AF Gear Vs Other Gear

Just based on wikis, am I correct in assuming AF gear is generally inferior to other augmented gearsets (Herculean, Adhemar, etc), and our 119 AF/RL/EMPY pieces should mostly only get macroed in in certain situations?

I ask, because I rarely see any "endgame" BLUs wearing full AF sets, Reforged or no.

You are correct. In terms of sheer gear progression, AF is the easiest to 119. Then Relic. Empyrean requires vagary wins to 119. However, mostly all of it is extremely inferior to augmented 119 gear (abj gear) and it could be considered a waste of time/money to pursue.

There are some exceptions to this, though. Luhlaza feet for the diffusion bonus, empyrean +1 body for the blue magic fast cast, and maybe the feet for chain affinity, though im sure those are outdated too now. empyrean legs for efflux, but in the same boat as feet, since casting for phys dmg is outdated and uneffective. Luhlaza body provides a good fc body and acc/att/ws piece if the others aren't attainable, but overall, all of that gear is sadly inferior to everything else available.

EDIT: ineffective*

For pure stats, an item that can't be augmented is, with very rare exception, never going to be better than one that can, because augments fall outside the item level designation and are thus basically gravy.