Brand New Player

[Peachez]

Hi All,
Brand new to the game and have a few questions if anyone is able to help.

1.) Server: which is the most populated

2.) Classes: What would be a class that is fairly easy to play and understand starting out. I have not played an MMO in a long time. I would prefer something that is able to solo when unable to find a group.

3.) End game classes: Which are the most sought after?

Thanks for everyones help!

[Arcon]

Hey, welcome to FFXI.

1.) Server: which is the most populated

Actually not sure, a while ago a server merge happened and those servers are likely to be more populated as of now, although that's subject to change. Server population doesn't matter as much though, it's fairly easy to find a decent linkshell (clan/group/guild) with active players. If you know some people on certain servers, that's just where you should go, otherwise it doesn't matter much.

2.) Classes: What would be a class that is fairly easy to play and understand starting out. I have not played an MMO in a long time. I would prefer something that is able to solo when unable to find a group.

Easiest to play are usually straight damage dealers. Warrior is probably one of the easiest of the basic classes (and overall), healers obviously require more skill. THF may be one of the most complex of the basic classes, Monk may be a nice average solution, it can be decent even with low skill, but with experience grows more useful. Same goes for Samurai and Dragoon.

For soloing purposes, you might wanna look into Dancer or Ninja, they perform exceptionally well at that (especially Dancer). Other jobs also work to lesser degrees, Monks, Thieves and even Dragoons. Mages are also really good at soloing (all offensive mages, RDM, BLM, SCH, BLU), but they usually require better gear and experience to be efficient.

3.) End game classes: Which are the most sought after?

Right now still Warrior, Ninja, Monk, Thief, White Mage, Black Mage and to a lesser degree Bard and Blue Mage. Right now FFXI is at a crossroads and what will be useful and sought after again depends heavily on what kind of new end game content SE has in mind for levels 91+. In the end the best advice I can give you is to try some jobs, see for yourself which ones are most fun to play. Leveling and even gearing is rather easy these days, so when you see a new job you may like, you can pick it up quickly.

[Peachez]

Thank you very much for the information. I am just wondering why the Thief in your opinion is complicated? I am thinking between either a thief or warrior. I have chosen Leviathan as the server but again I do not know anyone so any help would be appreciated.

thanks

[Arcon]

I am just wondering why the Thief in your opinion is complicated? I am thinking between either a thief or warrior.

Thief has more practical applications, Warrior can only do damage, and occasionally use Provoke to keep hate. Thief, especially later in the game, has better survival capabilities, meaning you can utilize it for more things like farming, solo/duo strategies, questing, etc. This requires higher knowledge about the game, how evasion works, how hate mangaement works, think about links/adds when you fight, how movement speed works, how you can utilize terrain, how to equip the right gear for ranged attacks, for sneak/trick attack, for evasion, to switch it out for damage sets, how to utilize status bolts to enhance survivability, and a lot more, this was just off the top of my head. Even early on, Thief has it worse, if you do EXP parties in old areas, people will expect you to pull mobs, which is a science in itself, and then still perform SA/TA in a party (native Thief abilities), which isn't always easy if people don't cooperate.

Warrior has none of that, it's straight damage. There's a few tweaks you can bring into the job, and some situations still require skill to enhance overall performance (knowing when to use your abilities, when to switch to defensive gear, how to utilize different gear sets the best, etc.), but compared to Thief it isn't nearly as complex. Since Thief is a supporting job, you will always have more work to do on that than on other damage dealers.

I have chosen Leviathan as the server but again I do not know anyone so any help would be appreciated.

I will always help out when available, unfortunately my playtime is a bit erratic lately because of RL stuff, but I would gladly help you to get started.