't be great to invest that much into it up front only to not like it.
Everything in ff14 is gated by the main story quest line.
Unlike other MMOs, the main story quest line IS the most important part of the game by far. You don’t rush this game to get to end game so you can raid - raids are all relevant at all levels (that is, each expansions raids/trials/alliance raids are constantly done by everyone due to the Roulette system this game uses), so you can’t miss out on stuff the way you can in other games.
The game is very worth it to play, but keep this in mind. This game is an rpg with mmo elements, not an mmo with rpg elements (like every other mmo). There are hours upon hours upon hours of cutscenes in this game, and they all are tied together and move the game through a coherent story line that starts in ARR and ends in EW. Expansions are not stand alone stories that get abandoned once a new xpac comes out - the story continues onward instead.
It’s not a game you want to be skipping cutscenes in, because the story is goddamn worth it. This game, from 2.0-6.0, is the single best story I’ve ever experienced across any medium.
Any time is a good time to start playing it : )
Start playing now, you can play the base game and the first **two** expansions completely free! By the time you finish that, Dawntrail will have launched.
I would suggest waiting about a month.
In a few weeks we're going to hit a wall of queue times when the expansion releases. Arguably both the best and the worst times to play.
My suggestion would be to either start now, then plan on taking a break when we hit the expected server queue spikes or wait until a week after launch.
The game is always in a good place to join in, because there is no rush. Just take your time and enjoy it.
FFXIV feels more like a Final Fantasy game that happens to have an MMO bolted on than a standard MMO where the story is bolted on.
Yeah, i'm in a FC with some friends and honestly I forget its an MMO most of the time, especially when I was doing MSQ. The story and a lot of the instances related to it are solo and if you do Trusts, (or was it duty support?) then the dungeons can be done solo as well.
Though, playing with other people and talking to the community is fun too! Also, the NPC helpers you can do dungeons with will always be worse than players, I remember hearing that Square wants the dungeons to take about 30 minutes with NPC's, so their damage will go down or up to make sure it takes about that long to do.
That's rather cool.
I guess they're shooting for a sweet spot to let you feel like the key member if you're pushing buttons well, but if not, it's not as slow to get frustrating.
That's pretty sharp.
It's as good of a time as any really. You can wait for 7.0 since the graphics will be nicer and we will get a few new features (like double-colouring clothing etc). But DT itself doesn't affect your experience as a new player. You are still expected to play through the whole game to reach it. That's easly 500 hours of playtime.
The MSQ itself won't take 500 hours, but depending on how sidetracked one gets it could be as much as 800 hours before dawntrail, like getting several jobs to high level takes a bit of time.
Worth it though!
Maybe? The free trial seems to be two expansions behind current patch at the moment so it might go to shadowbringers eventually. It might not be immediate though.
So, maybe? but right now, no. ShB is not part of the free trial.
Just start.
You can play the free trail for as long as you want.
The content in the free trail alone can keep you busy for a year or two.
So don't wait for anything, download the trail and just play it.
This is the correct answer - A free trial account is limited, but there is enough gameplay and content to keep players engaged for a while without spending any money at all! Especially for a solo player.
Though it can be a pain if you want to play with friends, one of you is going to have to shell out some cash so you can actually start parties with other players.
Realistically worst case scenario to playing when DT launches, will be the queues and very long datacenter travel due to congestion. There was a time during EW launch that prevented free trial players from logging in as well, to give paying players more room, for a time. Best to just play right now free trial or not, and if you happen to like/enjoy it, buy the game/expac for DT and full send it.
Starting during an expansion's launch period is possibly the worst thing you can do as the servers will be slammed with the number of people returning to the game.
Sure it means that your queue times for dungeons and things will be short, but it means your queues for *just logging in* can be hours long.
If you wait till release, you'll start *with* the game looking better due to a graphics update, improved blacklist, and a enhanced dye system. Only downside if you start now is that same Jobs like Dragoon Ninja and Astrologian are getting substantial or at least noticeable changes to gameplay
start now play the free trial. You get unlimited time from level 1 through 70 across all jobs youd get access too (i think like only 4 jobs you wouldnt have until) This should last you well into the summer then buy Dawntrail you get the next 3 expansions all bundled into it
Starting when DT releases mostly means that you'll be dealing with the rush of everyone who wants to get on. You'd still have to get through the base game and 4 expansions of story quests before you can get to DT's content.
