Joining mid-wipe just isn’t fun.

I've played in three different wipes now. The second wipe I was able to join from the start; That was the only time I have enjoyed myself.

Joining mid-wipe is just frustrating. No matter what map you go on, no matter where you go, you are severely out kitted. There are almost no options for armour, guns, sights or ammo so you are pretty much left totally defenceless.

Everyone you come across can tank any round you lay on them. They on the other hand are skilled up, medded up, geared up, etc. and firing back at you with no recoil about 20 rounds of "get rekt".

I would be fine if I could just access the flea market earlier. Even if it was just for ammo. Or restrict me from selling on it, but let me still buy.

The path to unlocking the flea market is a huge slog.

There is no real quest progression path to get there, as the quests rely on you getting very lucky with items (I haven't even found a second mp-133 as the Scav loot pool is so large now they rarely spawn with them).

Exploring/looting slowly is insanely time consuming and you come out with at most 4,000xp – that is, if you don't get blatted along the way. You can try scav hunting but 9/10 you won't even make it to them as they spawn late and players know all the spawns. Even if you manage to kill 1 or 2, you'll have big bois on you before you can reposition.

Money isn't even the issue, as I have 500kish still. I just have nothing to spend it on that will actually help.

Yes, I get that the game has a sense of progression and what not – but how are you ever meant to retain new players once the game stops wiping? I may juts be venting as I do like this game but boy, I do wish I joined at the start of the wipe. At least then everyone is on similar ground and it's actually FUN to run around with trash gear.