New player with lots of advanced questions (LONG)

[Economizer]

but I have of a lot of advanced questions for you veterans out there.

These questions don't seem so advanced.

Current both my wife & I are level 12, (whm & thf respectively), and we have a long list of potential goals that we are looking to, over time, meet.

Willing to start over from level 1? Valefor is a pretty sweet server.

These goals ultimately include going through each and every expansion (including the original game and add-on packs), completing their respective primary missions, and experiencing each of the main stories (it is a final fantasy after all )

#1 : How realistic are our goals?

You'll need to know when to look stuff up, but you should be able to duo the majority of stuff, and shout for the handful of things you can't duo. Level caps will probably be your hardest challenge though, but WHM and THF are the easiest jobs to beat Maat on, and the rest is just a shout away.

#1a: Can we meet our goals, without having to face any absolutely unreal challenges?

I can't really think of anything, since it is all easier now.

#2: Can we play through the game, with the jobs we want want to play?

THF and WHM are pretty popular, and a good combination, but it really helps to have extra jobs leveled to 99 after the fact. Your first 99 job is the hardest though, the rest are just a week or less of leveling though.

#3: Money, what can a poor noob do about it?

Well, THF will definitely help with getting drops. You can start by remembering never to leave town without Signet. This will get you crystals, which can sell anywhere from 1~6k a stack (check the FFXIAH website for pricing before selling anything, and check one of the wikis that FFXIAH links for NPC pricing, and get in the habit of doing this for everything). After this you'll notice you can farm expensive items like Silk Thread, Beehive Chips, Honey, Hare Meat, which all sell for quite a bit (check those FFXIAH prices).

After this you should have an okay amount of gil, but you can look into low level crafting recipes and cross check them to FFXIAH pricing to see what crafts can make a profit.

You'll note that Copper Ingots (which are a stack of Fire Crystals and four 9~12 gil a piece Copper Ore per synth) make a good profit, and if you want to continue with Goldsmithing, Brass Ingots (You'll want to skill up your Goldsmithing first, but Fire Crystal, Zinc Ore, three Copper Ore) make a big profit too. Leathercraft has Sheep Leather (Dark Crystal, Sheepskin, Distilled Water, Windurstian Tea Leaves - look up how to get the mats for these recipes).

Cooking and Alchemy tend to be good beginner crafts, although they may take slightly more investment to make a good profit. Fishing is also great, but your character has to be a few weeks old and level 20 or you'll run into Fishing Fatigue after a handful of fish each day. Regardless, if you plan on taking up a craft, be sure to plan ahead and research each one individually.

Another avenue you can try is HELM (Harvesting, Excavating, Logging, Mining, and by extension Chocobo digging, gardening, and other related activities) if you want. Many players have a bad view of it, but if you research areas that have the Harvesting/Excavation/Logging/Mining Points close together and have expensive materials, you might be able to find something profitable. As a bit of a hint, at least one of this is very profitable, a tiny bit of research on on of the wikis will reveal which one(s).

Still, if crafting isn't your style, and you need money faster then what farming some low level stuff will get you, you'll want to race to level 99 as soon as possible - you can farm much more expensive things off of harder mobs you two can duo (such as Wyrdstrand), or even try your hand at farming currency in Dynamis.

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As a final note, be aware of the community websites. FFXIAH, FFXIDB, BGwiki, FFXIclopedia all tend to have their own share of information. Knowing to research things, especially when it comes to gil, is a major key to success in this game. Having a linkshell doesn't hurt either.