It is never a problem and why is because we have many newbies on the forum doing well and are seeing the result, if you doubt have a look at this The future of Bitcointalk: Low Ranking Top Merit earners in the past 30 days its updated till date and after you could have gone through, do well to check some user's profile and see what they are posting and how they are doing it that makes them have a deserving result, so don't say or assume it's a problem for newbies to have merit, everyone is lied with equal opportunity and those that maximize the effective use of it get a deserving benefit from it as well.


Furthermore to clear your doubts i think you need to go about the reading of the forum's rules and regulations, and some important key topics in this area of merit like i will love to drop you some here:
Merit FAQ for us read as well this also for more directions onnhow to go about [GUIDE for NEWBIE] Merit-help from other users, how to use them correctly? and i think by now you should have got it right and realize what you've been missing out.