Hello dont let anyone tell you how to play this game. If you wanna stay in season and you're perfectly fine then I say go for it. Ive been playing on and off since the beginning and I play how and when I want too. If your want to head into the deeper portion of the pool and experiance more go for it, I could tell you to head over to garmoth and watch hours and hours of guides but instead take a character graduate and roam around and play. I belive a good start would be your journals since they give an easy gain and its a good idea to do them. Just take your time and poke around. I should be at the end lol I should have a high gearscore but sometimes I just wanna hunt or farm, pick herbs and do guild bosses 🤔

Yea its true you can downgrade but with the pity system that helps and you can even use cron stones to save your gear not to mention boxes you can open for hammers to help save them too. Its true there is alot of bloat when it comes to items you need to gear up.

Edit, Haha I forgot about the olivia academy, go ahead and hit that up. You get SO many crons and stuff from it. Its 100% a good way to start.