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Clusters
I do a lot of crafting and have three disciples of hand at lvl 80 now with all the others not that far behind. I also regularly do the weekly crafting in Idylshire for crafter's scripts and two of doh's have all 8 master's books.
As a result I am now able to craft items that require clusters rather than crystals. Right now I am purchasing them at the mp simply because I have no idea how to obtain them on my own.
From the little bit I have learned from googling them it seems that fighting mobs is the best (only?) way to obtain them. Is this correct? Is it possible to obtain them with retainers? Or with my miner or botanist?
I generally prefer to absorb the cost of items (like skins and hides) from buying them on the mp rather than taking the time to dps mobs for the drops. So will likely continue to purchase my clusters if the only way to obtain them is by dpsing mpbs.
Thanks for you help!
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You can get clusters using your level 50+ miner/botanist in Mor Dhona. They spawn mining: 9:00 - 12:00 1:00 - 4:00 5:00 - 8:00 ET Botany: 13:00 - 16:00 17:00 - 20:00 21:00 - 0:00
It would be worthwhile searching out "Teamcraft" on google, that has a great searchable database of everything crafting related.
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You should look into "Aetherial Reduction", considering that your miner and botanist are level 80.
I'd recommend looking for a guide, but the short version: Certain items can only be gathered as collectables with the intention to "atherial reduce" them into Crystals, Clusters and special types of crafting materials (a variety of ather-sands). The nodes for these items are timed and are called "Ephemeral Nodes". Depending on the item, you'll get a different type of crystals, clusters and aether-sand - now that you know what you're looking for, it shouldnt be to difficult to do a bit of research yourself to figure out what nodes you want to hit.
This: https://ffxiv.consolegameswiki.com/wiki/Ephemeral_Nodes might be a good place to start some reading - you can also look up videos on YouTube from people explaining how to cluster farm.