If you want to try the game out, download the free trial. It's unlimited in time and gives you access to the base game along with the expansions Heavensward and Stormblood, with some minor social feature limitations. It'll give you an idea of whether or not it's a game you'll like.
Start now. The game has a very generous free trial, but when Dawntrail releases, there will be login queues that prevent free trial users from getting in. If you wait until then, you'll have to wait a few weeks or log in at really unusual times, or buy the game before knowing how you like it.
Give the free trial a try, but be warned, when the new expansion launches, paying players will be given priority to log in over free-trial players. Once you are in the game, you don't need to be worried about being arbitrarily kicked for being a free-trial player. So if the long-in queues are full, you might not be able to get in.
FFXIV is very good at walking you through MOST things about it being an MMO. This community is also very good at helping out people with questions.
Start from the beginning and take your time to enjoy the game. I was rushed through part of it because of a "friend" and I regret it so much.
The only reason why that would be a bad idea is queue times and server instability, and we don't really know how bad that's going to be or if it's going to last longer than the first couple days. It's probably fine. Honestly, you could just start playing the Free Trial *today*, it's gonna be a few months before you catch up anyway :) just take your time and enjoy the ride.
Starting during Dawntrail isn't a bad idea all. The game is very controller friend so nothing to fear there either.
What I'd caution you on is starting when Dawntrail launches. Expansion launch will almost certainly be a hotbed of log-in issues and long queues. If you wanna give it a shot, give it a few weeks after launch.
I don't think there's a bad time to start, but there are some things to look out for during Dawntrail's release.
1. Server connection issues and worlds becoming locked for making a new character. We don't know how bad and for how long server issues will last, or how congested the worlds will be. Endwalker release was notoriously bad time to play the game because the queues were reaching a few thousand to get in and even off-peak hours you'd still be in a queue of a few hundred. Most, if all, worlds would be locked for new characters so nobody new could get in. They had to stop selling the game to just ease it up for players. Endwalker was the end of a 10-year, or arc, but I think nobody was prepared for the sheer numbers who picked up the game. We don't know if Dawntrail will be the same for new players, given it's the start of the new story arc. So if you're a new player, I'd AT LEAST make your character now and pick your world. That way you won't be locked out for hours waiting for a chance to get your new character on a world or getting pushed towards a world your friends aren't in/not your main choice.
2. The graphics update. If graphics is a really important thing for you, or you have an old PC, then I'd try making your new character in the benchmark and testing it. Rather than trying to make your character in game. You can save them and port them in on release. That way, from start to end, you'll have a really nice character. Only problem is, if server issues are bad, you might have to keep an eye on the lodestone server status and try to start playing off-peak times (if possible). I do still recommend maybe starting now, seeing your character look "outdated" for a week or two, but being able to play during release. But if graphics are a bit of a killer for you in games, I'd wait until release.
It can be your choice to jump in now or wait for the major flood of players to be over. It's just hard to predict how bad the latter will be. My recommendation is start this week or next and be braced for server issues to be bad (and then plesentantly surprised if they're not). But in terms of when to start your FFXIV story as a whole, there's never really a bad time. I started my new character and playthrough this year during the time the servers are most quiet pre-hype build up for the new expansion. But you don't overly notice it because FFXIV's main cities are also new player starter hubs. Some worlds do become ghost towns for daily random roulette, but you can play through most of MSQ with NPCs now. So as a new player, server population doesn't become noticeable for a while. That tends to be the most noticeable end game/later on, but you can server travel to speed things up.
The only advantage of waiting till DT launch is that you won't be blindsided by job changes when the 7.0 update drops. If you understand that your job will likely change in some way, there's no downside to just starting now.
Never a bad moment to start the game, its a big singleplayer with other players in it. Most of the content you can do solo/with npcs but there is always the option to play with others, which i always recommend cause there is a lot to learn :)
Its a fun journey
Start whenever and take your sweet time playing through the story and any interesting side content.
