Why you need extra retainers

I hear so many complaints about how hard it is to make gil in this game and that crafting is monopolized by the 1 percenters..

Just to prove a point, and because I was tired of having to change prices every 10 minutes on high competition market, I've done a little experiment over the past few weeks and here is the result.

http://i.imgur.com/ruxd9oM.jpg

All low level (don't need a level 50 crafter for this)
All low competition (don't need to babysit the MB all day long)
and also low demand (not a good thing, but it is the truth)


If you want to make gil in this game and you're having trouble.. Go make an alt, play for a couple days to unlock that extra pair of retainers and put them to work. You don't need to sell anything high-end or high competition, just stock up your spare retainers with whatever you see the market has a deficit of, let it sit for a few days and it will eventually sell.

P.S. Note the price difference between rose gold nugget and steel ingot :D
P.P.S. This works better on low to medium pop servers where not everything on the MB is saturated, I imagine it should still work for high pop servers as well, your choice will be limited though.

Your servers market is very interesting if you can sell full stacks of HQ steel ingots and horn glues with such regularity.

Why anyone would need large amounts of those items in HQ puzzles me.

PS: Considering the amount of time required to craft that many HQ items, I think its fair to say that the complaints regarding markets being dominated by the top 1%~ arent entirely baseless.


On the plus side, its a great way to get the required amount of crafts for the luminary achievements.

Well, if you check out the steel ingot prices from 10 days before, you can see that the price fluctuates, a LOT.. But even at that low price, it's still mostly profit.
As far as why anybody needs those HQ items, I have no idea.. I just know that if I sit on it long enough, it will sell.

Thing with horn glues is.. I seem to have a monopoly on them now, I didn't force anybody out, but I guess the thought of earning a profit of 2-3k each craft (25 sec) doesn't appeal to anybody else. But that's still ~300k/hr in profit.

It's certainly not the most time efficient method to make gil, but all the crafting can be done semi-afk with macros which is what I do with a dual monitor and playing another game at the same time.. I can churn out a decent chunk of stuff to sell.

While it's true that it'll eventually sell, this is because all of the other people selling said item have already sold theirs and now yours is all that's left on the market board. Again, yes, you do make the profit from it eventually, but it's largely based on how long it sits there and if other players decide to sell the same item. By this logic, you can put an item in your retainer for the maximum gil amount possible, and while it may take a long time, even years possibly, it will sell once no one else is selling that item....

Not really arguing with what you're saying, just pointing out a flaw with purposefully trying to make gil this way. More than likely in the time it took you to craft these items and sell them, you could have made just as much gil after costs by doing dungeons, FATES, and quests, while selling the excess items from those....

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Originally Posted by Aeyis

Your servers market is very interesting if you can sell full stacks of HQ steel ingots and horn glues with such regularity.

Why anyone would need large amounts of those items in HQ puzzles me.

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Doesn't seem so unusual to me. There are plenty of reasons why someone would buy a bunch of HQ mats.

Well one reason could be they are not on your server.

Masamune (A Legacy server where most people sustain themselves and ''no one'' buys RMT Gil)

Stack of Steel Ingot HQ - 34k (470k~188k for your server)
Stack of Horn Glue - 38k (280k for your server)
22 HQ Rose gold nuggets - 30k (104k for your server)
99 Granite - 10k (47k for your server)

And your prices show the Net Profit, mine are still the Gross prices.
(But when housing was introduced my server was in the most expensive bracket!)

Also... when people complain about not enough retainers, it's because they lack inventory space. It has nothing to do with Gil.

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Originally Posted by Aeyis

Your servers market is very interesting if you can sell full stacks of HQ steel ingots and horn glues with such regularity.

Why anyone would need large amounts of those items in HQ puzzles me.

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It's not regular though, that sales volume is pretty bad and we have no idea what the actual margins are. If anything he is proving a point by saying even if you do this horribly inefficient way of making money, one of many you can do without being a 4 star crafter, you will be able to make whatever you need.

