flabbergasted with reviews on speakers

@slick2 , It sounds like you got up on the wrong side of bed this morning. More so than any market I know of the audio market is consumer beware. 

You have to learn what you like and why. Experience will lead you to the best speaker for you not some reviewer.  Very few dealers have dedicated rooms for their systems where you can get a reasonable idea what the speaker is capable of.  I don't even read them. At some point you just have to jump in. 

Looking at my own experience, it took me 20 years and 6 different pair of speakers to figure out what I liked. Then another 20 years perfecting that approach. This is what the hobby is about. If you don't want to be bothered with it just get one of those package systems from Best Buy.

IME, it's true both that speaker sensitivity  matters, and that manufacturers sometimes (frequently?) misleadingly exaggerate it. If you can't try a prospective speaker with your amp, at least gather as much testimony as you can as to whether amps similar to yours can drive it.

As for the other sense of sensitivity, I quite like my speakers, and only say nice things about them.  This approach has "dramatic" positive effect on their performance!

“ Speaker sensitivity is real. My Moabs are so sensitive if someone even hints they aren't the best speaker ever I go into a deep inconsolable sulk for the rest of the day. “

FTFY

I don't own focal speakers but I do appreciate that in their website the tell the consumer what size room each model in a line the speaker is designed for. Sensitivity ratings alone aren't enough because like russ69 said impedance will affect the way an amp controls the output and possibly color the sound. 

In a top notch system, most, if not all the electrolytics caps are not directly in the signal path. Speaker crossover capacitors are, and get the full brunt of amplification. What is actually audible is a variable that’s difficult to quantify, but it’s better if they were good audio grade poly caps instead of the electrolytics, and it’s a fairly simple thing to upgrade....at the very least, bypass them with a small value poly cap.

It’s a similar logic to better wire, better connectors, etc. At some point, just about everything makes some difference.

Regarding the importance of sensitivity...I suppose it depends on how loud you want to listen, and the size of the room. I’m using primarily about 17 watts triode tube power into 89db speakers in a fairly good size carpeted room. I have the option of exceeding 30 watts in Ultralinear mode, but rarely ever the feel the need for more power....it seems to get plenty loud enough to annoy the family. There is an active subwoofer in the system to help fill out the bottom octave,so I’m sure that makes some difference, but overall sensitivity has been a non-issue for me....like anything else, I guess it depends....the transparency gained by better caps and wire means far more to me than a little extra volume level.