Question regarding progression (1st time MSQ)

[Jeeqbit]

Is story progression actually gated with group content, or is there a way to do these things solo? eg.: Ramuh/Striking Tree, etc.

The only way to do them solo is by being a higher level than them (using higher level gear from the market board). Then you can use the Unrestricted settings to prevent it from syncing your level, allowing you to destroy the content as a higher level.

We expect these trials will be able to be done solo with NPCs in the next expansion's patches, but that process will most likely begin in 2024 and take 2 years for the developers to complete through the sequence of patches.

I've tried finding a party a few times now, waiting 30+ minutes with zero people joining for Striking tree, but understandably it seems nobody wants to queue the old content, yet people doing story for the first time can't continue without a group to do the old content.

These trials are served by something called the Trial Roulette (which people queue for to get experience for alt classes, as well as tomestones to upgrade their gear, or gil). These roulettes match them with people who queue directly for trials (which is almost always new players doing them for the first time). It is also served by the Mentor Roulette, which a much smaller portion of veteran players have access to.

When I used to do the story, it would take about 40 minutes for the queue to work. If it takes longer, you might be trying to queue when everyone is asleep in the server's region.

Note that if a trial name contains (Extreme), Minstrel's Ballad, Savage or Coil, then they are either not served by a roulette or are only served by mentor roulette and direct queues and rarely work. You are not asked to do any of these for the Main Scenario quests though. These are only unlocked through sidequests.

[Toxy]

Thank you for the information, guess I'll just try and wait longer and hope a Roulette comes my way.