Also as with above, Japanese servers actually have competitive prices since people tend to gather and craft their own stuff a lot more. The prices are closer to equilibrium, NA servers are a turkey shoot to make gil in comparison so I don't know what people are complaining about.

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Originally Posted by ElHeggunte

Doesn't seem so unusual to me. There are plenty of reasons why someone would buy a bunch of HQ mats.

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Those are very large amounts tho. High level crafters dont actually need or want low level HQ mats (because they are more expensive), unless its needed for a specific 2* (for use in macros, if the price is similar enough to the NQ) or higher.
Low level crafters dont have any use for HQ items of those amounts.

As a result on my server those kind of items typically sell in stacks of up to 10, while rarely in increments of 20-40.

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Originally Posted by Niqote

Also... when people complain about not enough retainers, it's because they lack inventory space. It has nothing to do with Gil.

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Pretty much, yeah. Altho + 1/2 retainers can help with selling if you go through large volumes of different sizes.

Horn glue I understand. http://ffxiv.gamerescape.com/wiki/Spruce_Plywood

The ingots...I got nothin. Both available in nq form from vendors and no high level synths. Iron ingot shows up in one 1-star synth, the i55 pvp shield. Steel ingots...nothing.

Without divulging names you blocked out, is it mostly different buyers or repeat customers?

Also if you need an answer to why people want (because using the word need is silly no matter what) extra retainers, having 3 covers all 3 cities. Quite often I'll move items to the city of the lowest priced guy. No point undercutting by a small amount if you're not selling in the city with the higher chance of certain things selling.

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Originally Posted by Gamer3427

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That's the common misconception.. Because how crafting is so mind numbingly boring, people overestimate the time to craft such a large amount of items.. In the span of about 3 hours, I could make 4 stacks of horn glue Which at the price I posted them, would net me over a million gil. That's not to say that it will make me 1 million gil in 4 hours.. You have to let it sit and wait for it to sell which can take a few days to a couple weeks.. So you expand this operation to 3 or 4 different itemss and maybe you can have enough workload.. It all depends on the player of course, personal preference plays a very large role in this.

With this method, you can take out the time to sell out of the equation because you don't need to babysit the items with price wars (nobody's going to undercut a hq horn glue at 3000 gil)

What you DO need, is spare retainers, because your main needs to be doing higher demand, big ticket items which is what I use my main for.

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Originally Posted by Niqote

Masamune (A Legacy server where most people sustain themselves and ''no one'' buys RMT Gil)

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Masamune's economy... I'm not touching that with a 40 foot pole... and I do believe some of my customers may be RMT related, can't say for certain though, when I've felt lazy I've spent stupid amounts of money on mats just because I didn't wanna make them.

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Originally Posted by Alistaire

Without divulging names you blocked out, is it mostly different buyers or repeat customers?

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Usually, it's one person for a bout of 2-3 days then they're done.. And a new buyer will come along in a few days to a week and buy a few more stacks.
In the case of horn glues, the large stacks are 2 different people, with 1 person buying the majority.. he's probably farming chocobotail saws. But all the smaller stack sizes are different people.



Again, this method isn't for efficiency or perhaps even most money made, this is about making gil without having a 4 star crafter and without fighting the monopoly.

Reason I mentioned getting extra retainers for this isn't because of inventory management, it is because you need extra sell slots that you can sit on for days/weeks without worrying about it.. I couldn't do this on my main retainers, they have more important things to sell.

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Originally Posted by Alistaire

The ingots...I got nothin. Both available in nq form from vendors and no high level synths. Iron ingot shows up in one 1-star synth, the i55 pvp shield. Steel ingots...nothing

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Here's the thing though: a lot of players will NOT look up where you can purchase mats from NPCs. If it's not available within a town vendor or their class' guild, they automatically assume you can't buy it from an NPC. I know quite a few people that will buy things from the residence districts' vendors and from beast tribe vendors and put those items immediately back on the MB at double or triple the price. And it sells. Quickly.

