New and Returning Player Guide 2016

Starting over in FF11 can seem like a daunting task for most. For those of us who played during those exciting times remember the difficulty involved in every task. There may be some who wish to play again and finish parts of the storyline they hadn’t before. Well starting over isn’t completely bad.
One of the first things you want to start is RoE (Records of Eminence)
RoE is extremely useful. You get objectives for just about everything you would normally do in the game. Killing a certain amount of enemies in an area, plus majority of them are repeatable. Free experience points! There are objectives for reaching certain levels with each job, completing limit breaks, and so on. It’s good to check this often and become familiar with them. The Sparks collected from the completing the objectives will help you gear your character through the levels and at 99 start you out with a full ILVL117 set. Although, I rarely buy armor but every 30 levels (can level to 99 naked if you wanted thanks to trusts), but keeping an up to date weapon is always wise.
Also, start checking every Home Point you pass. You can teleport between them and it is extremely useful. You can teleport free within the same region otherwise it will charge you a fee. 
Be sure to check every Survival Guide you come across. These let you teleport to more remote areas much quicker. Survival Guides let you travel by charging either Gil or Tabs (earned from Fields of Valor and Ground Tomes). 
Also, by completing RoE you get Accolades which you can use to teleport to Unity Notorious Monster Locations, which can help you teleport quickly to areas you haven’t visited yet. For example, you don’t have to run to Jeuno.
Unity Concord Look at the UNM Monsters to see Locations you can teleport to.
One of the first things I recommend doing is going outside and getting level 5. At level 5 you can start
the quest to get your first Trust. Trusts are NPC’s you can summon to help in leveling and many of the mission battlefields. They help create a much better soloing atmosphere. These NPC’s listed below will help you get started.
Trust Quest NPC’s:
Gondebaud in Southern San d'Oria (L-6): Trust: San d'Oria
Clarion Star in Port Bastok (K-7): Trust: Bastok
Wetata in Windurst Woods (G-10): Trust: Windurst
Once you’ve completed the quest, go into the RoE Quest Menu -> Tutorial -> Basics and complete “Call Forth an Alter Ego”. After this, it will give you a Cipher. Trade the Cipher to: 
Gondebaud in Southern San d'Oria (L-6)
Clarion Star in Port Bastok (K-7)
Wetata in Windurst Woods (G-10)
Once you summon that Trust outside the town, go back into RoE Quest Menu and complete the Alter Ego Eminence Quest, it will give you another Cipher. Rinse and repeat this process and by the end you will have a full party worth of trusts. Of course right now you can only summon three. 
Also, once you join one of the Unity's this allows you to get the Trust version of that Unity's Leader. The Unity Leader will not show up right away. There are new objectives under RoE Quest Menu for Unity that you should start doing right away, once you gain some standing in the Unity the Leader will appear in the Trust Magic Menu.
Also, while in town you should talk to the Tutorial NPC they hand out a few useful items, like a free voucher for an EXP Ring and Chocopass
Follow this link: Tutorial npc
Now you can start leveling with added help and blast through levels fairly quickly now. Once you finally reach Selbina or Mhaura you can begin working on the Rhapsodies of Vana'diel Missions. The first set of missions can be done easily at lower levels.
By completing these you can get Key Items like Gilgamesh's introductory letter which satisfies the requirement for Sub Job items. Even a free trip to Norg! (Make sure you check a home point for easy travel back, for those of you familiar with the pain it is to get here). 
Then once you get the Rhapsody in White Key Item it gives you this:
Rhapsody in White:
Experience and Skill Gains
  30% bonus to experience and limit points gains 100% increases to combat and magic skill gains 
Alter Egos
  Allows an additional alter ego to be called forth at once. 
Home Points
  80% reduction in gil consumed by home points 
Vendors
  Addition of items for sale by Curio Vendor Moogles located in the three nations 
Fields of Valor
  Reduces the amount of gil and tabs consumed by Survival Guides.
  Reduces the amount of tabs required for the following effects.
Other Notes:
The Chocobo License Quest has been made easier. You can trade to the Chocobo every minute instead of every hour. Chocobo's Wounds
Once you hit level 50 and don't seem to be gaining levels anymore, you are ready to start doing the wonderful
Limit Break Quests.
For good information on jobs and how to gear them and play them I recommend heading here: 
http://www.ffxiah.com/forum/forum/83/jobs/
Some information is a little out of date, but it is still a great resources and further in the forums current information is still being discussed.
Underneath the RoE Menu -> Other has daily quests you can do.
