Started the crafting journey.

I've held off leveling DoM for now to focus on crafting, and I finally started up DoL/DoH and looking for a few tips and corrections. I've looked everywhere for start up guides. Most revolve around old content (2.0-2.5), and advanced guides for getting from 50-60and my poor butt is stuck somewhere in between.

Please feel free to correct/add to any of the following:

I do have 7-figures for an initial investment, but I am more willing to invest time. So I am leveling DoL before actually doing any crafting. My questions here are should I go ahead and take them to 50, or should I run DoL/DoH a bit parallel to each other? If taking DoL to 50 first, I am curious what is the best move to do with my yields. I figure to sell most things, but keep the items that are a little harder to come by.

After I've paved the way with DoL, prioritization will be:

Get all DoH to 15
Get the most helpful DoH cross skills
Get all DoH to 50
Get DoL to 60

After that, I will pick my favorite craft to take to 60 first :)

If anyone has made their own guides and have links, I will be happy to check them out. Have a great weekend all!

Hi Gemina, I too am new to crafting. To make sure that I dont lose alot of gil, I decided to level all classes toghter. The steps that I took are:

1. Level all DoL to level 15.
2. Level all DoH to level 15
3. Level all DoL to level 20
4. Level all DoH to level 20
5. .... etc

The reason why I am leveling like this is, because of 2 reasons:

1. By keeping my DoL classes close to my DoH classes, I will be able to provide for myself, my DoL is level 41 and my DoH are around level 35. So far I have not made any loses gil wise and have only made alot of profits, being able to provide for yourself is very helpful.

2. By leveling all classes close to each other, you will save alot of inventory space and your gear will reach 100% soulbound fast. The materia can be either melded (I recommend you meld them) or sold on the AH.

The only downside is, it takes longer to level like this, but atleast I have not wasted any gil.

In general some items are required to craft a different item, so keep those items, everything else can be sold on the AH or used to level Desynthesis. The items often tell you in the description which items are for desynthesis which are not. The one for desynthesis are used to level their desynthesis level, so sell those on AH.

One final advice make sure to:

1. Always have a exp buff on.
2. Hand in the daily GC item and only hand in HQ.
3. When doing leves, always hand in HQ items.
4. Do the Ixali Beast Tribe Quests. If you reach a point where you are not able to clear a quest, ignore it untill you are higher level. Finishing Ixali Beast Tribe questline required me to be a level 30 crafter. Some players finish the questline at a lower level and others finish it at a higher level.
5. Always wear HQ items, the bonus stats are worth it. I change my gear every 10 levels and I always make sure I have HQ items. At first making HQ items is going to be very hard, so I recommend you ask your friends, linkshell buddies or free company members to craft some for you.


I am still a newcomer to the craft, just like you, but this is what I have been doing so far and so far its working.

You dont lose much by choosing to level your DoL classes ahead rather then keeping everything roughly the same. Basically, you wouldnt be able to make your own gathering gear... and you could potentially run into inventory issues if you keep too many mats. Of course staggering your DoH levels too far could lead you to those same inventory issues, so you could probly scratch that off the list of cons. Making your own gear is nice(save on money/favors), but the gear does take awhile for the stats to really ramp up so the advantage is a little delayed. As for what to do with your spoils, most gathering mats are easy enough to get that you can safely sell anything you find while leveling up if it gets you a good price. By the time you start getting into mats that require more work, youll easily be able to tell which ones they are.

Otherwise your leveling plan looks sound. If you can, try to keep the DoH classes close to each other. A lot of the items you'll make will require materials made by other classes, and the more of them you have at the same range the more likely you are to be able to make them all for yourself. And ill join Laerune in recommending the Ixali beast quests. Great source of crafter exp until you get your classes over 50. Your daily GC turn-ins are a good source of exp for DoH and DoL all the way to 60(typically 1/8-1/2 a level of exp per day per class), so totally do those when you can.

Best of luck, and if you need more help dont hesitate to ask.

Thanks Laerune and Frizze! It's seems it is kind of a pick and choose. Being able to gather your own materials for crafting, or being able to make your own gear for gathering. I've learned that your gear is SO important for gathering. Those minor stat increases by updating as soon as the gear is available makes a world of difference when needed to gather HQ items, or get the 25% eval bonus from leves; every point of GP is as precious as a breath of air. I haven't begun crafting yet, but I would imagine the same applies to the trades as well.

I went a little past 15, and got DoL to 20 because it has been so fun and addicting. But I do plan on starting crafting today, and hopefully while getting them to 15, I will pick up a good feel for smart and efficient progression so I don't have to hammer every single little question I have into the board. I will try to keep that at a minimum and ask questions when I am stumped rather than a curious kitty. Learning is a big part of the fun :)

If/when something comes up that I have trouble finding the answer on my own, I will most certainly ask on the respective forum. Thanks again, and happy crafting!

A good tactic is to find a friend who has already worked on their crafting skills to make you HQ gear to turn in for Levi's. Even undergeared crafters at max level can reliably craft HQ gear for materials that aren't usually hard to get. Note also that your FC or personal house has many perks for crafting. Crafting stations increase your GP which makes it easier to increase quality and the higher quality you get an item the more experience you receive. Also the vendors available at houses sell items that can get most crafting classes to 20 with cheap, stackable materials.

