SE, We need to talk about Leatherworker ...

[Katchoo]

Edited my original post for a bit more clarity after the discussion

... in fact Leatherworker, Alchemist, Weaver, basically any recipe with a mob drop in it.

It is completely ridiculous that we are still in this situation with some of these drops. Limited spawn locations, low drop rates and not dropping enough mats for recipes that are BASIC levelling recipes.

To point out, i have no issues with having to put more work into some recipes. I'm cool with that, the issue is that when basic recipes for levelling require a disproportionate amount of work compared to other jobs.

This does not only apply to LTH but also to things like WYV and Dawn Serge metals requiring stupid amount of mobs drop (Chimera Felt all over again)

One of the biggest peeves i have is the inconsistency of mob drops for these recipes. All too often i have gone to farm something to start out fairly solid and then suddenly 10 kills later still nothing. It's incredibly frustrating to invest time into something and get nothing in return. I know RNG is RNG but not having a rough idea of how much time i need to farm for any given thing is annoying.

Personally i feel like many of the mob drops for low and mid level crafts should be increased.

EDIT: About retainers.

...

And even with retainers, it still takes too long to get all those materials. You might be fine for LTW, where each piece of leather takes 3 skins, even though the drop rates on those are horrendously low, but ONE piece of Worsted Yarn takes 4 mob drops, and ONE piece of Dawn Serge takes 3 yarns - that's 16 items for one complete material! And then your ultimate item might (probably) requires more than one cloth. Nobody's asking for the ability to get dozens of the items per drop but the amount of time invested. That's 3 hours alone for your retainer to get enough materials for 1 cloth. You're pretty much required to have multiple DoW retainers to get these items at a decent pace.

"Just use your retainer" isn't the answer, we need a buff to the drop rate or the amount you get per drop.

[Esp]

Don't forget that your retainer can actually harvest these for you if you have a battle retainer. I have geared up one of my retainers and have it harvesting the starter materials as I level other jobs in anticipation for when I begin leveling my crafters.

Doesn't fix the problem once bots hit the playing field (like they did for fleece ><), but it's for sure a start to make things less painful. xD

[Dzian]

Dow retainers can be sent to get a lot of those materials effortlessly. 10 fleece in 40 minutes for example. Doubled if you got 2 Dow retainers.. So if you need a lot just send an out between duties and stuff. It's how I got all my chimerical stuff and dissolvebt stuff in heavensward.

Takes no time at all. Under a minute to send your retainer out.

[Katchoo]

I absolutely new the first people to comment would mention DoW retainers XD

And yes i do, however this is not an answer to the problem and is certainly punishing for people that DON'T have a DoW retainer.

[Underlord]

Retainers will get them. And as for the fleece back in the beginning, they increased spawns cause bots had it all on Lockdown. You didn't have a chance when they were farming them. And then they controlled the market on them to earn Gil to sell.

[ZhaneX]

Well, we've got retainers at least which can bring us ~10 of a given mob drop an hour. More depending on how many extra retainers you may have bought and how you assign them.

But yeah, it can be pretty rough. I'm just leveling WVR currently and am dreading how much farming looks to be involved for Serge stuff.

Could really use that "Shepard" or whatever job they conceptualized ages ago for gathering mob drops.

[Elamys]

Retainers are great and all, but if you're in a situation like me where your DoW retainers are classes you don't have leveled yet, you're kind of screwed. I like having my battle retainers be varied, since then the different classes I play can give them all my upgrades. The amount of drops required for Serge is ridiculous; one pair of pants for GC turnin today required a grand total of 40 mob drops - 20 Manzasiri Hair and 20 Halgai Mane. Even if I did have my main retainer up high enough to get those, it would take 4 hours for her alone to get all those.

[QT_Melon]

I pretty much take it as a rule to always have your Disciple of War retainer be your main. There's no benefit at all other than gear hoarding on having them different jobs (I rather old gear go elsewhere tbh). I always kept note on what mats I needed during the time to level her. The thing with Leatherworker and Weaver is they get a lot of gil due to the fact a majority of gear crafted is their job. If made too easy a big glut would happen and bots would overtake it.

That being said, I found the drop rates better than HW. Still a bit of work, but not as bad as before. Considering one of the best leves uses Gagana leather, these have been exceptionally easy to farm.

I feel like tho SE should have given people 1 more retainer after 2 xpac and a growing library of items to collect. Same with giving us one more role ability (but I digress). There's more stuff around to collect and their system still requires quite a bit of mats to keep them from being completely outdated.

[Ayerinn]

Well with current reasonable retainer gear...you are still getting at most 7 mains or hairs per hour. If you send out your retainer 10 times in a day (meaning you are probably playing for 11-12 hours in that day) you would have enough main/hair for a whopping ~18 THREAD = 6 CLOTH. Talk about gating... and LOL at actually farming mobs - complete waste of time drop rates are far, far too low.

[Elamys]

I pretty much take it as a rule to always have your Disciple of War retainer be your main. There's no benefit at all other than gear hoarding on having them different jobs (I rather old gear go elsewhere tbh)

It's just easier for me to give them my old upgrades. Whereas if all of them were AST I'd be needing to make/buy separate gear for them. The top level ventures require pretty high level gear.

And even with retainers, it still takes too long to get all those materials. You might be fine for LTW, where each piece of leather takes 3 skins, even though the drop rates on those are horrendously low, but ONE piece of Worsted Yarn takes 4 mob drops, and ONE piece of Dawn Serge takes 3 yarns - that's 16 items for one complete material! And then your ultimate item might (probably) requires more than one cloth. Nobody's asking for the ability to get dozens of the items per drop but the amount of time invested. That's 3 hours alone for your retainer to get enough materials for 1 cloth. You're pretty much required to have multiple DoW retainers to get these items at a decent pace.

"Just use your retainer" isn't the answer, we need a buff to the drop rate or the amount you get per drop.