If you need Gold, engage the Legerdemain System and Steal and Fence. There are many areas that are rich in things to steal with few to no NPCs around so the risk is next to 0.

Gear, with Enchants that help your character is important. Not meaning you need the best set, you just need something. And, don't forget Jewelry, either normal stuff, or something that is part of a set. Just have something in all your slots. Note, while leveling, try to wear a mix of armor weights so they all level up. Food can help, Blue for early levels, Purple for higher ones.

Have a Class Skill and a Weapon skill on your bar at all times so you can get those leveled. Mix in a 5th skill to level up and use along the way. Once you get a skill to Morph stage, you may want to slot another one and get that to Morph rather than build the previous one all the way up. Save maxing your skills for later.

World Bosses are not designed to be solo'd. Wait for other players to show up, or send out a Zone chat that such and such World Boss is up, people will show up, as they are farming dropped set items.

Join a good guild, sometimes you can find one by running with a random player, sometimes from zone chat, sometimes from a thread on the boards here. You can always drop a guild, so don't worry about doing that. There is no black list unless you are a complete tool, and while there is still no list, word will get around if you just dump on everyone all the time. But, try a guild, then leave for whatever reason? No worries there.

Delve Bosses you can solo, if your gear is decent (not the best, just decent) and you have some skills in your rotation. Its all about skills in the game, sometimes weaved in with Light or Heavy Attacks, sometimes just skill rotations. The rotation you use needs to make sense to you and your build, so it will be different for everyone. However, some skills will buff the next skill you use, or next set of skills you use, so maybe use that first. Some skills are Damage over Time, so apply those early, but don't spam them until you need to apply it again. Some skills are cheap cost damage dealers, so spam those, but not so quickly you use up your resources. Weaving in Light or Heavy Attacks, with or without animation canceling, can help.

Finally, combat in this game requires you to be Mobile, Agile and Hostile. Move around, attack from advantage. Learn to Block, Dodge Roll, Interrupt (Bash), Stay out of Red etc, and you can soon take very little damage while in combat, at least most of the time.

Good Luck.

While leveling you should be preparing your self for the future, not your build (as that will change). So:

1. While leveling, have one class skill from each class on your bars at all times. Classes level the slowest, so get them done now.
2. Have at least one weapon skill on your bar at all times
3. Have a flex or support skill you want to level at all times
4. Once the skill gets to the Morph stage, then put another one on the bar to level that rather than take the morph.

Your not going to have the best DPS now, but you will have the most flexibility later. You can apply this to both bars equally or some other way, but this is the best method while leveling 1 to 50. Reason, the game handicaps you right now to make you stronger than you really are. So, take advantage of that. You don't need the optimal skill load out, you need the optimal leveling load out.

Also, try to wear at least one of each weight of armor to get all those lines leveled.

Once you get up to or near 50, you should have all the skills that matter at Morph stage, your armors at 50 and most important, your classes at 50. Then, you can optimize your build.

Combat in this game comes down to Skill Rotations, with Light or Heavy Attacks interspersed. So, it's more like 1,2,3,4,1,2,3 dead. Pick your skill rotations so that one skill will set up or buff another skill. For example, use a skill that Snares, then a skill that gives Damage over Time to an area so the snared mobs spend longer in pain, then use a spam damage skill. This is just one example.

Once you learn a good rotation, then you can weave in light or heavy attacks between the skills to extend the resource pool you play from. So it's more like 1, LMB, 2, LMB,3, LMB, 4, LMB, 1 Dead. Then once you learn how to weave attacks, then you can start animation canceling to up your DPS.

So, attacks are not just a spam of the Left Mouse Button, but an application of your skills and weapon attacks.

You add in Blocking (reduce damage), Bashing (interrupting a caster or heavy attack wind up), Dodge Rolling (double click on a WASD key to avoid damage and get out of red quickly). Throw in some terrain advantage, and your basically a Mobile, Agile and Hostile wrecking machine.

As for Gear, well, while leveling, gear does not matter as long as you have something. It does not have to be best in slot, or even all that good. Also, we have lots of dropped set pieces so if you spend any time in a zone, you will more than likely pick up a set or two to wear. Each zone has a Magic, a Stamina and a Health or Tank set. Since everything scales, you can use this gear longer than you would think from the levels. It is only once you reach CP160 that you really want to worry about the gear, and by then you will have a good idea of what to use and where to farm for it.

