Retainer Venture?

After reading the question and answer by that person in the event forum, what exactly is this retainer venture?
Are we going to get it this week or will this be in another patch after the 2.2?]
I'm really wondering what it is about.

http://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodest...a2f50fd428c5c2

You assign your retainer a job (that you yourself must have) and you spend retainer credits, which are earnt from your grand company and probably other methods, to send them out on "ventures" to collect an item for you. They'll be out on their venture for a certain timeframe and when they return they will give you the item and earn themselves some retainer experience and level up themselves. You can gear your retainers too to increase the returns.

And yup it's going to be in 2.2

Question about retainer ventures.

It says in the 2.2 pre-patch notes that you can only send your retainer out on a class your character has actually unlocked. (Like if you leveled GLA but not CNJ, you could send your retainer out as a GLA but NOT as a CNJ)...but what if you have both GLA and CNJ unlocked, but your CNJ is lower leveled than your GLA? Does your class level matter or effect your retainers class level? Does your retainer 'cap' at your current class level (like if your CNJ is level 15, will the retainer only be able to hit level 15) or is it separate? (so in theory, your Retainer could have a level 50 CNJ, and your characters CNJ is only level 15)

I'd like to know so I can plan my ventures and Retainer roles accordingly.

Also, can your retainer perform ventures in areas your character has yet to enter/discover? Can it gather items you have yet to obtain on your own?

Since WE don't go out mining/fishing/or foraging on our combat classes, why would you expect a retainer would? You'll need to have the gathering professions in order for the retainers to gather anything.

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Originally Posted by Kinseykinz

Does your class level matter or effect your retainers class level? Does your retainer 'cap' at your current class level (like if your CNJ is level 15, will the retainer only be able to hit level 15) or is it separate? (so in theory, your Retainer could have a level 50 CNJ, and your characters CNJ is only level 15)

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From what I remember reading you cannot unlock a class on a retainer if you haven't unlocked it yourself and retainers cannot go higher than your level for the class it is currently on. So if you only have a 15 CNJ that's the highest your retainer will be able to go until you level yours up more.

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Originally Posted by Orophin

From what I remember reading you cannot unlock a class on a retainer if you haven't unlocked it yourself and retainers cannot go higher than your level for the class it is currently on. So if you only have a 15 CNJ that's the highest your retainer will be able to go until you level yours up more.

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This is what I had assumed I was just looking for clarification.


I still would like to know if retainers will go 'venturing' in zones/areas your character might not have actually been to yet, or if it only will stay in your 'discovered' areas.

The same thing was implemented in SWTOR, and if it works anything like it did in that game, your retainers will have set tiers containing a pool of venture missions for various items. In fact, it does seem as though it works exactly like in SWTOR.

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Originally Posted by Kinseykinz

Also, can your retainer perform ventures in areas your character has yet to enter/discover? Can it gather items you have yet to obtain on your own?

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As it turns out we cannot do this. For example, this morning I made one of my Retainers a Botanist. In order to have her use that class, I had to first unlock it. Then I attempted to send her out to gather Earth Shards, but was denied.

I could not send her out to gather an Earth Shard until I had gone out as a Botanist first and harvested at least one Earth Shard myself. So, it's not possible to send Retainers out on Ventures to hunt/harvest items that your character has not already obtained before. :(

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Originally Posted by Starkiller

So, it's not possible to send Retainers out on Ventures to hunt/harvest items that your character has not already obtained before. :(

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Thanks for confirming this however I believe the original question was about the areas (of the map / world) rather than specific items and as you can obtain majority of the items form multiply locations this doesn't prove anything. However the question here is if the reatiners actually even use the "standard" game locations to "explore" or if they even care if those were already discovered by our character or if they simply obtain the items based on some RNG algorithm and their level / gear? I believe it's latter as we'll hardly see groups of retainers running around Eorzea performing their quests ;)

So I'm running into a new problem along the same lines. I picked up mining so I could make a retainer a miner. I got mining to level 5 and did the relevant quest. My retainer's max mining level is still 1, she cannot level up past 1, even though I'm now level 7. Does anyone know the actual determining factor for your retainer's max level?

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Originally Posted by Mordraine

So I'm running into a new problem along the same lines. I picked up mining so I could make a retainer a miner. I got mining to level 5 and did the relevant quest. My retainer's max mining level is still 1, she cannot level up past 1, even though I'm now level 7. Does anyone know the actual determining factor for your retainer's max level?