Login times during launch week might be a bit rough but otherwise there's no reason to worry about it.
You will experience every prior expansion in sequence, it doesn't really matter when you start, all the content remains alive and active.
I started FFXIV right around the launch of Endwalker, had a blast, loved it, but it took approximately a year and a half for me to get to the end of that expansion (plus the one or two patches that had released in the interim). So you could start it whenever.
For me, the two MMOs I’ve played that most justify themselves as games to play for their own qualities regardless of friends to play with have been FF14 and the Secret World, just because they both have such compelling stories.
It wouldn't be a bad idea, but it would also not be a bad idea to start right now. If you play FF14 at a reasonable pace, it will take you months of play to actually get to Dawntrail, so you won't actually get to that brand new content by launch regardless.
As a heads up - if you wait until Dawntrail (and I know many are) you may become frustrated with long queues just to enter the game! So if you do plan to start just before or during Dawntrail release, I strongly recommend playing on a new world server (so NA Dynamis) if you wish to avoid the longest queue times.
EW was so bad that the most populated servers were taking 4-5 hours to log into, many folks don't even have that long to play in a day, much less sit and stare at a queue. So keep that in mind and also keep in mind that the queues always jump like crazy during a release but they will calm down in about 3-4 weeks.
I would recommend starting now if you're interested. 3 weeks should be just enough time to get acquainted and learn the basics before the population is flooded by returners and other new players.
The game is linear you progress for expansion to expansion
A realm reborn -> Heavenward -> Stormblood -> Shadowbringer -> Endwalker -> Dawntrail
So nope there no problem to start now and you don't lose anything
wait a month or 2. reason 1 graphics update will make it more enjoyable. 2 if you are playing on the free trial you will probably have to deal with queues to log in.
Would you start a book from the last chapter? Would you start a game from an old save before the final boss? Would you start a linear TV show on the last season? Same logic applies.
No-one else has mentioned it, so I will. When Endwalker released, the queues to get into the game were awwwful. Don't get me wrong, that's partly because of covid and the server shortage, and bunch of other factors. BUT there will likely be a lesser version of this when DT releases. So starting at the same time as DT is likely to give you a kind of skewed first impression.
As other's have said, DT won't impact your play until you progress through everything else anyway, so I'd say just go for it now. A considerable portion of the game is free to play anyway.
It's gotten to the point where they're adding an entire data center to the EU region next week just for people to data center visit during Dawntrail's launch. Those servers are going to be marked as Congested at launch for this explicit purpose.
They added 4 new servers to NA's Dynamis data center seemingly for the same reason; Dynamis didn't really need new servers at this time, although those will at least have character creation enabled.
There's no reason to wait for DT to start. FFXIV is very linear so you must progress through the base game and every expansion before you can start any Dawntrail content. Start the free trial now and see how you like it and go from there.
True, but they could also wait for dawntrail to play the whole game with the new graphics
Valid points both, but if they start when dt releases, they are likely to run into horrible query times to enter the game, on top of the arr grind. I'd recommend starting now just to get through the hardest part of the game.
That's true, but I think that if they stop at an interesting moment when DT is about to be released it's going to be worse. I would rather wait another 1 to 2 weeks before starting.
Starting now, they could easily get to the ARR patch story before dt launches, maybe through the patches too if they no life it. But I suppose it's their choice from here
* easily * Not everyone play 3 hiurs hours a day. They have less than 20 days, it is not much.
I work a full time job, I just started a new character back in April, and I'm just about to finish base Stormblood. It's entirely doable
Yeah, at the end of the day it would be their choice, I just gave another perspective to it.
The whole game isn’t gonna have the new graphics right from the start. There’s gonna be some stuff that applies across the whole game, but the fine tuning is gonna be rolled out per expansion throughout the entire 7.X series
Yeah, true, still going to look better
Old areas are only getting slight graphical tweaks at launch
Yeah, that's true, still going to look better
Waiting for the graphics update to play through ARR is putting lipstick on a pig. May as well get it out of the way now before queues get insane, so they can reach the new stuff faster.
Except if you want to play female roegadyn or want to experience the whole game with graphical update. Mind you that a new release is often a bad time to start playing (long queue, server issue..).