99 HQ Steel Ingot for 470,250 = 4750 each?

What's the normal average price on your server that people sell at? From your post, this price obviously is a lot higher than the average price.

On my server HQ Steel Ingots sell for 500~700 gil. Horn Glue HQ for about 800 gil.

Last stack on my server sold between 300-400 each. NQ and HQ have the same prices.

If they are selling for 4750 each on your server then yes it's trivial making money.

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Originally Posted by DreadRabbit

Here's the thing though: a lot of players will NOT look up where you can purchase mats from NPCs. If it's not available within a town vendor or their class' guild, they automatically assume you can't buy it from an NPC. I know quite a few people that will buy things from the residence districts' vendors and from beast tribe vendors and put those items immediately back on the MB at double or triple the price. And it sells. Quickly.

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This. As an example, you can buy cinnabar for a measly 3 gil at the tradecraft vendor in any of the three city-states, as well as the vendor at the Alchemist guild. On the market however, NQ cinnabar sells for about 40 gil each, and while not selling quickly, does sell. People are lazy. Especially if they have a little excess gil from leveling another DoH or DoL. Rather than trying to find out where something is sold or obtained if they don't know, they'll just buy it off the MB without a second thought......

EDIT: I should say "on the market for my server" it sells for about 40 gil each....

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Originally Posted by DreadRabbit

Here's the thing though: a lot of players will NOT look up where you can purchase mats from NPCs. If it's not available within a town vendor or their class' guild, they automatically assume you can't buy it from an NPC. I know quite a few people that will buy things from the residence districts' vendors and from beast tribe vendors and put those items immediately back on the MB at double or triple the price. And it sells. Quickly.

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The items in question are HQ. You cant buy HQ items from a vendor anywhere.

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Originally Posted by Aeyis

The items in question are HQ. You cant buy HQ items from a vendor anywhere.

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That's true, but Alistaire was wondering why bother when you could get the items for much cheaper as NQ. Or at least that's how I understood it.

Now if people are making HQ leveling gear for mates or their own classes, then you're right. No choice but the MB if you can't harvest/make the mats yourself/too lazy to.

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Originally Posted by DreadRabbit

Here's the thing though: a lot of players will NOT look up where you can purchase mats from NPCs. If it's not available within a town vendor or their class' guild, they automatically assume you can't buy it from an NPC.

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I think Dark Matter is my favorite, I used to be able to sell the stuff for something absurd like 500G a piece... Costs 80G off an NPC... Right next to the Market Board...

Even today I can still get something like a 4~6k profit off just buying a stack and reselling it, not like it sells slowly either. It's... Amazing...

I can kinda understand not bothering with the beast tribe vendors, since they're generally out of their way. Dark Matter though... 5 seconds away from any given Market Board, tops. Heck the repair NPCs probably offer better value for money...

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Originally Posted by Aeyis

The items in question are HQ. You cant buy HQ items from a vendor anywhere.

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The items in question are also of a tier where HQ shouldn't matter. Not in those quantities anyway. The only people who would need them in such quantities are serious crafters, and then the only one I can fathom is Horn Glue for Spruce Plywood. I'm guessing those sell the most with novice crafters who don't have a solid rotation trying for their Artisan's.

@OP. Honestly, I'd take extra Retainers solely on the Venture benefit. I have two Retainers farming shards/crystals for me the majority of the time. I am never wanting for either as a result. Don't think I've ever bought any off the blatant RMT bot Retainers, and I'm someone who'll occasionally decide it'd be fun to spend the day rotating Unspoiled Nodes and churning out stacks of NQ Darksteel Nuggets/Twinthread/Gold Nuggets/etc. to make money, it's not like I don't burn through crystals or anything.

I think I learned something from this thread...about markets...and HQ items.

Okay, so then what HQ materials will move?

Also, what sells better raw materials or crafted materials?

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Originally Posted by SarcasmMisser

Last stack on my server sold between 300-400 each. NQ and HQ have the same prices.

If they are selling for 4750 each on your server then yes it's trivial making money.

