Althea’s Guide to Introductory Crafting
This isn’t gonna be fancy or pretty formatted, but throwing this out for anyone who’s thinking of dabbling in FF14′s crafting world. Or happens to be an alt junkie like me and wants the super fast method of earning enough GC seals for their chocobo permit.
(and it’s 2am and I cannot sleep)
Note: If you are using this guide for your first set of GC seals for that wonderful chocobo issuance, make sure you have unlocked the challenge log. The quest to open it comes from a barmaid in the Drowning Wench in Limsa.
Optional:
- A Free Company willing to turn on Helping Hand/Helping Hand II. This action adds 5%/10% to experience earned from crafting and at low levels it’s incredible to have. Likewise, if they are willing to turn on In Control/In Control II, also a good because HQ is where fast exp gain is.
- A FC with crafting stations in their house. The buff to CP is a great aid for getting those HQ items made.
- A friend or two willing to make an alt and sit through the opening CS long enough to answer the question for adventuring. Selecting ‘Fortune’ will net a CP+6 ring. They are tradeable and not unique. Extra 12 CP from level 1 can be godly and hold you well until you get to the Brass Ring of Crafting at level 18.
Getting Started:
Starting out on any craft, the guildmaster will issue you a tool and on completing his task, a beginner’s crafting body piece. If you follow this guide, you will be drowning in them. Choices involve slapping them on a fighting job and spiritbonding them for easy crafting materia or handing them off to someone learning to desynthesis weaver. You only need one, however.
Visit any one of the main city’s potwatch npc vendor and purchase unto yourself one or two of the mint lassi. It’s cheap crafting food, handy for the craftsmanship boost when new, and frankly in a very few levels of culinarian, you’ll be making this yourself and thanking the Twelve for a way to dispose of all that galago mint you keep acquiring.
Unlock all the crafts (and gatherers), even if you intend to focus on one. Do as you will with all the kurtas, but the eventual goal is to take each of them quickly to 15 for their handy skills. Culinarian will be first for the CP-less Hasty Touch. This is a threefold benefit though. First you acquire cross skills that make crafting a lot easier for yourself. Second, you can make your own low level, level 1 crafting gear and not pay out the nose on the boards for it. Third, you get ridiculously easy turn in requests at the GC for opening. Just turning in one of everything, HQ or not, will net you 1000 seals for completing 10 supply and provisioning missions. Enough for that chocobo.
Never ever buy your mats for any crafts level 20 or under from the market boards. A rare exception or two being the animal skins and hides being sold at 1gil a piece on practically every server. The npc in the crafting guild will sell everything you need for any craft under level 20, except for fish which can be scored from the Hyaline in Limsa. Likewise, a FC Material Supplier can also provide you with these lowbie mats, as can its counterpart in the main cities. There are a few other mats that will also come in cheaper than the npcs and you can certainly compare the two but it won’t break the bank if you don’t.
The Steps:
- Step One: Make whatever item the guildmaster asks for at the first. This might seem no brainer, However, part of his reward is in the form of shards for crafting and mats to make a lot of one of the initial crafts.
- Step Two: Having unlocked all the crafts, take five minutes to make yourself a remainder left side set of gear.
Maple Clogs (CRP), Leather Calot (LTW), Merchant’s Belt (LTW), Hempen Halfgloves (WVR), Hempen Breeches of Crafting (WVR)
- Step Three: Craft up all of the mats that the guildmaster gave you. Salt, copper ingots, bronze ingots, maple lumber, etc. By the time you finish, if you aren’t level 5, you should be pretty close to it. Yes, it might render those fresh clothes obsolete but the belt will hold until level 10 and the rest can be spiritbonded for crafting materia.
- Step Four: The moment you reach level 5, absolutely use as many Basic Touch as you can without breaking the craft. Chances are you aren’t going to HQ at the start, but even attempting to improve the craft’s quality gives you a HUGE boost to exp gained. Exp and gil/seals are doubled for HQ items, so always always try for it. Sometimes RNGesus will surprise you.
- Step Five: Make one of everything, up through level 10. I know, that is a lot of stuff. Cram it in your saddlebag if you must. You get an exp buff for making an item for the first time. But there’s more. Quite likely some of those items will be your GC turn ins for the day. And starting out, you want to take advantage of those requests as much as possible. Especially if you are low on leves.
- Step Six: Look at all these piles of things made by your own hands and get thee to the in town levemete. Compare what you’ve already got with what the leves want. Crow that soon your inventory will be yours again and you’ll have made gil and crafting experience. Some of the starter leves will shoo you out to a settlement’s levemete as well. While dropping those items off, Pick up that levemete’s leves as well. Some they want directly, others will turn in within town.
- Step Seven: Somewhere along the way, you probably pinged level 5 and lo and behold there’s a quest. Go ahead and do it. Select a new to you gear piece. If you want to max out your stats early, making the level 5 gear you don’t get from quests is not a bad idea.
- Step Eight: Check your available accessories as you level. Crafting necklace can be worn at level 9, new belt at 10, earrings at 15, bracelets at 16. Rings as noted above come in at 18 if you don’t have the Ring of Fortune.
- Step Nine: This could also be step five. Stop what your doing and get cooking. Culinarian has a skill at 15 that is a touch that does not use CP. The catch is that it has a 50% success rate. We are going to bump that up with Steady Hand unlocked on all jobs at level 9. It still won’t be 100% guaranteed but it will preserve your CP for Master’s Mend.
- Step Ten: Continue Crafting all recipes through level 15. Compare your piles of goods against leves and GC requests. Anything leftover from those, feel free to sell on the boards for a little extra gil in your pocket.
