Well, there is a bit of a list of things you need to do, but here are some main ones:
-Visit the coalitions in Adoulin, and take on the tasks they offer. You will need to complete 50 tags worth (but can use up to three tags per mission, if you want) to progress some in SoA, particularly to be able to enter the Wildskeeper Revies (some incrementally better, but not great gear there)
-Travel through the Adoulin zones, with a focus on getting the survival skills (watercraft in Foret de Henetal and climbing in Marjami) way points and home points. This will take some time, but will be incredibly useful later; you can do most of this solo and with sneak/invis, not much fighting
-Find and activate the enigmatic devices in Rala Wayerways (easy, under east Adoulin) Cirdas Caverns and Yorcia. The last two will be a bit of work, but are very important for the next part
-Get into any pickup groups for Skirmish in Rala, Cirdas or Yorica, focusing mainly on Yorica. Rala and Cirdas have some good weapons, but Yorica has very good armor and an option to obtain weapons as well. Also, Yorica is the easiest for a pickup group or random person to join. The skirmish weapons and armor can be further upgraded through items obtained in those zones and with a little luck upgrading (or much gil spent) will be your primary armors. Even unupgraded, they make a nice baseline
The Skirmish system has been SEs way of maintaining a low barrier to entry baseline armor and weapons option to players, especially those in your condition of trying to catch up. In general, the event is low cost, low(ish) difficulty and not much loss for failure.
Once you get yourself up to speed through Skirmish, you can also look at the hard-mode mission battles, Vagary and the new content released in the most recent update. But my advice at this time is to focus on skirmish to the extent that you can.
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Renatus (Titan)
"We are Dragoons, and to make short work of foppish cavalry is our bread and butter."
-Bob Shaftoe, The System of the World