I love newbies!

[Jiramisu]

OH MAN I CAN DO THAT, I guess.

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Holy crap thanks man. Makes me kind of bummed that I tried starting off with a Gladiator vs Marauder as I love the challenging classes. Pug sounds right up my alley as I love melee circle strafing (esp in pvp). I got a Conjurer to 10 but was so bored to death killing mobs, I just couldn't keep going. In general, do most people play one toon and just switch between classes? Or do people have one toon for X and Y classes and another toon for Z and others? Debating if I should reroll to a Marauder or just play my Gladiator out and switch classes when I can.

Trying to stick to a healer or tank for now since I want to be able to get into dungeons quickly.

[Niwashi]

In general, do most people play one toon and just switch between classes? Or do people have one toon for X and Y classes and another toon for Z and others?

The game encourages following multiple classes on a character. You have to get at least two of them to unlock the advanced jobs anyway, and you can use certain skills from a class on other classes you advance with the same character.

The most common reasons for creating multiple characters are to try different races/genders (purely for the aesthetic variety - stat differences are too trivial to care about) or to see the first 15 levels of the storyline from each of the 3 starting cities. (The first part of the main scenario story is dependent on which city you begin in, but then all three storylines merge at level 15.)

Some people specialize characters to some extent, having for instance one character who's focus is as a tank, another who specializes in healing, and one who does melee DPS, but that requires a bit of duplication to bring in the secondary and tertiary classes so you can have all the cross-class skills you want. (For instance, a tank character, if they want to become a Paladin as well as Warrior, will need the early levels of Conjurer as well. So you might end up repeating the early levels of CNJ on both your tank and healer characters.)

Debating if I should reroll to a Marauder or just play my Gladiator out and switch classes when I can.

To unlock Warrior (the job upgrade for the Marauder class), you'll need to level both tank classes at least part way anyway. (The requirements for unlocking Warrior are to have Marauder to at least level 30 and Gladiator to at least level 15 on the same character.) It doesn't matter in which order you achieve those requirements. So I'd say continue with your Gladiator character and and then make him/her a Marauder as well. Then eventually, when you reach 30 MRD, become a Warrior.

[Jiramisu]

The game encourages following multiple classes on a character. You have to get at least two of them to unlock the advanced jobs anyway, and you can use certain skills from a class on other classes you advance with the same character.
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Awesome, thanks for the info! Makes me feel good about going Gladiator then, sounds like a great balance between switching off between Conjurer, Marauder, and Gladiator which are the three I wanted to try the most. Guess I need to familiarize myself with the jobs more to know where all the mixing occurs.

[Garlyle]

In general, do most people play one toon and just switch between classes? Or do people have one toon for X and Y classes and another toon for Z and others?

Since levelling multiple classes confers benefits on others in the form of a limited cross-class ability transferal system, it's generally best to stick to one character unless you've got a particular reason to have multiple.

For instance, if were to have three characters for BLM, WHM, and SMN separately, I'd be eventually levelling all of them up to about level 26-34-ish anyway on each of those characters in order to access the useful cross-class skills they offer (Thaumaturge's Swiftcast at 26, Conjurer's Stoneskin at 34, and Arcanist's Eye For An Eye at 34, among other things gained along the way). I'd also have levelled Archer to 15 as part of unlocking Black Mage, and getting Conjurer levelled up also puts me in a good spot for a head start on becoming a Paladin... you see how it all kind of interconnects, right? (Nevermind all the fun skills I can add pre-30 to mix and match classes and have a much more interesting time early) ; If you need more info about cross-classing skills work, I'm sure I or someone else here can offer.

If I have all three of those on one character, it saves me a huge amount of levelling, and in several cases gear I used for one class can be used on another down the road. (This applies to crafting classes too, which can transfer/share about 80% of gear and each have three unique skills that other classes can use).

EDIT: Seems I completely missed an entire page of replies WHOOPS, so here's something more useful!

While you don't need to worry about these for a long time, here's the skills you may want to develop towards in time in order to help increase the effectiveness of your classes. Each class turns into a Job that can only pull from two other classes for cross-classing opportunities, so it's easier to discuss skills. Don't let that stop you from experimenting - almost every class has a useful skill or two by level 12 that you could cross-class to any other class prior to Jobs being involved, and several of them can be used basically anywhere. Having several of them will make sub-30 levelling more interesting! Just remember, for the most part, these aren't mandatory; hell, they're really not going to be expected until you're well into level 50 content.