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Not quite sure yet. Someone in my FC made their's a Gladiator and the max level the retainer could obtain was 34 when the player's Gladiator level was higher than that.

I wonder if it has to do with an average of all of your class levels or something, but being that you're level 32 on the class you're posting on I can't see why it wouldn't be able to go past level 1. Maybe your Miner has to be higher. *shrug*

Seems fair enough to me. Your retainers are in effect your subordinate pupils, so they effectively learn from the master, so to speak.

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Originally Posted by T2teddy

Since WE don't go out mining/fishing/or foraging on our combat classes, why would you expect a retainer would? You'll need to have the gathering professions in order for the retainers to gather anything.

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Combat classes will gather things dropped from animals and creatures like skins, hides, horns etc... I'm assuming. They're not going to help you fight so I can't think of any other reason to make them combat classes. I sent my two retainers out today, one as a botanist and the other a miner, on two 18 hr expeditions after equipping both with level 1 gear. I've reached 50 in both so it'll be interesting to see what they come back with tomorrow. There are rare items that you can only get from ventures so hopefully I'll get lucky.

I did a quick exploration with a level 9 botanist retainer and got back a decent looking green marauder weapon which was level 41, it was untradeable though. I'm somewhat wondering if some of these unique items you'll be able to get from retainer ventures will just be like aether gear.

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Originally Posted by Starkiller

As it turns out we cannot do this. For example, this morning I made one of my Retainers a Botanist. In order to have her use that class, I had to first unlock it. Then I attempted to send her out to gather Earth Shards, but was denied.

I could not send her out to gather an Earth Shard until I had gone out as a Botanist first and harvested at least one Earth Shard myself. So, it's not possible to send Retainers out on Ventures to hunt/harvest items that your character has not already obtained before. :(

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Yeah I messed around with my alts/main this morning and yup.

(which is how I thought it was going to be, I just prefer clarification)

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Originally Posted by Mordraine

So I'm running into a new problem along the same lines. I picked up mining so I could make a retainer a miner. I got mining to level 5 and did the relevant quest. My retainer's max mining level is still 1, she cannot level up past 1, even though I'm now level 7. Does anyone know the actual determining factor for your retainer's max level?

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My educated guess looking at my main+ my alts is the game 'caps' you so that your alt can't go out and in theory, come back higher level than your PC on the same role. So low level, I believe you need to be above level 10ish...but higher up, the level between you and your retainer can be closer. On the 18hour venture for example, your retainer can easily gain 4-5 levels.

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Originally Posted by HEC

Thanks for confirming this however I believe the original question was about the areas (of the map / world) rather than specific items and as you can obtain majority of the items form multiply locations this doesn't prove anything. However the question here is if the reatiners actually even use the "standard" game locations to "explore" or if they even care if those were already discovered by our character or if they simply obtain the items based on some RNG algorithm and their level / gear? I believe it's latter as we'll hardly see groups of retainers running around Eorzea performing their quests ;)

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In this case, it seems it 'depends'

When it comes to DOL....if you never gathered it neither can they. However, it WILL show up in your list as possible harvest assignments.

When it comes to DOW/M....harder to say as well, I'm pretty sure every single one of us has touched an animal skin etc while leveling. But seemingly the retainer goes out and finds these things without asking 'hey, do you have the map to...'
-Basically, this will be easier to tell 100% when people are higher rank and there's a better chance for a retainer to be assigned to go farm something you might not have gotten as a drop before

All that said: One of my gathering Retainers is level 10+ and could do the quick exploration. She came back with a house roof. (I don't know how the lala carried it back, but she did). Anyway, I have never crafted a house roof/owned a house in game etc. So at least for the 'quick explorations' (where you say 'go have fun/surprise me), they literally can bring you basically anything, and you didn't need to touch it previously in game.

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Originally Posted by Starkiller

As it turns out we cannot do this. For example, this morning I made one of my Retainers a Botanist. In order to have her use that class, I had to first unlock it. Then I attempted to send her out to gather Earth Shards, but was denied.

