Begin with crafting and gathering

Hello everyone,

I've been playing a lot of FF14 and I'm quite high level by now, but I haven't really cared about crafting up until now. I've tried to look for information but there are so many so I just wanted to ask some specific questions to help me start.

Atm, I'm levelling Botanist and Miner at the same time.
For crafts, I'm levelling Carpenter, Goldsmith, Leatherworker and Weaver at the same time.

My question is : since a lot of people told me that it is useful to up everything, is it mandatory to do all the jobs ? For instance, I have no interest in crafting food or fishing, but Culinary seems to be a must since you have access to Steady Hands 2. I don't want to spend my time on something that i have no use to, since other classes already takes a lot of time (same goes with Alchemist too, I've never used a single potion...)
Furthermore, I haven't started Blacksmith or Armorer (I'm considering Armorer), but I might be a little more interested in the income of theses classes. Should I level them up too (I don't need weapon and only play "light armor classes"?)

At the end of the day, I'm starting all of this because I have some time to spend, but I'm primarly interested in crafting some glamour stuff (no weapons though) and furniture. So I need you professional point of view about that !

Thanks !

From what I remember, they recently adjusted crafting so that there’s less need to level ‘every single one’ for cross class skills. There are still quite a lot and I can’t say which ones are most worth getting, but you can generally get the most important stuff like Steady Hand II without them. Personally I have only Alchemist at level 80, Culinarian and Weaver at 70, and everything else is 50 or below, and thankfully haven’t had any issues with it so far. So while having them all levelled is a good advantage, I don’t think it’s entirely necessary if you don’t have the time or would rather focus on just a couple.

You might have already done so but it’s also worth looking at ‘specialisation’ too. I think around level 56 you can choose three crafter jobs to set as ‘specialisations’, which comes with a pool of abilities unique to specialists (abilities are the same for each job) as well as bonuses to craftsmanship and control that can be really helpful

In terms of income I feel like every crafter can generate vast amounts of Gil if you put in the time, so I wouldn’t worry about that and just pick whichever you like the most. In terms of making glamour Weaver and Leatherworker are probably the ideal choices, though for furniture I think Carpenter has the largest variety of items (may be wrong though).

If you are using the crafters mainly for housing you should consider taking up ALC as well as you get aaaall the plant stuff from them. Wall Planters, Planter Partitions, all kinds of potted flowers, etc.

Also - CUL has some sweet tabletop items and is one of the easiest crafters to level. I would just take it one by one. Look up leve guides, ask other crafters to help you out with HQ items for turn ins. Do your daily GC turn in and don't rush it. You are not in a hurry.

It never was mandatory to level all the jobs, and it still isnt. It is advisable to level them all at least a little ways for cross class skills, and the people who get into crafting tend over time to level them all(or at least most) up for the advantages it offers. So lets start with cross class skills. The most recent patch removed 2 highly sought after CC skills from crafters, and made the skills native to all crafting classes instead. So any guide telling you to level Culinarian for Steady Hands 2 or Carpenter for Byregots Blessing is a little out of date - you automatically get these now. In general, the advice to take every class to 15 for the first set of CC skills is still good, and several classes still get great CC skills at 50 or later(all but arguably carpenter and leatherworker).

Beyond skills though, the real benefit to having most/all classes leveled is the freedom to make your own mats. Lets look at one of the most recently added glamour items, as you said glamour was of interest to you. Lets examine the Hooded Fireglass Leather Vest. Its a sharp looking top, you might want to wear it(or sell it for millions). So how do you make it? Well, its a leatherworker recipe, so first you level that up to 80(its in the master recipe book volume 7, so also earn 1200 red scrips and buy that book). Then you need to get or buy the rare mat, in this case Fireglass Leather. This mat, like several others used only for glamour recipes, comes from treasure maps. You need 3 for the vest, so you run some maps or break down and buy off the market board. The hard part is done, what next? The vest uses some weaver materials(2 pixie floss and 1 pixie cotton - maybe to sew the leather pieces together) and a goldsmith material(a stonegold nugget - maybe for the ornamentation on the vest). Those are low 70s materials for WVR and GSM, if you have them leveled you can make them yourself to finish the vest - if not, you need to pay the market rate for them(which is ridiculously high for some intermediate to high mats). So this one leatherworker piece also used three weaver or goldsmith items. You see this in almost all of the higher level recipes, needing items from several classes to finish a craft.

So back to your question: if your goal is primarily glamour and furniture, your initial list of classes looks good. The crafters and gatherers you picked will do the majority of the glamour and furnitry work(and BTN/MIN will get the majority of the mats for said work). That said, ALC has the furniture "plant" items and CUL has some "food" furniture items as Nanami mentioned. And BSM+ARM both have furniture and glamour of their own to offer. They also both had really useful high level CC skills(Ingenuity 2 from BSM is still a keeper, the recent changes make me unsure how much i recommend Piece by Piece from ARM - i need to study this more). Keep in mind, for leveling crafters you have 3 beast tribes, leve quests, GC turn ins, custom deliveries, crystarium deliveries, and collectables in addition to just making stuff. Leveling a class for later use doesnt have to mean anything more then turning in an item here and there when its cheap and convenient to do so.

As for the intermediate materials issue, some are more dependent on each other than others are. If, for instance, someone were planning on leveling weaver without leatherworker or vice versa, it'd be worth pointing out that those two are quite tightly linked with using each other's mats. Culinarian, on the other hand, is almost completely independent of the others, hardly ever using their materials and I don't think ever providing mats for them. (At least, if there's any exceptions I haven't come across them. I'm level 50 with all eight.)

It used to be essential to level CUL at least to 37 for Steady Hands II, but now that that one has been moved to having each DOH class learn it, the only reason to level CUL now is making food (including food-based housing items).

ALC is kind of in between. It does provide some materials needed by other classes, so you'll need it if you want to be fully self sufficient. But its mats are used less often cross-class than those of the classes you've already picked to advance, so buying the ALC materials needed for the others might work for you.

ARM and BSM have some overlap, as they use the same types of metals. For instance, right at the start, both ARM and BSM can make bronze ingots, but only ARM can make bronze plates. It may be worth picking up at least one of the two (both if you want to be self sufficient).

I'd recommend unlocking all eight (or seven if you want to leave out CUL). Then focus most of your attention on leveling the ones you've picked, but when you have the time, do all of their GC daily turn-ins. That will gradually get you some levels on the others with minimal effort, giving you a bit of a boost if you later decide to go back and level them as well.

There are two main reasons people will usually tell you to level everything.

First, cross-class skills. Wile slightly less important with the SB and ShB changes, some of the skills are still amazing, especially at lower levels when you have less CP and no access to the stronger skills or better gear.

Second, being able to craft thing besides just the completed items. Like Frizze said, crafting often requires materials made by other classes. Leather needs a lot of cloth, and vise versa. Armorer sometimes needs goldsmith exclusive ingots. If you want to craft a bed your carpenter is going to need not just lumber, but also metal and cloth. And the list goes on. There's a huge amount of overlap. Leveling everything lets you actually make everything yourself rather than having to buy all the mats that come from the other classes.