Idea to solve the low level gear problem.

[Coephoros]

There's already a ton of freely available gear through your conquest vendors.

I don't understand why this is a "problem". People keep talking about how "you can't find crafters because low-level crafting isn't profitable", but that's the lazy way out. Low-level gear is (mostly) cheap to make; if it isn't on the AH, why don't you just buy the mats and shout for crafter? Tip them if you get a +1. Sell it back on the AH when you're done with it. Congratulations, you've just kickstarted the economy.

Adding a whole new stack of rare/ex gear is only going to make your "problem" worse.

[Karbuncle]

There's already a ton of freely available gear through your conquest vendors.

I don't understand why this is a "problem". People keep talking about how "you can't find crafters because low-level crafting isn't profitable", but that's the lazy way out. Low-level gear is (mostly) cheap to make; if it isn't on the AH, why don't you just buy the mats and shout for crafter? Tip them if you get a +1. Sell it back on the AH when you're done with it. Congratulations, you've just kickstarted the economy.

Adding a whole new stack of rare/ex gear is only going to make your "problem" worse.

The problem with Conquest gear is that its not always the best, And that its Nation Specific, and requires Rank (while i dont think the Rank thing is a problem at all, The Nation Specific is). Like say you're windurstian and you want Legionnare's Gear. Windurst has to be above Bastok in Conquest ranking, and its double points to purchase.

Hell in the last thread to suggest this, I was on the side of "Use the NPCs, Use the Conquest NPC, The armor is there". but the more i thought about it, Some new players won't immediately have the friends to Rank up to get the Conquest armor, Or get the Conquest points to purchase it. Especially from other nations. And the NPC-gear only goes so far, most of it is stat-less NQ junk. (a lot of low level armor is, albeit...). Us established players tank Nation-Rank and etc for granted. a New player is going to have -hell- finding people to help them rank up.

I think the AH merge will fix a lot of the problems, However, If the problems of New players being unable to find crafters, or find armor on the AH, I think something like this would be a good Solution. It erases the Randomness from the Equation (Conquest Ranking, Nation allegiance, Finding a Crafter, Etc) and allows new players to actively work towards the ability to equip themselves with Better armor.

Most new players (which is where the biggest problem is) Don't have access to places like Jeuno either, how many crafters do you think sit in Port Bastok, or Windurst Walls that Aren't afk? I'd be willing to be 0-1 per day. Those new players are then screwed. Plus in new cities theres also the problem that even Synth mats are rarely in stock unless they're easily gotten from surounding creatures.

There is a problem with New-new players finding armor, its not a huge problem obviously due to lack of new players, and i really think the Auction house-Merge will solve 99% of it, but if it doesn't, It might be time to consider moving away from AH and just letting new players work toward an "Assault" system-like Goal of Obtaining gear through FoV.