first off thanks for some very detailed and useful information, it would have saved me and I imagine other new players a lot of time if something like this was in the sticky notes on new player information
I have progressed thru my class quest to lvl 25, and main storyline to 18 and have just been given the retainer unlock
as a feedback it says who to contact for retainers, but not where, other than in the city, would be helpful if the person for retainers was a quest completion so you could find him, luckily someone in general area chat told me to look at the market, and there he was.
a follow up on class, when you hit lvl 30 class and do side for your job
so if I follow up with archer I will become a bard
can I choose a different class?
can I decide once I am a lvl 50 bard, to go back and level gladiator/conjurer and have a second "job" as a paladin?
or do I need to level and alt to be able to do that

on crafting
i do enjoy it, and as a MMO junky i have always done the gathering and crafting, so it fits well with my personal characteristics, gathering is smooth and easy, though i don't like that i cannot "gather" or even see nodes unless i am in gather class, so i cannot gather while questing/leveling you have to actually change to gather and activate the radar. but i do like that you don't have to go searching too much, that the nodes are spawned specifically for you and you can run the 4 spawns in a circle until you feel like stopping

and as a final note, could you explain "place of the dead"

and sorry, but one of the first things i did do was open the play manual and was trying to find out what the purple with a + quest was, and manual didn't have answer, nor does it have the information that you all have shared, it is fine for some basic how to stuff, but doesn't even come close to the information an experienced player starting a new game is interested in.