Lightning and wind crystals

[Zfz]

Just curious. Is this a level 70 thing? Or are you crafting to sell? What are you crafting "daily"?

I would imagine if you're crafting to sell, then buying crystals should be a part of your cost of doing business, and it creates demand for gatherer-only players who would be able to make a buck.

But if you're only self-sufficient and not particiating in the market, it makes sense that crystals shouldn't be such a big problem.

[Alisi]

Just curious. Is this a level 70 thing? Or are you crafting to sell? What are you crafting "daily"?

It's a level 70 issue. I craft two or three full sets of both to sell and another set or two to SB. This wasn't a problem before but then they came out with the new recipes that require you to craft a whole TON of around level 70 gear to get yellow scrips for. All the level 70 crafts take an insane amount of crystals to craft so the demand is way more than the supply. They've been cresting 1k a piece lately. This is an issue for me because each piece takes over 100 crystals to craft it. So I'm looking at a 100k increase in the cost to make the starter level 70 set when some things only go for a bit above 100k.

[Caimie_Tsukino]

I do find my lightning crystals running out a lot faster than everything else... I havent paid attention to what I used them for though... Anyway, it is an obvious game imbalance issue if the majority of people have this problem. And SE should do something about it.

[Caimie_Tsukino]

And to think, I dont even make weaver products... I usually craft threads and cloths just to support the making of other classes' products! Really dunno how I depleted all my lightning crystals...

[Alisi]

And to think, I dont even make weaver products... I usually craft threads and cloths just to support the making of other classes' products! Really dunno how I depleted all my lightning crystals...

Caimie, I firmly believe that any real recovery from crystal dependence (be it on fire, wind, earth, or in this case, lightning) is to acknowledge that there is a problem. That this isn't just a side thing. We must face this addiction full on to break it's dependence.

(Honestly, half the reason I posted this was in hopes that people will be like 'what's this? Lightning crystals are the newest get rich quick scheme that actually work? sign me up!' and drive down the prices. xD A million an hr is decent for non-crafters, after all.)

[Mysterysword]

I honestly can't remember the last time I actually ran out of crystals, but maybe I just don't craft on the quantity that you do. That said, there may be a couple of options for getting crystals that you haven't yet explored, aside from aetherial reduction.

- Kugane levequests. Depending on your luck when rolling levequest rewards, their additional reward will be crystals, and usually they give way more crystals than you need to craft the item for them. As an example, "O Pine", a level 64 CRP levequest, requires just 1 Pine Lumber (takes 4 wind crystals to craft) and usually gives 22 or more wind crystals back.

- Treasure hunts. This is dependent on RNG, especially if you're running Gazelleskins with a party, but if you're running solo maps, all maps at 60 or above give crystals, around 200 or so per chest. They also give you materials, so that's more crystals you don't need to use for crafting.

[Caimie_Tsukino]

I was running low with my lightning crystals again yesterday. So I sent out all 4 gatherer retainers of mine for lightning crystals, which took about 40 min.
I then queued up as AST or SCH for Bardem's Mettle / Doma Castle / Castrum Abania dungeons (I am currently leveling AST and SCH, and they are usually pretty quick with queues).

I ran two dungeons within the 40 min, and came back with a crap load of loots. I then turned them all in at GC, got the seals, bought ventures coins.
Got back to the bell, and refreshed their lightning crystal gathering trips. It worked quite well.

Btw, apart from lightning crystals, water crystals seems to be depleting really fast for me (instead of wind). I probably use my ALC a lot more then my GSM and CRP these days.

[AdamZ]

So I sent out all 4 gatherer retainers of mine for lightning crystals, which took about 40 min.

Like you can always be doing this to get crystal when doing something else. But in that 40 mins you got all of 120. When one Steppe Serge costs 20 lighting, you can see that it will not go that far.

The most time effective is to gather on the Schorl and Windtea nodes. Depending on rng in 10 min you can get between 400 and 800 crystals. The issue from a market standpoint is that the only reason to gather on Schorl or Windtea is for crystals (given how Dawnlight is pretty much useless). Therefore gathers are not passively getting these crystal types to sell, which then results in a unbalanced market. Compound these with these crystal types being used by WVR which has the the thread/silk issue which eats a ton of crystals.

Water is actually in one of its better places, compared to say 3.0. At HW start it was only fisher that could get water (this one bad, it still made sense to get the clusters on the level 50 nodes bad), that changed in 3.3 where BTN and Miner could get that or ice (rng). Now we have a direct minning node, which also has a used sand on it that gives water. While water is used in food and pots, which are higher volume, they are saved by the fact not many people grind scripts on those classes.

In the end, the markets would have been better if they had windtea give dusklight (Doman Yellow getting Dawnlight), Schorl give dusklight, Almandine give Everbright, with water getting the short end of perlite now giving dawnlight. I am actually convinced that Almandine/Perlite was an error. Why is the BTN specific sand on a level 70 One star, while the Minner specific sand on a level 66???

[Caimie_Tsukino]

SNIP

Thank you so much for your detailed analysis! I haven't done much gathering for a long, long time. And you just gave me a summary of endgame gathering since patch 3.3, the reasons why certain aetherial reduced items are more expensive than the others, existing problems, as well as suggesting a solution. 10 likes for you!

[Alisi]

The most time effective is to gather on the Schorl and Windtea nodes. Depending on rng in 10 min you can get between 400 and 800 crystals. The issue from a market standpoint is that the only reason to gather on Schorl or Windtea is for crystals (given how Dawnlight is pretty much useless). Therefore gathers are not passively getting these crystal types to sell, which then results in a unbalanced market. Compound these with these crystal types being used by WVR which has the the thread/silk issue which eats a ton of crystals.

I find the HW nodes are generally better than the SB for crystal farming, believe it or not. The chance of getting DE from IE2 is 100% with current gear. That makes every thing you harvest give 28 ~ 30 crystals each, even when you're waiting for your GP to regen. I do the SB, of course, but I prefer the HW ones. The only thing is that the dusts are useless but I don't farm the light/wind nodes for dusts either so it breaks even.