I could not send her out to gather an Earth Shard until I had gone out as a Botanist first and harvested at least one Earth Shard myself. So, it's not possible to send Retainers out on Ventures to hunt/harvest items that your character has not already obtained before. :(

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dang... I just made one of my retainer as fisher. Since I don't really like it (because of real life issues too), was hoping my retainer can go in my stead. Oh well... lol

BTW, I wonder if retainer in future can be sent for gathering unyielded nodes like gold ore or darksteel ore for miner. I am a lvl 50 miner and I do have mined it before. Would've been kewl if that can happened. :D

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Originally Posted by Kinseykinz

my gathering Retainers is level 10+ and could do the quick exploration. She came back with a house roof. (I don't know how the lala carried it back, but she did).

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O.o - Nice! Poor Lalafeline - what size of the house was it for? Is is tradeable afterwards? Would be "funny" (not) to end up with your inventory / retainers stack-up full of housing items without possibility of using it (FC house prices are STILL way to high!!) or trading it in. But if I'm not mistaken only "unique" gear should be untradeable so if the venture produce the common items those should be tradeable the same way as if procured by another methods. One "sad" think though which I've discovered last night is that the ventures (the "currency") is untradebale which makes it impossible to send it to your alts :( So those of us having multiply reatiners on alts would need to procure the ventures directly on alts, join GC and level the alts to allow those retainers to level up as well.

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Originally Posted by BobbinT

BTW, I wonder if retainer in future can be sent for gathering unyielded nodes like gold ore or darksteel ore for miner. I am a lvl 50 miner and I do have mined it before. Would've been kewl if that can happened. :D

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I am very interested in this as well. I am working on a BTN retainer now. I'm sure someone will beat me to 50, but I'll post back here with the results if no one else does. Though, it may take a while depending on how quickly we can level at higher levels.

Level 12 retainer of mine can now do ventures to obtain shards in 50 minutes instead of an hour for the 30 shards. Amount of shards seemed to change with gear, and guessing level affected the time it takes. Should be funky if at level 50 with proper mining gear if the venture length goes down to 10 minutes if the shard amount also increases as gathering/perception go up, could mean we'll be able to really use retainers for farming up shards for us.

Not sure if this was posted anywhere yet, but I wanted to add something here.

I sent out 2 retainers on exploration. One Archer and one Arcanist. I noticed my Archer retainer can get a maximum level of 50 and my Arcanist Retainer a level 21 at maximum.

Now, I have leveled my Bard to level 50 and my Arcanist to 26. However, my Arcanist currently has iLevel 21. So the maximum level a retainer can have seems to be the iLevel of what you have of the corresponding class on your own character. With a maximum of 50.

Not sure how the loot works, but the leveling seems clear.

Yeah - it seems that while your corresponding class is bellow 50 the retainer's max lavel is capped at your level -5 ...

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Originally Posted by HEC

Yeah - it seems that while your corresponding class is bellow 50 the retainer's max lavel is capped at your level -5 ...

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I'm curious if your retainer still gains experience while capped though. Say I was level 10 and my retainer was 5 and I sent it on a whole bunch of ventures without levelling myself up at all; If I levelled up the next day would the retainer level too (or be closer to levelling)? Unlikely but maybe.

Just had my level 13 mining retainer bring me back a HQ offhand for miner, which I'm in the middle of leveling so she won't catch up.
http://i.imgur.com/ORwKM7r.jpg

o_O; These rewards seem almost too good to be true. An HQ Militia Sledgehammer....from a quick exploration...on a level 13 retainer? What on earth do level 50's bring back? High Allagan Blades?

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Originally Posted by Espritduo

o_O; These rewards seem almost too good to be true. An HQ Militia Sledgehammer....from a quick exploration...on a level 13 retainer? What on earth do level 50's bring back? High Allagan Blades?

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I think it's more random than that. There's a lower chance retainers will bring back fancy things at lower levels but anyone who's faced the RNG (regardless of winning or losing) knows that that doesn't mean a lot. I do however think some photoshopping is getting around too though, with a low level retainer supposedly bringing back 2 primal weapons and the like. I doubt they'll be game breaking but people only seem to comment about the big stuff so it gives an impression of a higher ratio than there really is too.


Edit: Aside from housing stuff, I've gotten an electrum earing and a whole bunch of single fish to NPC and other junk. (And yes I burnt through way too many tokens on that.)

Where do I gain the ability to send my retainer out?

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Originally Posted by SolusekRo

Where do I gain the ability to send my retainer out?

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Via a low level quest in Limsa (possibly other cities too, not sure). Sorry, I can't remember where or what it was called.

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Originally Posted by SolusekRo

Where do I gain the ability to send my retainer out?

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In each city there is a lvl 15 quest to unlock it.