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Then Steel ingot isn't one of the items that would work for your server, although if you're willing to put up a stack of hq at 1200 and sit on it for 2-3 weeks, you might be pleasantly surprised.
As for your latter comment, yes it IS indeed trivial making money, which is the point I'm making.
It may not work for all servers, but it does work for a good amount of them, and if the items I've posted aren't profitable, look around, there will be other items that are.

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Originally Posted by Nalien

Even today I can still get something like a 4~6k profit off just buying a stack and reselling it, not like it sells slowly either. It's... Amazing...

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Yes, those kinds of items also work wonderfully if you're willing to sell a variety of them.

For example, you can sell olive oil from beast tribes, vitriol, cloths from sylph vendors and mythril ingots even.. If you have a few spare retainers you can stock up with those mats, and just relist once every few days that's very easy money. I'm taking similar concepts just slapping an hq stamp on it, and it seems to double/triple its price.

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Originally Posted by Solaria_Luna

Okay, so then what HQ materials will move?

Also, what sells better raw materials or crafted materials?

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What will move depends heavily on your own server and also depends on if there's recently been a person who just leveled up that certain craft.
For example, if there's been somebody who just leveled BSM from 1-50 few days ago, you may see a bunch of ingots at cheap prices, then you'll find no room to compete. If you're willing to wait a week or so, you can just sit on it and see.

Usually the crafted mats will sell better than raw mats.. I tend to specialize in mid-grade refined mats that need a crafter's handiwork, but is not an actual final product and it does quite well. Not too many people specialize in these markets, the profit margin is small when you look at it in a profit per craft sense.. But when you can hq a low end item in ~9 steps (20-25 seconds) as opposed to a 2 star mat at ~25 steps (70-80 seconds) your time is well paid for.. It's just hard to find a buyer, which is why diversifying and having 10 retainers helps.

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Originally Posted by Solaria_Luna

Okay, so then what HQ materials will move?

Also, what sells better raw materials or crafted materials?

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It really depends on your server. Some materials are in demand more than others. Sometimes the raw materials are actually worth more than the finished product. In order to get an accurate answer to your question you would have to examine the price history of the items you think you might be able to sell and then decide if the process of making or obtaining the items would be worth it.

Prices can also vary, sometimes wildly, based on the day of the week and even the time of day, so study the market carefully before investing a lot of time and gil into it!

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Originally Posted by ElHeggunte

It really depends on your server. Some materials are in demand more than others. Sometimes the raw materials are actually worth more than the finished product. In order to get an accurate answer to your question you would have to examine the price history of the items you think you might be able to sell and then decide if the process of making or obtaining the items would be worth it.

Prices can also vary, sometimes wildly, based on the day of the week and even the time of day, so study the market carefully before investing a lot of time and gil into it!

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lol the one known is Alumen...it seems people need Alumen a lot. "I mine Alumen, people love Alumen." (people is a self censor)

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Originally Posted by Solaria_Luna

lol the one known is Alumen...it seems people need Alumen a lot. "I mine Alumen, people love Alumen." (people is a self censor)

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It's because of Aldgoat leather. It's used in quite a bit of crafting, and you can't buy it anywhere but the MB. The only two ingredients for it are Alumen and Aldgoat Skin, which can be farmed easily, (I think I got nearly 200 Aldgoat skins in a short session while a miner friend of mine was gathering about 30 Alumen). On my server, Aldgoat Skins are practically worthless on the market, but Alumen sells for about 100 gil each. The finished leather on the other hand sells for closer to 500 gil each, and can be crafted pretty early on in leatherworker....

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Originally Posted by Gamer3427

It's because of Aldgoat leather. It's used in quite a bit of crafting, and you can't buy it anywhere but the MB. The only two ingredients for it are Alumen and Aldgoat Skin, which can be farmed easily, (I think I got nearly 200 Aldgoat skins in a short session while a miner friend of mine was gathering about 30 Alumen). On my server, Aldgoat Skins are practically worthless on the market, but Alumen sells for about 100 gil each. The finished leather on the other hand sells for closer to 500 gil each, and can be crafted pretty early on in leatherworker....