Marauder: You'll need to take Gladiator to 15 anyway eventually to get Warrior, and it sounds like you have. Convalescence is amazing, and Flash has its uses (Usually to spam while you're in Pacification from Berserk, since you can't use 'weapon' skills during that time, which is 90% of your moves). However, taking Gladiator to 22 will net you Provoke, a long-cooldown move which lets you immediately be the main target of whatever you provoke, albeit only by a slight margin initially - but it's enough to come back and regain hate after dying. It's also absolutely necessary for some level 50 content, and one of the most valuable single cross-class skills - but you don't really need it until well into level 50 content, so don't feel rushed. Marauder also benefits from Pugilist abilities. Notably, Featherfoot (+evasion for a time) and Internal Release (+crit rate for a time) only require you to go to level 12 in the class and will be valuable for a long time.

Gladiator: if you plan to raise Marauder and Conjurer, you are completely set. You get Foresight and Bloodbath from the first eight levels of Marauder, and those are probably the best ones Gladiator can get access to; past that, everything else is basically optional (other than raising Conjurer to 15 by Gladiator 30 for Paladin). Gladiator definitely has the least pressuring cross-class options.

Conjurer: A little trickier. You take Arcanist to 15, but none of its cross-classable skills are really all that great (Virus is largely irrelevant, Physick is a reskinned Cure that doesn't benefit from your traits so it's weaker, and Ruin is trash). You can go to 34 for Eye For An Eye (Buff that adds a small amount of damage reflect), but it's completely optional. The real key skills for Conjurer come from Thaumaturge. Level 8 THM grants Surecast (Prevents a spellcast from being interrupted by damage), and most importantly, level 26 gets you Swiftcast (Nullifies the cast time/global cooldown of the next spell). If you haven't seen it yet, Raise has an 8 second cast time, and so casting it in-battle, especially later, can be extremely difficult. It's not super urgent, but you should aim to get it by level 50.

[Vespire]

I just recently joined about 4 days ago and the community here seems much nicer than other MMO communities! Even though I've levelled quite a lot in that time (I'm having a ridiculous amount of fun playing!), I do still feel like there are so many things that I don't know - it's nice to know that there's a good community spirit to turn to when in doubt

[HBLR]

So far ive had good experience with people. overall everyone is nice to me. Better community then im used to!

[LanceValiant]

I remember when I first started the game. I am very much a social phobe irl, so I don't really get out and meet new people like I should. This makes it extremely difficult for me to hook up on PF or DF for runs; anyways, as a semi-noob still, I'd have to say that the fun part about the game is learning your way through the game and having allies that will support you in your endeavors (i.e. cheering you on, giving honest feedback, investing time). I made a pledge the other day that when I get to end-game, I am going to take the time to invest in the new players and help them through their endeavors without making them feel pressured. Oh, we wiped for the 20th time? It's cool brah, we'll get this.

I'd say, at end-game, pick at least one newbie to mentor through the game. It's so awesome watching a player grow in skill because of YOUR support and encouragement. It sounds cheesy, but you know what? It works, and you BOTH have fun doing it.

[Urthdigger]

Doing halatali hard the other day and got some newbies. Took like 10 seconds to explain each fight and the party did well. Well, minus the drg with wax in his ears :/

[LanceValiant]

Doing halatali hard the other day and got some newbies. Took like 10 seconds to explain each fight and the party did well. Well, minus the drg with wax in his ears :/

I can say that that's helped me out a lot in plenty of dungeons lol I remember just having issues with Sastasha when I first started I was like, "Omg what is this crazyness?!" Now, I amaze myself at what I can accomplish, but I haven't reached end-game yet LOL so I am still in for a surprise. But yeah, just take a few moments to explain the mechanics. I've come to find, though, that being able to vocally communicate with players helps out the most cuz it's real-time. I don't have to interrupt my rotation to respond.

[OdinEon]

What is with dragoons they all seem to have wax in their ears.