New to 3* and above crafting - need some advice

[Lemuel81]

http://www.ffxivcrafter.com/

Play with this for a while.

the simulator for 3 and 4* are not accurate, less its been updated recently. Honestly better off practicing on wolfram ingots. Its cheap and if u can get some HQs out of them it can make you some money.

[Mishini_Dracoto]

http://www.ffxivcrafter.com/

Play with this for a while.

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SouterTaru and Scarebearz both know what they are talking about. They completely disagree with each other on a lot of points, but both of their styles work. **I've tried both**

I've recently started doing more and more crafts like Stouter Taru, and Find I'm reclaiming less. For Example, I don't use PbP Right away. My rotation is more like this:

Comfort Zone
Inner Quiet
Steady Hand II
ToT / Hasty Touch until SH2 falls off.
Tot / Piece by Piece x2 or until CZ falls off.
Refresh CZ
PbP / CS2 until @ 10/20 Dur
Master's Mend II
Steady Hand 2
ToT/HT until SH2 wears off --and--
Refresh CZ when it wears off
Once at 11 stacks IQ, depending on progress, use Rapid Synth to gain progress. while SH2 is active. CS2 if SH is down.
MM2
SH2
Ht until SH wears off
Great Strides
depending on available CP, I'll ING2 + Innovation to bait good/excellent proc, if I'm low on CP, and have enough durability left, I'll hit Careful Synth instead.
Byregot's Blessing
ING2
Careful Synthesis until complete. Often is only one CS2 left at this point.

[scarebearz]

They completely disagree with each other on a lot of points

To be honest, I tend to agree with StouterTaru's posts more than the majority of crafters on these forums xD

Like you say, there are more than one "correct way" to do these and personal preferance comes into play a lot too.

[Ellatrix]

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Except.. it is accurate. You should try it. And you advocate IG2 and don't use CSII to fish for BB finisher proc. lol

[Havenchild]

http://i.imgur.com/1MQpZwq.jpg

This was linked to me a long time ago to start off and frankly I think it's the best beginner's rotation to 3 star crafting. I still occasionally use the first rotation now and then.

Manually crafting is however better because you can adapt to situations better but that should be obvious.

The only thing to watch out for post Great Strides is to not stick to the rotation 100% if you get a good or excellent before your supposed to byregots, ignore the ING2 or Innovation and just use Byregots as the bonus from a Innovation or ING or Both will be less then a Good Proc.

[scarebearz]

http://i.imgur.com/1MQpZwq.jpg

This was linked to me a long time ago to start off and frankly I think it's the best beginner's rotation to 3 star crafting. I still occasionally use the first rotation now and then.

To be honest I think "rotation's" like that are counter-productive, as they teach people bad habbits. E.g. Replacing Hasty Touch with Basic Touch after every ToT.

[Havenchild]

To be honest I think "rotation's" like that are counter-productive, as they teach people bad habbits. E.g. Replacing Hasty Touch with Basic Touch after every ToT.

I would agree with you on that to an extent, but at the same time when you progress to 4 star crafting, anyone will already have some forbearing knowledge that Basic Touch is almost a thing of the past unless you get a lot of ToT at opportune places.

That rotation is linked is one of the safer ones because it provides a lot of ToT chances where as many 4 star "rotations" don't, on top of it's not MMII dependent while also removing the "calculation" aspect of crafting. Masters Mend II while great if you have the CP for it, is not really something to depend on either, because if you get shafted with no ToT procs or not enough (which I'm sure many understand where I'm coming from with that), you may sacrifice more touches for the sake of simply finishing or Reclaim. Rotations that are soluble in CP tend to be sought after for that purpose. 4 Star really just teaches you to depend less on definites for the sake of adding more chances at IQ stacks.

Crafting manually is 100% better due to ability to adapt but that's only really beneficial for Byregot's. You can't guarantee enough CP for MM II (6-8 ToT) across any rotation. While it's sought after (MM II), there are few rotations that can give you 11-12 stacks of IQ and can be solved within CP boundary with no ToTs for 3/4 star which is already overkill if you're using HQ mats, which I would imagine most people would go for with these items.

[Rath]

For 3/4 star, I tend to:
cz
iq
sh2
pbp
rsx2
ht until sh2 drops
refresh cz when it drops and use all tot.
mm2 at 20 dura if sh2 is down 10 dura if not, 10 is preferred. The more CZ used earlier the easier it is to fit in a third and another mm2.
at 20/30 dura, after 2nd mm2, finish with gs bb cs2 (based on your craft skill you may need 3 cs2 on 4 star) Use 1 cs2 before bb if not good or ex (standard fishing technique on 4 star m2 books).

While replacing HT with BT seems like a good idea, even when near capped CP, I would rather just be glad I will have ample cp for a 2nd mm2.

There are times when I know I will not have enough CP to CZ a third time and mm2 a second time. These times are when your experience comes in handy. Myself, I tend to drop the third CZ and just go with mm2. If stacks are high though, I will mm (manipulation if gsm) and drop cz as well. This is a rare occurrence as I will usually just drop CZ and go with it.

To point out, I only make 3 stars as mats for 4 star synths. I am sure there are 100% (with HQ mats) rotations out there, but I always use NQ mats unless I make them myself. The above basic method has worked well for me.

[juniglee]

Thanks for all the advice guys.

I'm currently doing (very similar to Rath's):

CZ
IQ
SH2
PbP
RS x2
HT until 10 or 20 Durability
MM2

SH2 before starting HT spam, put up CZ anytime it falls off.

Spam until about 20/80, then GS + SH + BB, then CS2 to finish off. No Basic touches were used, unless I saw an Excellent proc (maybe a bad habit I need to get out of?)

Managed to 100% my CRP's Artisan Claw Hammer without too much trouble XD

[Mishini_Dracoto]

Except.. it is accurate. You should try it. And you advocate IG2 and don't use CSII to fish for BB finisher proc. lol

You're right, my post was misleading. I only use ING2 to fish if I have tonnes of CP. It depends on how much progress I have left also. IE, if I need a lot of Progress, I might need ING2 running AFTER the BB o finish he synth. 4 more actions will alwas suffice. Also, if I've already almost completed it, I can't CS2, or I'll finish the synth, so I have to usesomething such as ING2 or Inn. This is all drasticall different every time I synth, because it depends on two large RN factors : how many good procs have I obtained, and how much hasty touches were successful thus far.

I get 90-100% on all of my 3* Synths, even with all NQ materials. 4* I have no problem HQ'ing with about 50% HQ materials.