how to reliably craft HQ now.

[Maeka]

I, and a couple people under my tutelage, have seen that you could start fairly reliably (subject to RNG, of course, since it wasn’t usually 100%) HQ’ing finished products starting in the low-mid 20’s, assuming both up to date HQ gear and a good selection of level 15 CC moves, from all NQ mats. I noticed that during 2.0, the others more recently (somewhen between the release of HW and the release of SB).

In other words, its always been about having up to date gear, and a good selection of CC moves. Now, they’ve taken those CC moves away and provided some of them to everyone. But we’re still left with it being about up-to-date gear. So why are some people (not the person I quoted, obviously) surprised by it, or need to be reminded of it?

Well you see, a new problem exists now: You level up so fast that it's easy to not realize you need new gear.

Even at Level 71. I made myself Lv71 HQ tools and 5 hours later my BSM had dinged 74 and I was like "woah, I need new tools and new clothes now!" I saw someone ding 32, 33, 34, and 35 by turning on one GC item. They had one set of tools... now they need a new set of tools, IIRC. It's easy to forget when you gain levels that fast. And NQ stuff just doesn't cut it, so .... you do a bunch of speed leveling and now you're not able to craft anything at your level anymore.

BUT

Thankfully, prices on the MB are dropping, as I noted a couple days ago.

EDIT: IMO, I think it's time for a buff to NQ tools and cloths up until Level 70. Buff the NQs so that they're only 10% weaker than the HQs so that you don't *NEED* HQs to do anything. And then when the new expansion comes out, do the same for ShB stuff.

That, or give us easier ways of getting ahold of tools and clothes, perhaps do the same thing you do for Poetics: Dump a full set of tools, clothes, and jewelry on the crafting tribe vendor at the end of the expansion that's good enough (with mild difficulty) to HQ the next expansion's x1 equipment.