Until then, the most important thing with gear is to wear a mix of it (light/medium/heavy) so they all level up somewhat equally. Also, have one skill from each of the 3 class skill lines on your bar at all times, and at least one weapon skill. For the 5th, it can be another weapon or attack skill or a support skill or some skill you want to level.

First leveling character? Forget about Builds right now. No need, your handicapped anyway by the game so you are way more powerful than you need to be. Instead take advantage of this buff to properly level your character so you can be deadly when it matters later on when you are not buffed by the level scaling. In other words, you can create a rotation that makes you think your all that and a biscuit because of the scaling buffs, then get a rude awakening come Champ Ranks when you are on your own.

In other words, right now if your wearing any gear, the mobs will die.

1. Have one class skill on your bar at all times, swapping them out once the skill reaches Morph stage. Worry about your Morphs later.
2. Have one weapon skill on your bar at all times, again until Morph stage
3. Wear a mix of all 3 armor types so they all level about equally
4. From L1 to L20, invest in attack skills and actives
5. From L20 to L35 start investing in Passives and Support Skills
6. From L35 to L50 start investing in Morphs (but only if all your class skills are at the Morph Stage), Passives and Crafting Skills
7 From CP10 to CP160 try out dropped sets to see which ones fit your playstyle, don't worry about traits right now, fill in passives and actives you may have missed
8. Grind on Dolmens to level your Fighters Guild, or find the Lore Books to level Mages Guild
9. Do some stealing to level Legerdemain, best source for money in the game
10. Decon every piece of gear you get that you are not going to use immediately to level equipment crafting, no need to invest skills points until Champ Ranks.

Once on the horse, lets talk about a few things.

1. You can sprint past your Stamina as long as you keep sprinting or don't hit a rock or a pebble or something that slows you down. As such, you have to re-apply the Sprint as you go along. On the PC, this is the Left Shift, not sure on the consoles.
2. Speed of the Horse until you get that part upgraded to around 25 to 30 is kind of slow to the point it almost not worth it to ride if your in a hurry. Sure you get there faster than running, it just feels like your going slower than you can run.
3. Once past the first two character bag space upgrades, horse bag space is the cheapest in game, but it takes the longest to max out as it's one bag a day.
4. Stamina is useful to upgrade, but most people wait until Speed and Bags are upgraded before investing in Stamina.
5. You can upgrade one element of your riding each day at the stables. Some people roll alts early and park them at the stables upgrading things before they play them
6. You can buy packs of Riding Lessons in the Crown Store.
7. The upgrades you apply to one character do not carry over to another character.
8. Different Mounts are different skins the Riding Upgrades apply to all Mounts on that character.

One thing to remember, a lot of guides are written with idea to maximize production to the Nth Degree, which can make sense when your leveling your 8th character. But it can really suck the fun out of the game on your first character worrying about it.

Here is a better approach:

The beauty of the game now is each zone drops a Magic Set, a Stamina Set and a Health (Tanky) Set. You can do the content in the zone and get the gear you need with some nice bonuses to help your characters. It drops in at least Green and Blue is common once you get around the 30;s. A lot of times it drops in the Training trait, but you really don't need to have every single item in Training. Just prefer it as a trait, but wear what you get. When you are done in that zone move on to the next and start replacing the gear with the stuff from that zone. You can usually go about 10 levels over the gear before it starts to get noticeable as needing to be replaced. If you get something that is higher level than your wearing, just swap it out as you go along. Again, don't worry about the traits while leveling. The game is buffing you anyway.

As for leveling crafting, you should do that, but don't be in a hurry to invest all the skill points you need for it. You need those points for combat and defense. Just decon all the loot you have left over after selling to cover any repairs you do. Research Traits on items you think you are going to use. Then do the other traits later on.

Let me give you an example of what I did with my last two leveling characters.

1. I collected all the Skyshards in the zone. I avoided any and all quests other than those that show up in the delves that have skyshards.
2. I would farm the dolmens a few times to get set jewelry that helped my character
3. I would do the Public Dungeons including all the bosses
4. Then I would move to the next zone.

In doing this, I could fully gear up my character with level appropriate stuff, and it was helpful gear. May not have been the best, but you don't need the best while leveling. Then, I had all the content quests left for me once I reached CP160 as those can give you sweet Set Drops in good traits you want. And, Quest Experience is huge for gaining CPs once your past CP160. Kind of a waste before that.