Free bonus crafting tip! Depending on what your crafting goals are, you can prioritize which classes you boost in which order to get the most benefit. If you want to focus on making your own gathering gear most of your wearables(left and right side) will be made by leatherworker, with the rest being almost all weaver(one or two sets of shoes are carpenter, earings are the only goldsmith jewelry), while blacksmith does almost all the tools(only exception is that fishing poles are carpenter). Prioritizing for making crafting gear will focus on weaver a little more then leatherworker(though both will make wearables), goldsmith will do almost all the jewelry until high levels, and tools(main and off) are mostly blacksmith with a couple exceptions(sewing needles are goldsmith, offhand for goldsmith and weaver are made by carpenter). If your priority is making crafting easier you want to target cross class skills(after level 15 since almost all of those are helpful and you can do the first 15 levels in almost no time) at carp 50(byregot), cul 37(steady 2) and wvr 50(careful 2) - roughly in order of importance(the rest of the 50s are worth going for too, but these three are pretty high impact).

Oh so many more good tips. I should mention that I'm OK with my FC making HQ gear for me to wear, but I refuse for them to make or gather HQ items for me to turn in. I'll check the company safe and take what I need if it's there, otherwise it's on me. I want the same grind those who came before me went through, and a big reason why I want to gather and craft is to become as self sufficient as possible. Relying on people is a bad start for me on achieving that. I was even going to buy all my HQ gear but my FC insisted not to do so if updating my gear only takes them a few minutes, which is far more efficient than farming the Gil.

I honestly don't mind though. I know I'd want the HQ items I put on the MB to sell, and I always have a little trouble accepting freebies when the helping player gets nothing out of it.

Honestly, you will save yourself enormous amounts of gil if you level your miner and botanist to 60 first. I would also recommend leveling a miner retainer and a botanist retainer. That way, you can gather everything yourself without having to rely on other people or paying on the MB for your supplies.

As for crafting, I did most of my 1-50 leveling using leves. Then, from 51-56 I did a combination of mass crafting certain items (such as Mythrite Nuggets on GSM/BSM or Rainbow thread/cloth on WVR) and leves. At 56, I stopped doing any leves and did all the rest of the leveling by crafting collectibles and turning them in. It's massive XP plus blue crafting scrips which are used to purchased your Master 3 and 4 tomes.

this may of been covered im too lazy to read everyones responses right now.

even if you are not actively crafting make the daily turn ins for your gc. even if you just nq them as by the time you look at it more seriously youll of already levelled a bunch. all the mats youll need will be sold in venders (fc vender is great choice)

levellng together takes time and limits you hq chance so best to follow the old arr levelling plan to 50.

which btw you should def do as repairing your own gear saves you gil and you need 50 in most of them to repair all pieces.

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Originally Posted by NorthernLadMSP

Honestly, you will save yourself enormous amounts of gil if you level your miner and botanist to 60 first. I would also recommend leveling a miner retainer and a botanist retainer. That way, you can gather everything yourself without having to rely on other people or paying on the MB for your supplies.

As for crafting, I did most of my 1-50 leveling using leves. Then, from 51-56 I did a combination of mass crafting certain items (such as Mythrite Nuggets on GSM/BSM or Rainbow thread/cloth on WVR) and leves. At 56, I stopped doing any leves and did all the rest of the leveling by crafting collectibles and turning them in. It's massive XP plus blue crafting scrips which are used to purchased your Master 3 and 4 tomes.

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I decided to keep DoL significantly higher than DoM. I won't take them all the way to 60, but will level them in increments of 15 opposed to 5 towards DoH after getting them all to 15. It's been a slow start due to some internet troubles over the last several days, and I prioritize my beast tribe quests atm. I did manage to get Carpenter to 10 so at least my hands are dirty, and I am finally learning how this all works. Naturally, every answer to my questions is replaced by two more lol, so I am allowing myself some self-discovery along the way.

I was a bit weary about leveling BTN and MIN retainers as I didn't want my inventory to explode. I'm sitting on a lot of old gear at 100% SB that I hope I can do something with, but creating and melding materia has only been mentioned thus far. DoL and DoH leveling this far has been a mix of leves, checking off gathering/crafting log, GC turn-ins, and just good 'ol whacking away at stuff to use up whatever time is remaining on any exp buff I have active, or to recharge GP between leves. Between all of that, the levels come very quickly.

I do know at level 56, I begin collecting blue scripts that I will need. That's a ways off though, but I am enjoying the journey so far :)

What I ended up doing for my DoH and DoL classes was to max out levels first and then focus on gear in all honesty. I was usually strapped for gil and ended up benefiting more from levels instead of gear. Best make use of the cross class skills you get access to from classes. Depending on how your crafting goes you might want to beeline it for some of them. Honestly Alchemy has two of the best skills, that being Tricks of Trade and Comfort Zone. Unlocked at 15 and 50 respectively. You can skip Leather Worker entirely in my opinion, both cross class skills are terrible when used with every other skill you acquire. This is just how I went about it though, If you're going for a self sustained route its going to take much longer. Depending on MB prices you can easily save yourself alot of time and effort with mats and easily level up your classes.