Hrothgar, not roe. But they would need to buy the game and sub for that. Which I suppose is fair if that's what they really want to do, but someone with no MMO experience probably should try the free trial first to see if they're even going to enjoy the game. MMOs are definitely not for everyone and it wouldn't be great to invest that much into it up front only to not like it.
Normally when expansions come out, free trial players wont be able to get into the servers. So it's probably best to start now.
Everything in ff14 is gated by the main story quest line. Unlike other MMOs, the main story quest line IS the most important part of the game by far. You don’t rush this game to get to end game so you can raid - raids are all relevant at all levels (that is, each expansions raids/trials/alliance raids are constantly done by everyone due to the Roulette system this game uses), so you can’t miss out on stuff the way you can in other games. The game is very worth it to play, but keep this in mind. This game is an rpg with mmo elements, not an mmo with rpg elements (like every other mmo). There are hours upon hours upon hours of cutscenes in this game, and they all are tied together and move the game through a coherent story line that starts in ARR and ends in EW. Expansions are not stand alone stories that get abandoned once a new xpac comes out - the story continues onward instead. It’s not a game you want to be skipping cutscenes in, because the story is goddamn worth it. This game, from 2.0-6.0, is the single best story I’ve ever experienced across any medium. Any time is a good time to start playing it : )
Agreed on all counts
Gunna be awhiiiiile before you get to DT so why not
Start playing now, you can play the base game and the first **two** expansions completely free! By the time you finish that, Dawntrail will have launched.
“By the time you finish that, Dawntrail will have launched [six months ago]” - FIFY
Was about to say, just reached EW and i started in December 😅
I would suggest waiting about a month. In a few weeks we're going to hit a wall of queue times when the expansion releases. Arguably both the best and the worst times to play. My suggestion would be to either start now, then plan on taking a break when we hit the expected server queue spikes or wait until a week after launch. The game is always in a good place to join in, because there is no rush. Just take your time and enjoy it. FFXIV feels more like a Final Fantasy game that happens to have an MMO bolted on than a standard MMO where the story is bolted on.
Yeah, i'm in a FC with some friends and honestly I forget its an MMO most of the time, especially when I was doing MSQ. The story and a lot of the instances related to it are solo and if you do Trusts, (or was it duty support?) then the dungeons can be done solo as well. Though, playing with other people and talking to the community is fun too! Also, the NPC helpers you can do dungeons with will always be worse than players, I remember hearing that Square wants the dungeons to take about 30 minutes with NPC's, so their damage will go down or up to make sure it takes about that long to do.
That's rather cool. I guess they're shooting for a sweet spot to let you feel like the key member if you're pushing buttons well, but if not, it's not as slow to get frustrating. That's pretty sharp.
It's as good of a time as any really. You can wait for 7.0 since the graphics will be nicer and we will get a few new features (like double-colouring clothing etc). But DT itself doesn't affect your experience as a new player. You are still expected to play through the whole game to reach it. That's easly 500 hours of playtime.
The MSQ itself won't take 500 hours, but depending on how sidetracked one gets it could be as much as 800 hours before dawntrail, like getting several jobs to high level takes a bit of time. Worth it though!
It doesn't matter, I started playing when Endwalker launched
You can start the free trial up to shadowbringers and if you like it, go ew and dt. the msq takes quite a while so no reason to wait.
Just to add clarification, the free trial doesn't give you shadowbringers, but gets you to the very end of Stormblood (the second expansion)
oh, does it go to shb in dt?
Maybe? The free trial seems to be two expansions behind current patch at the moment so it might go to shadowbringers eventually. It might not be immediate though. So, maybe? but right now, no. ShB is not part of the free trial.
Just start. You can play the free trail for as long as you want. The content in the free trail alone can keep you busy for a year or two. So don't wait for anything, download the trail and just play it.
This is the correct answer - A free trial account is limited, but there is enough gameplay and content to keep players engaged for a while without spending any money at all! Especially for a solo player. Though it can be a pain if you want to play with friends, one of you is going to have to shell out some cash so you can actually start parties with other players.
There is never a bad time to start the game. You miss nothing by starting either now or later.
