The game would absolutely be better without the Novice Network or Mentor System. Many other MMOs have alternative ways for players to communicate such as zone-wide chat channels that aren't say/yell/shout. Likewise, there's a myriad of guide content to refer new players to, such as WoWHead for World of Warcraft, that are a perfect replacement for having mentors provide answers. In a lot of cases, I've seen mentors give bad answers that are correct by returners and sometimes even sprouts themselves. I'm sure the system actually works better/as intended on Japanese servers but it doesn't work on European or North American servers (although people hoarding housing or engaging with RMT services isn't as much of a problem on JPE servers either so Square Enix will be pretty reluctant in changing anything for us).