however you posted that should work.

People with 0 reputation (ie, new users) can create a New Topic with no problem, as @bulrush15 already found out. (And after making this dummy post, they successfully asked their question(s))

I think the reputation may make it tricky for you to answer though

There is no trick involved. You have misunderstood the system, and have apparently not paid attention to developments in the Forum. First, because you didn’t see that @bulrush15 had earned 3 upvotes for this Topic hours ago, long before your reply, so it was no longer an issue, whatever the current state of the Forum. And second, because people with 0 reputation can reply on the Forum with no difficulty. (The oddity that was around for the first couple months of the 0-rep-no-linking rule has been fixed for months now.)

To clarify: 0-reputation prevents a user from posting links to outside sources. But they may create new Topics and they may reply to any existing (unlocked) Topic. They may even quote their reply, as long as the text they are quoting does not contain a link to an external site. (Internal links, such as the “in-reply-to” link and the @-mention, have worked since we updated the NodeBB, months ago.)