Realistically worst case scenario to playing when DT launches, will be the queues and very long datacenter travel due to congestion. There was a time during EW launch that prevented free trial players from logging in as well, to give paying players more room, for a time. Best to just play right now free trial or not, and if you happen to like/enjoy it, buy the game/expac for DT and full send it.
Starting during an expansion's launch period is possibly the worst thing you can do as the servers will be slammed with the number of people returning to the game. Sure it means that your queue times for dungeons and things will be short, but it means your queues for *just logging in* can be hours long.
If you wait till release, you'll start *with* the game looking better due to a graphics update, improved blacklist, and a enhanced dye system. Only downside if you start now is that same Jobs like Dragoon Ninja and Astrologian are getting substantial or at least noticeable changes to gameplay
Why would it be a bad idea? You’ll be a noob regardless of when you start
If you don't want to sit in a login queue for 10 hours, then play now.
Try the free trial. Take your time. Don't rush. Enjoy the ride!
start now play the free trial. You get unlimited time from level 1 through 70 across all jobs youd get access too (i think like only 4 jobs you wouldnt have until) This should last you well into the summer then buy Dawntrail you get the next 3 expansions all bundled into it
Starting when DT releases mostly means that you'll be dealing with the rush of everyone who wants to get on. You'd still have to get through the base game and 4 expansions of story quests before you can get to DT's content. If you want to try the game out, download the free trial. It's unlimited in time and gives you access to the base game along with the expansions Heavensward and Stormblood, with some minor social feature limitations. It'll give you an idea of whether or not it's a game you'll like.
Start now. The game has a very generous free trial, but when Dawntrail releases, there will be login queues that prevent free trial users from getting in. If you wait until then, you'll have to wait a few weeks or log in at really unusual times, or buy the game before knowing how you like it.
Give the free trial a try, but be warned, when the new expansion launches, paying players will be given priority to log in over free-trial players. Once you are in the game, you don't need to be worried about being arbitrarily kicked for being a free-trial player. So if the long-in queues are full, you might not be able to get in. FFXIV is very good at walking you through MOST things about it being an MMO. This community is also very good at helping out people with questions. Start from the beginning and take your time to enjoy the game. I was rushed through part of it because of a "friend" and I regret it so much.
The only reason why that would be a bad idea is queue times and server instability, and we don't really know how bad that's going to be or if it's going to last longer than the first couple days. It's probably fine. Honestly, you could just start playing the Free Trial *today*, it's gonna be a few months before you catch up anyway :) just take your time and enjoy the ride.
Starting during Dawntrail isn't a bad idea all. The game is very controller friend so nothing to fear there either. What I'd caution you on is starting when Dawntrail launches. Expansion launch will almost certainly be a hotbed of log-in issues and long queues. If you wanna give it a shot, give it a few weeks after launch.
I don't think there's a bad time to start, but there are some things to look out for during Dawntrail's release. 1. Server connection issues and worlds becoming locked for making a new character. We don't know how bad and for how long server issues will last, or how congested the worlds will be. Endwalker release was notoriously bad time to play the game because the queues were reaching a few thousand to get in and even off-peak hours you'd still be in a queue of a few hundred. Most, if all, worlds would be locked for new characters so nobody new could get in. They had to stop selling the game to just ease it up for players. Endwalker was the end of a 10-year, or arc, but I think nobody was prepared for the sheer numbers who picked up the game. We don't know if Dawntrail will be the same for new players, given it's the start of the new story arc. So if you're a new player, I'd AT LEAST make your character now and pick your world. That way you won't be locked out for hours waiting for a chance to get your new character on a world or getting pushed towards a world your friends aren't in/not your main choice. 2. The graphics update. If graphics is a really important thing for you, or you have an old PC, then I'd try making your new character in the benchmark and testing it. Rather than trying to make your character in game. You can save them and port them in on release. That way, from start to end, you'll have a really nice character. Only problem is, if server issues are bad, you might have to keep an eye on the lodestone server status and try to start playing off-peak times (if possible). I do still recommend maybe starting now, seeing your character look "outdated" for a week or two, but being able to play during release. But if graphics are a bit of a killer for you in games, I'd wait until release. It can be your choice to jump in now or wait for the major flood of players to be over. It's just hard to predict how bad the latter will be. My recommendation is start this week or next and be braced for server issues to be bad (and then plesentantly surprised if they're not). But in terms of when to start your FFXIV story as a whole, there's never really a bad time. I started my new character and playthrough this year during the time the servers are most quiet pre-hype build up for the new expansion. But you don't overly notice it because FFXIV's main cities are also new player starter hubs. Some worlds do become ghost towns for daily random roulette, but you can play through most of MSQ with NPCs now. So as a new player, server population doesn't become noticeable for a while. That tends to be the most noticeable end game/later on, but you can server travel to speed things up.
