New Player (maybe?) with questions I haven't found answers to yet (I think?)

[Brude]

I've played the 2 week free trial and so far have enjoyed it. I've played quite a few of the MMOs (WoW, Rift, GW2, SWtOR, ESO, Wildstar), but for various reasons none of them are really getting me hooked. They all have their pluses and minuses, so I'm not looking for input on those (unless somebody else who has played them all wants to chime in as well). I primarily play PvE, but dable in PvP if I've got a group of people to make it fun. I'd be coming to FF by myself, and am looking to make some new friends in the game. I've browsed this sub-forum, the SE forums, the Reddit sub page, and a few other forums. So far I'm thinking this may be a nice home that I can enjoy; but before I make the dive I've got a few final questions I can't find answers to.

1. Since I did the free trial, I assume I can still do the recruit a friend thing? Obviously I've seen that I want to apply the code prior to purchasing the game/game time; but does it matter who's code I use? Is there a reason to find a code from somebody on the server I want to play on?

2. I've found a few pages that hint at server populations, and I've narrowed down the server choice to Balmung and Gilgamesh. Anybody wanna give me reasons not to play on one of those realms? They seem to be the larger populations from everything I've seen and I prefer a larger population where I can then find a nice medium sized FC to join.

3. I'm sold on my primary job being a healer (I usually tank or heal, but am not comfortable tanking a new MMO right now). I've got a good feel for the different healers right now, but if I were to say start a WHM, and then find after playing with it some that I don't like it as much how easy is it to switch to a different healer job (say AST or SCH)?

4. Any reason at this time to buy ARR and HW? My goal would probably be to at least get to max level on my primary job then a few others depending on time prior to the new expansion, but if I read it right with the expansion coming out if I just buy ARR now I can just wait and buy the expansion and get HW at the same time? I guess the information on this isn't very clear (or I'm just bad at reading comprehension).

5. Any other pointers? Advice?

Thank you all for your input. I'm sure you've seen all these questions tons of times, but figured I'd give an ask just to make sure I'm getting the information I'm looking for.

[Kazgrel]

1. I believe you have to sign up using the code someone sends you in order for you (and the sender) to reap the RaF benefits, but I may be wrong on that part. There's no reason to use the code from someone on the same server; just use one from whomever (if you're picking up one from the thread here or elsewhere).

2. I'm a resident on Balmung, and I love this place, but I honestly advise newer players to look at other servers, because to get on Balmung you have to pay an extra $18 bucks to transfer off another server to get on here since they have the servers lock out new character creation. Balmung pretty much stays locked 99.99999% of the time, with Gilgamesh not being much better. Excalibur, Hyperion, Behemoth, and Leviathan are some other medium to high pop servers that come to mind, and I am sure others can vouch for other servers. If the extra cost doesn't bother you, then go for it. Were it not for a friend who was already here on Balmung, I would've opted for one of the other servers I mentioned. The new character lockout makes it really hard for me to recruit other friends of mine to this game.

3. You'd have to start as a Conjurer if you want to start healing right away; it's the only base class that's actually a healer at low level. Not the most terrible thing, either; conjurer hosts several valuable cross class skills you'll end up using for other healing jobs (if you decide to pursue those). If you were looking to start as Astrologian, you can't do that until you're well into playing the game and have just hit the Heavensward content.

4. If you get them on sale via bundle, go for it, but you don't "need" HW right out of the gate unless you absolutely want to play Au Ra. Otherwise, you can put off purchasing it until you reach level 50 on a job.

5. There's a FAQ here, and the game's subreddit have tons of links to resources and information pertaining to just about anything in and about the game.

[Brude]

Thanks Kazela. I've read quite a bit over the past 2 weeks during my trial with what you linked in item #5, but I started running into problems with the first four which is why I figured I'd ask here as I usually trust mmo-champ in general in the game specific forums (some of the other sub-forums here get....interesting).

I will check out some of those other FCs on those servers you mentioned. I want to make sure I do some research on potential FCs prior to making a character so I don't pick a server then regret it later looking for FCs.