Once you join a Unity you will get more objectives in the RoE Menu and some daily quests
Good links for leveling routes:
You will eventually find a route that works best for you, but got to start somewhere.
https://www.reddit.com/r/RedditLinkshell/comments/3h9791/leveling_guide_update/
https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxi/comments/3q64lv/most_current_solo_leveling_guide/
Another alternative leveling area is in Escha - Zi'Tah. This area is unlocked through the Rhapsody Missions. You can essentially level from 40-85 here.
After 99:
Once you hit 99 and get Sparks Gear you will be able to easily solo the old story content. Although, if you are interested in getting some beginning ILVL119 gear and a weapon then Yorcia Alluvion Skirmish is your next step. (A nice feature of having a 119 weapon puts your trusts at 119). You will want to do 1/1/1. For those not having done this that probably makes no sense. Alluvion Skirmish is part of Adoulin for those who don’t know. 
To get to Adoulin follow this guide here: 
How to get to adoulin
Before you do run off to Yorcia you will need at least two survival skills, but getting them all is well worth your time. You will need Watercraft and Climbing. You will need to get Watercraft prior to getting Climbing, its needed to travel to the area to start the climbing quest:
Watercraft:
I'm on a Boat
Climbing:
Hide and Go Peak
Link to Alluvion Skirmish information:
Alluvion Skirmish
Short Summary for Alluvion Skirmish:
For those who don't know what 1/1/1 means:
You use a Simulacrum Tier 1 head, torso, feet and one Eudaemon Item to create the Key Item needed for Alluvion Skirmish.
[https://www.bg-wiki.com/bg/Category:Simulacrum_Segment 
Simulacrum Segment]
(Each of the segments affects the Skirmish is different ways).
To make Alluvion Skirmish KI you will need:
*Yorcia Visage I
*Faithful’s Torso I
*Faithful’s Legs I
*One Eudaemon Item (I highly recommend the Sash, this will allow you to summon a Shijin known as Kirin who is simply incredible and will actually summon allies to fight about every 90 seconds).
Each Eudaemon in Yorcia Alluvion Skirmish summons a different type of Shijin and affects the types of stones dropped, which are used to add augments to your Alluvion Skirmish Armor
Basic Solo Strategy:
1.    Convert Copper AMAN Vouchers to Obsidian Fragments via the Sparks Gear NPC. You'll want at least 3,000.
2.    Obtain Alluvion Skirmish KI from by trading the pieces to Oston
(Note: You will have to speak to Oston and Lola multiple times to get them to allow you trade the Eudaemon item.)
3.    Enter Yorica Augural Conveyor in Yorcia Weald (I-10) these can be teleported to from Proto-Waypoints once you have been there once before. 
4.    The first area you enter is your buff area and you can summon trusts at this point. Take note the time limit has already started.
5.    Click the Living Cairn to enter into the first level.
6.    Go straight to the book, and find the Convert Puissance option. You can only convert a maximum of 1000 Obsidian fragments to Puissance.
7.    Go to the Summon menu and summon a Shijin for 1000 Puissance. Let him head to the enemies stronghold and start attacking. DON’T FOLLOW HIM. The monsters summoned by the enemy stronghold will destroy you in a heartbeat! They will aggro Trusts and Pets.
8.    Kirin will do most the work for you. At this point you can go kill Escalents, (if you are a DD I recommend avoiding the elementals, they can be very nasty to fight), to obtain more Puissance and get some backup for Kirin. (Sometimes you won’t be able to find a good path to Escalents and will have to go behind the Stronghold from the start to kill them).
9.    Keep an eye on the enemies Stronghold, once it gets to 1% you have to deliver the final blow to be able to advance to the next level.
10.    If you reach a point where you are happy with the drops, complete the Skirmish, or your own Stronghold is being attack use your Fenestral Key to end the Skirmish. You will obtain the items for only the completed levels you have done. So, if you happen to make it to the third level and find yourself loosing make sure to use that Key as quickly as possible and you will get the drops from level 1 and 2.
Proto-Waypoints allow teleportation to other Proto-Waypoints, Angural Conveyor and Geomagnetic Founts. To obtain Kinetic Units used to teleport trade a Proto-Waypoint any type of Crystal.
This is a THF soloing 3/3/3 Alluvion Skirmish: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ufedWdihyI
If you get to play book keeper for Yorcia Alluvion Skirmish:
How to book yorcia alluvion
I am no expert and have only recently returned to the game myself. I wanted to pass along this information to help those in need. Also, for those who are current veterans please feel free to leave any helpful advice or corrections to my material.
Also be sure to check out Reddits FAQ
A special thanks to those I have linked to for useful information.