A returning veteran and battle power roadblock

SpoopyPie

Hello everyone, I'm a returning player.

I guess I have to start with being grateful with the free orange gear I got because to be completely honest, when I look at the battle power requirements (for QB at least), I don't think I would've made it with not just the low amount of gold I had but with the purple stuff I was wearing.

Moving on

I'm the type of person that don't mind grinding relentlessly but usually after I finish main story quests in a mmorpg, if the story quest is solid and good to start with. Otherwise, I do with grind. For vindictus, I really do like the story and I was pretty much on the edge of my seat until I pretty much hit what I call the "QB Wall" for "Surprise Attack". I have to call it as such because it happens that it's fairly difficult to find a party that will join yours without it. The other alternative is using a server megaphone and ask for help. I normally wouldn't have a problem with this but the way I see it, it's that it feels like I'm asking for a carry because I can't meet the minimum requirements and that sort of makes me feel bad a bit.

So I thought to raise this battle power naturally. With Kayna's Pot and Premium Soap, I was 3k short. The first thing I did was try to sell all the Airtight Cash Shop stuff I had on some other chrs plus my main to rack up as much money as possible, to see if I could maybe try and afford some better accessories. Turns out the economy has definitely left me behind in many aspects. So I turned to the CS to see if there was anything in there that could raise it up substantially and that was a no go. Then I discovered that I could raise the stats on the gear I possess so that helped some-though it killed my ingame wallet-but I still found myself short of 2k battle power.

At this point, I want to ask what should be my next step here because I'm sort of afraid that even if I manage to get 43k, the next quest after that might ask for higher and higher. I don't have a clear sense of where or what should I do even after I finish maxxing the stats on gear. I learned about reforge but I don't know what kind of content I could try grinding to fulfill reforging requirements.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that I feel lost. I really want to clear the story quests, then do all the other side stuff but if even msq is that much of a hurdle, can I even hope to try my hand at the other things the game has?

Not looking for a handout. I can work at getting things, I don't mind that. Just want like, a roadmap or something at getting things effectively and efficiently.

Thank you for your time.