[Kazgrel]

No problem.

Regarding your search for an FC, if you are looking for something where the end game focus is raiding, as of the last major patch (3.5), the Party Finder is now data center wide, whereas before it was confined to each individual server, so it's a lot easier to get into a static group for raiding now compared to even a month or two ago. The only thing that would hamper that now, though, is the fact that the most recent raid tier is already ~6 months old now, so groups that are recruiting are likely looking for people with experience...catch-22 situation, of course.

[Shadowbane]

I did the trial mode since I knew a friend of mine played the game, and then I think he was able to get me an RAF code for me to use / apply to my account. I think I got a headpiece that gives 25% more experience gain when lv25 or under, and some chocobo feather items to buy gear with - but I think that's all the RAF does as far as being on the receiving end of it goes. Mightaswell find someone on the same server to invite you though, get them to help you out in exchange for the mount you'll earn them.

My friend played on Balmung so I had to transfer there - can't make a new character there but I don't plan to soon anyway. Always very busy, and personally that's how I like to see MMOs.

Visiting Palace of the Dead is a good way to see what the class is like at higher levels without having to level it the classic way. Might be worth visiting there as different classes, getting a look at their abilities to see and feel how they play. Gear and stats aren't a factor there so you don't have to worry about having the right equipment.

No reason to get HW before completing ARR I think. Plus when you get HW the intro cinematic has some spoilers to the end of the ARR story, so best to complete that first! You can skip it, I guess, but yeah, that's a thing.

As for advice, I started playing about a good few months ago now so here's what I remember I would've done earlier / differently. do Hall of the Novice offered by NPC called The Smith in Adventurer's Guild locations in cities, I think - it's been a while and hard to remember. You get some gear and a Brand-new Ring, which increases exp earned by 30% when level 30 or below. Combined with that RAF headpiece, it's nice. You don't really need to buy gear off the marketplace whilst leveling, you'll get most of what you need through dungeons and quests. You need to progress the main story quests to do a lot of stuff in the game, so be sure to progress on that. If you lose track of it, you can probably find where you left off / where you need to go on the little things-to-do window when you log in.

The 'leveling roulette' signs you up for a random dungeon, scaling you down in level if it's for a lower level dungeon. One per day it offers a massive chunk of exp as a daily bonus. Always worth doing that once a day. That 30% ring works for the exp you get from mobs in said dungeons, too, even if you're actually lv50 something and get scaled down to 26. Eating food is good too, since you get a 3% exp buff from that. Golden Saucer is fun, visit there sometime. Find the quest that allows you to use your chocobo as a fighting companion sooner rather than later. I can imagine that helping if you plan on leveling as a healer when playing solo.

Probably some other stuff, but part of what made it all fun for me was being a noob again and figuring stuff out. Hope you have fun with stuff too. PM me if you do move to Balmung

[The Casualty]

2. I've found a few pages that hint at server populations, and I've narrowed down the server choice to Balmung and Gilgamesh. Anybody wanna give me reasons not to play on one of those realms? They seem to be the larger populations from everything I've seen and I prefer a larger population where I can then find a nice medium sized FC to join.

I'm on probably one of the bottom 3 servers as far as population. I never had difficulty with finding active communities of people to play with - the first FC I joined when I started was large enough that they capped out members on not only the main FC, but the leader then expanded to 3 sister FCs which also capped out. Right now my current FC is probably at 130ish members, but we also don't recruit as much. Even on this smaller server, I have been able to find a raiding community that clears current content, even prior to the advent of cross-server party finder.

The notion that all of the other servers are dead and you will have no one to play with is a myth.

One of the other perks of picking outside of Balmung and Gilgamesh is housing. On medium to low pop servers, you can actually get prime real estate. The only caveat is that getting a mansion might be a bit difficult no matter the server size.

With party party finder, you get a lot of the perks of being on a large server, without actually having to be there.
There are reasons to pick those servers, especially if you already have friends there, but if your only prerequisite is just having a selection of medium sized FCs to join, literally any server can fit that bill.