[Lunaryn]

Economy: Possibly starting to recover from rampant deflation, still unstable, cheap items not always available due to extremely low margins, at least in Jeuno/AU, but this has gotten better in the last few months. General rule has shifted from check vendor prices before buying from AH to check AH before buying from vendor. HELM seems to be somewhat viable again, especially Harvesting which took a big hit when the bottom fell out of the clothcrafting market at the beginning of deflation, but it's not the kind of profit generator it once was. Farming has probably been hit the worst in all this, as supply often outstrips demand, at least until the price drops low enough that it's not worth trying to sell on AH. Reports are that careful watching of the market still produces good profit, but for the casual gamer who just wants to put time in and get gil out so they can have gear for their next party, prospects aren't so good. Ultimately, there's still repeatable quests and selling to NPCs, which has increased viability as the value of gil rises.

Time to 75: Varies significantly depending on the length of your sessions, when they occur, how much effort you put into gearing up, and how popular the job you've chosen is. For reference, I've only just gotten 70 and I joined back in late 2005. A friend of mine who joined at the same time and had a lot more time online teamed up with a veteran player and took RDM to the 60s in a few months, and has been 75 for over a year.

PVP is as it has been for some time: Special contests with marginal popularity. We have Ballista and Brenner. In the former, you kill an opposing player to get "Gate Breach" status, which gives you and any nearby teammates a limited time to score goals by throwing rocks into a floating miniature castle. The latter is more strategically-oriented. Both have lost their popularity, at least on Midgardsormr.

Not being 75 I'll refrain from commenting much on endgame, but as far as party sizes this varies considerably depending on what you're looking to take down and how you're looking to do it. Some NMs can be duoed or soloed with the right setup and are normally taken down by parties, some can be done with a highly-specialized 6 member party but are often done with a 12 member alliance, some may require a full alliance of 18. You may want to check out Main Page - FFXIclopedia - a Wikia Gaming wiki for a place to start gathering info.

Job flexibility: This can be considered somewhat arguable. Jobs do what they do with the resources they have. Aside from merits they can't be customized that much, though gear and food can adjust the focus from one ability to another or compensate for a deficiency somewhat. However, subjobs do offer some additional strategic options, especially for solo or endgame situations. For the majority of your time XPing or meriting, however, flexibility is seen more as a liability than an asset, as party leaders like to be able to know more or less exactly what someone brings to the table just by looking at their job/sub and level. Expect to be called on to perform a standardized, community-approved role at least 90% of the time.