I'm lonely D:!!!

[MiniDiamond]

You could be like me. A player who started when it first came to the U.S. and now has no friends left to play with cause they all quit.

; o ;! *tear*
...
*puts Billdance in purse and walks away*

[wildsprite]

Bahamut is loaded with rude Elitists, the fun players on that world are few and far between, many of us jumped ship and went hunting elsewhere when we got sick of them, quite frankly while I do miss some of my friends that remain on Bahamut, I don't miss the Elitist attitude most of the players on that world have, I agree with others, you should delete that char and start elsewhere before you get too attached, I suggest Fenrir or Bismarck as your world, I suspect you will find lots of fun players there, if you happen to choose Fenrir look up Eythen or Stormyfox, or myself to join Misfitz, or look up Kuzuryu, and I'm sure Meyi or Minidiamond will hook you up if you choose Bismarck I'm sure any of us will help you with lossa fun ^^

[Chronofantasy]

The very first day I started back in 2005 I had a lot of people talk to me. Times has certainly changed. I didn't know anyone beforehand coming into the game as well. It was during the summer too and there was a summer breeze event going on. Someone needed to team up so they asked me to help and gave me 50k gil for assisting them since this player had a lot of gil on them anyways. Then there were other people exping outside of Windy and I ended up talking with them and getting a linkshell from them. Within my first week of playing FFXI I had at least 3 different LSs.

Shortly after that I started my own LS and started recruiting a bunch of new players like me and we all grew up together to lvl 75. After majority of us reached 75 however the LS kinda died down and split off from there. Nowadays it doesn't take 2-3 months to reach 75+ however for a new player like it used to, but it would be best to still enjoy your time lvlling and experiencing the game. Once you find a nice and fun social LS then you should be golden to find people to socialize with and find friends to help you out. Another factor is which time of the day you login and play as well depending on your server.

[Zero-Hour]

Many "New" Players are actually "Old" or returning players starting new mules or just a new character as they have done everything already. These players will often already be part of existing groups/linkshells and probably overlook a genuine new player. It might be wise to get yourself started before trying to find a group.

The game has changed a lot recently and it is possible to solo a very large part of the early stages of the game. I would be inclined to start off in one of the basic areas and train solo for a while and get to grips with the basics of the game. Use the wiki to find out what is where, and complete some basic quests in your starter city. You will need reputation and rank in that city to advance and be able to unlock further content.

When training use the Field of valour / Grounds of valour to help. There are some boosts you can gain from them that will help greatly, in both XP gain to speed up training and buffs like refresh (MP regeneration). Always get "Signet" from the gate guards and learn how to sell the items you get dropped on the Auction house so you can afford to upgrade gear and weapons as you go.

If you are lucky you might find another person in a similar situation and team up. You will meed people along the way when out training and they are more likely to be responsive than people in the cities.

If you do join a Linkshell, try not to get sucked into "power leveling" and shortcutting your way. Some people might suggest that your sole purpose in game is to get to level 99 as fast as possible to "join in" with all the endgame content. This path will not do you any favors, as you will learn very little along the fast-track path and although your level might say 99, you will struggle to keep up with veteran players, and probably understand very little of what is going on around you.

Take you time and have fun - I would hope that is what you are here for. There are way too many people in game that take it far too seriously, and it would be a shame for you to get sucked into thier bordom.

I would agree with what some have said about the server thing too, Bahamut is possibly not the best server in your situation. If you have not got too attached, re-creating on one of the other servers people have suggested might be a wise move.

[wildsprite]

when I started on Bahamut there were very few helpful players, most were rude, pimp or gimp type, their attitude was if you didn't have atleast one awesome piece of gear you were low life garbage, the amount of those type players on Bahamut grew while the helpful ones mostly vanished, you might want to consider starting somewhere else, I cant speak for other worlds but Fenrir and Bismarck seem to be good choices, if someone else has suggestions for other worlds for new players to start on please speak up, lets help this new player out as well as other new players who might see this ^^

[Nordya]

I'm in same boat as OP, would be nice to find some nice helpful people. I don't mind transferring servers, so open to the suggestions above.