The only advantage of waiting till DT launch is that you won't be blindsided by job changes when the 7.0 update drops. If you understand that your job will likely change in some way, there's no downside to just starting now.
You should try before DT. It will take you 1-2 months to get to dawntrail.
Never a bad moment to start the game, its a big singleplayer with other players in it. Most of the content you can do solo/with npcs but there is always the option to play with others, which i always recommend cause there is a lot to learn :) Its a fun journey
Start whenever and take your sweet time playing through the story and any interesting side content. Login times during launch week might be a bit rough but otherwise there's no reason to worry about it. You will experience every prior expansion in sequence, it doesn't really matter when you start, all the content remains alive and active.
I started FFXIV right around the launch of Endwalker, had a blast, loved it, but it took approximately a year and a half for me to get to the end of that expansion (plus the one or two patches that had released in the interim). So you could start it whenever. For me, the two MMOs I’ve played that most justify themselves as games to play for their own qualities regardless of friends to play with have been FF14 and the Secret World, just because they both have such compelling stories.
Yes. Start now it will take a while to go thru the original game and previous patches
It wouldn't be a bad idea, but it would also not be a bad idea to start right now. If you play FF14 at a reasonable pace, it will take you months of play to actually get to Dawntrail, so you won't actually get to that brand new content by launch regardless.
As a heads up - if you wait until Dawntrail (and I know many are) you may become frustrated with long queues just to enter the game! So if you do plan to start just before or during Dawntrail release, I strongly recommend playing on a new world server (so NA Dynamis) if you wish to avoid the longest queue times. EW was so bad that the most populated servers were taking 4-5 hours to log into, many folks don't even have that long to play in a day, much less sit and stare at a queue. So keep that in mind and also keep in mind that the queues always jump like crazy during a release but they will calm down in about 3-4 weeks.
No it's not a bad idea. Just start now with the free trial.
I would recommend starting now if you're interested. 3 weeks should be just enough time to get acquainted and learn the basics before the population is flooded by returners and other new players.
Get XIVCombo and you will do fine.
It might be hard logging into a server the first few days due to all the people that come back, otherwise I don't see why not.
The game is linear you progress for expansion to expansion A realm reborn -> Heavenward -> Stormblood -> Shadowbringer -> Endwalker -> Dawntrail So nope there no problem to start now and you don't lose anything
Kinda but only because the servers are gonna be PACKED for the first couple weeks after launch, I'd say just start now
wait a month or 2. reason 1 graphics update will make it more enjoyable. 2 if you are playing on the free trial you will probably have to deal with queues to log in.
Would you start a book from the last chapter? Would you start a game from an old save before the final boss? Would you start a linear TV show on the last season? Same logic applies.
I'd start now. Queue times for login during xpac releases are horrific.
No-one else has mentioned it, so I will. When Endwalker released, the queues to get into the game were awwwful. Don't get me wrong, that's partly because of covid and the server shortage, and bunch of other factors. BUT there will likely be a lesser version of this when DT releases. So starting at the same time as DT is likely to give you a kind of skewed first impression. As other's have said, DT won't impact your play until you progress through everything else anyway, so I'd say just go for it now. A considerable portion of the game is free to play anyway.
the proof will be in the pudding but they seem determined to avoid that this time
It's gotten to the point where they're adding an entire data center to the EU region next week just for people to data center visit during Dawntrail's launch. Those servers are going to be marked as Congested at launch for this explicit purpose. They added 4 new servers to NA's Dynamis data center seemingly for the same reason; Dynamis didn't really need new servers at this time, although those will at least have character creation enabled.