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Alumen is used for all leather before raptor, starting from aldgoat. Also it goes without saying, you can't buy any leather anywhere (and probably skins for that matter). The low level stuff below lvl 10 don't count...

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Originally Posted by SarcasmMisser

It's not regular though, that sales volume is pretty bad and we have no idea what the actual margins are. If anything he is proving a point by saying even if you do this horribly inefficient way of making money, one of many you can do without being a 4 star crafter, you will be able to make whatever you need.

Also as with above, Japanese servers actually have competitive prices since people tend to gather and craft their own stuff a lot more. The prices are closer to equilibrium, NA servers are a turkey shoot to make gil in comparison so I don't know what people are complaining about.

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Doesn't that mean it's less competitive and worse because no one buys as often?

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Originally Posted by UBERHAXED

Alumen is used for all leather before raptor, starting from aldgoat. Also it goes without saying, you can't buy any leather anywhere (and probably skins for that matter). The low level stuff below lvl 10 don't count...

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Ah. I wasn't aware of the other. My main two crafters I've leveled to any point beyond level 15-20 are Alchemist and Culinarian, which don't exactly have much need of leather, (maybe one or two Grimoirs, but even then I'm not sure since I'm not looking at a crafting log right now).....

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Originally Posted by UBERHAXED

Doesn't that mean it's less competitive and worse because no one buys as often?

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Less buyers puts downward pressure on prices, this is not very ambiguous

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Originally Posted by SarcasmMisser

Less buyers puts downward pressure on prices, this is not very ambiguous

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Ah, you were referring to a buyer's market. Not convenient for making money though.

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Originally Posted by Alistaire

The ingots...I got nothin.

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Steel ingots are turned in for leve quests, it'll be people lvling trade skills wanting x2 for HQ turnins.

This is whe he'll have the same customer for a bit then it changes.

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Originally Posted by Gamer3427

Ah. I wasn't aware of the other. My main two crafters I've leveled to any point beyond level 15-20 are Alchemist and Culinarian, which don't exactly have much need of leather, (maybe one or two Grimoirs, but even then I'm not sure since I'm not looking at a crafting log right now).....

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On the other hand my Weaver is almost 30. (I checked and yep it's my WVR not LTW)

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Originally Posted by DreadRabbit

Here's the thing though: a lot of players will NOT look up where you can purchase mats from NPCs. If it's not available within a town vendor or their class' guild, they automatically assume you can't buy it from an NPC. I know quite a few people that will buy things from the residence districts' vendors and from beast tribe vendors and put those items immediately back on the MB at double or triple the price. And it sells. Quickly.

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Yep. When I have a dearth of things to sell, I'll go buy a stack of linen or velveteen from the sylph vendor and list it in stacks of 5 at a steep markup. It usually sells out pretty quickly. Honestly, most of the key to making money is just making sure that you have as many items as you possibly can listed on the market at any given time. I sell everything from dodore crafting/gathering gear to ingots to allagan crafting mats to fleece to food... well, you get the picture. Diversify!

Hell, I probably make as much money selling Krakka Roots as I do selling Thavnairian Onions. It's not always about selling big ticket items. Listing high-volume items in small quantities allows you to make a pretty hefty profit off of them.

Since the OP ran his mouth, these items are now gonna be pointless to put up in a few months.

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Originally Posted by Twilite

Since the OP ran his mouth, these items are now gonna be pointless to put up in a few months.

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lol I'm not really worried :p MB will change once 3.0 hits anyway and that's in less than 3 weeks.. Besides, there are other items that are just as profitable..

and one thing I've learned is that even if there are clear proposed solutions, most people just won't pursue it i.e. getting those extra retainers, I admit, it is a lot of work (6-7 hours) but it will pay off for as long as you play the game.. The extra inventory doesn't hurt either..

This is more or less a proof of concept.