Virtually empty Market Board?

Brand new player here.

I'm on Zalera, which I'm thinking is a pretty low-pop world. I took a peek at the market board and noticed there's practically nothing on it. As in, ONE weapon for marauders. Maybe 6 for dragoons. Similar numbers for other classes. And all the gear I see is low level crap, available from NPC vendors, that people are charging thousands of gil for.

What gives? Is the MB really this useless, or is it just Zalera? Does this mean that crafting is pointless? And finally, can I only get gear from dungeons/quests?

Pre-30 you should be sticking to quests/dungeons/vendors for your gear because the low level gear market boards will be too expensive for new characters. It mostly serves people leveling alt job/classes and spiritbonders. Your class quest every five levels will give you a new weapon. 1000s of gil may seem expensive now, but in several levels it won't.

I'm sure there are plenty of things on Zalera's market board, you will just have to adjust your search settings to see them since the default search settings will only bring up items you can equip. Crafted gear can be used until level cap, after which point you switch to dungeon/raid/points gear with a few exceptions.

Ah. I looked for something that was maybe filtering out stuff I couldn't use, but didn't see it. Have to check again.

And by expensive I really meant that people are charging 12000 gil for something a vendor sells for 900.

Charging around 10k is for an HQ in that range is not uncommon if supply is low, but if the NQ versions are actually selling for that much (check the sales history, circle button in the upper right corner) then list some yourself for profit. :) On the left side of the market search window beneath the job and slot icon is an area to input lvl and class/job for what you are searching for.

Out of curiosity what level are you looking for? I can tell you that the zalera MB is certainly not empty, but if you aren't adjusting your search parameters by level, you will not see any items above the level that you have that class at. If you current job is a level 1 marauder, and you simply click on the axe and search there, you are only going to get results for items that you can presently equip, which won't net you much in results on any server.

You really don't need to purchase gear when levelling to 15, there is almost always enough gear provided through class quests and other quests in general to keep you reasonably geared prior to your first dungeon.

And yes, there is almost always some form of mark up from NPC price to MB pricing. People pay for the convienence of not having to teleport and travel to that specific vendor.

This was what convinced me to level my crafters (still a work in progress), so I can gear Alts myself. However with regard to MB prices, the market is the market, people will sell things at whatever price the market will bear. One thing I find depressing is how much stuff can be bought from vendors and then resold on the MB for a good profit because there are so many players who either don't know you can get the item from a vendor, or just can't be bothered looking for it.

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Originally Posted by FwappaYomappa

I took a peek at the market board and noticed there's practically nothing on it. As in, ONE weapon for marauders. Maybe 6 for dragoons. Similar numbers for other classes.

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The first list you see when looking stuff up on the marketboard lists all items defined in the game that are tradeable and match the level and gear type that you're searching for, regardless of whether anyone is actually offering them for sale or not. If that first list isn't showing much, it's because of your search parameters (which default to your own class and level for most gear, or to the level you have the corresponding class if searching for weapons). From that first list, you select an item and it brings up a second list of all the sales currently being offered for that item. If a lot of items have 0 sales, or very few, that part would indicate a market board that's not very active (at least for the type of items you're looking at).

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Originally Posted by FwappaYomappa

Does this mean that crafting is pointless?

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Sounds just the opposite. If there were an abundance of crafters outbidding each other to sell stuff, driving the prices down to where they're all but giving gear away, then you can buy it off them cheaper than make it yourself. If, on the other hand, there's a shortage of crafters, and a lot of what you'd want either isn't available or is only offered at outrageously high prices, then making it yourself both gives you better access to good gear and can provide you quite a bit of profit as you sell your extras to other players who want it as well.