Undercutting crafted items that are "game drop" is a waste of time and money!

[Imora]

Never were. Only consumables and the mats to craft consumables. The only gear bought off the AH was maybe resistance gear back in the classic days. And even most of those were crafted by guilds.

Yeah, herbs and ore land leather. Legendary crafting made some people money early on but ranking up your crafting for them only to sell for mats cost is a waste of gold

[Nythia]

Items are not being sold for mats cost, they are being sold for substantially less. The rate at which prices are falling on hundreds of items is to the point that it's not even profitable to buy and desynth the items, because when you list the mats at a profit, more flood the market within days.

The only things that remain profitable, so far, are items which only drop from treasure hunts, etc. (i.e. Dress Material). Outside of that, there is next to no profit in crafting/gathering anymore.

Even with desynthesis it's just a matter of weeks or a couple months at the rate things are going before there's no profit in that.

Unfortunately, S.E. has made crafting so easy they might as well just start everyone at level 80.

[Prrringles]

Items are not being sold for mats cost, they are being sold for substantially less. The rate at which prices are falling on hundreds of items is to the point that it's not even profitable to buy and desynth the items, because when you list the mats at a profit, more flood the market within days.

The only things that remain profitable, so far, are items which only drop from treasure hunts, etc. (i.e. Dress Material). Outside of that, there is next to no profit in crafting/gathering anymore.

Even with desynthesis it's just a matter of weeks or a couple months at the rate things are going before there's no profit in that.

Unfortunately, S.E. has made crafting so easy they might as well just start everyone at level 80.

Even map items sell bad because bots have taken over map farming. Crafting in general is a sinking shit. Just abandon it. Move on to pve or a different game. Crafting/trading is dead

[Jojoya]

Even map items sell bad because bots have taken over map farming. Crafting in general is a sinking shit. Just abandon it. Move on to pve or a different game. Crafting/trading is dead

To you perhaps. I'm still making gil on all my characters via crafting and sometimes gathering. It may be for smaller amounts than in the past but it's still profit that adds up well over time.

[Prrringles]

To you perhaps. I'm still making gil on all my characters via crafting and sometimes gathering. It may be for smaller amounts than in the past but it's still profit that adds up well over time.

I can still make gil but I have to work too hard for it. I have to compete with bots and update my prices very frequently. I have to compete with players selling their pve loot (which I craft) for WAY less than I pay for materials. Then I have to compete with some lame * players thinking they are robin hood and that everyone deserves "free" glamour items (selling at break-even).

This all escalated since Covid. Crafting/selling was for people who invested their time into it. Now it is for bots and common folk who had 1 week to spare and powerlevel their crafters because it's so easy now. Comon man, crafting is dead, admit it. Sure you can still make gil, but crafting and selling in every other aspect is dead.

I give you a good example. There is this guy on my server who just got into ffxiv. He has got 1 lvl 80 job and 2 lvl 80 crafters within 3 weeks time starting from zero. He is already "competing" with me for a good portion of items I am selling. I'm sure you know how much time and gil you had to invest back in the day to start making millions. It's all gone.

Can you still make gil? -yes. Do you have to compete with literally everyone and sell at bottomed out prices? -yes. Is it fun? -no (at least not for me and problably most veteran crafters). I know you like to disagree and argue with everyone here Jojoya, but you have to give me this one. Admit it.

EDIT: I'm not pretending to be entitled here. I just know change when I see it. And this change is for the worse for sure.

[Liam_Harper]

For me it's mainly the bots that are the problem. I don't care about other players playing "robin hood" or selling cheap to move items fast or whatever, that's a part of any free market in any MMO and supply and demand always balances it out. Other players can sell for whatever price they like.

But there's just no competing with a bot that has one character gathering 24/7 and another able to churn out tens of thousands of items at material cost and distribute them across the entire data center via a retainer army. This is what makes the time vs reward no longer worth it for me, even if I can still make some gil, because a bot has a significantly different value on time.

Other issues are the obvious crafting being too easy that floods supply. Retainer quick ventures and things like bozja lockboxes have not only starting flooding the supply of crafted items, but are even churning out current expansion furniture and gear now which significantly limits the number of markets. Also spiritbond has destroyed the prices of materia because bots are generating thousands of them just by botting. Cross-world hunts have kill the prices of battle materia too.

It felt healthier to me in past expansions because even if a lot of crafters didn't reach max level fully geared crafting, we used to have tiers of crafters and gatherers at all difficulties. Everything from low level materials, sub lv50 DoH/L gear, plain white level cap DoH/L gear, furniture at all levels, demimateria, materia, ect could sell for rather nice prices. There were far more useful items and markets for every type player to make solid profits.

Currently you can still make some gil, but if you're a past player sitting on a few hundred million or more, there's no point. You could put in countless hours to make a fraction of that. Which essentially removes gil-making as a part of crafting for many players. But when crafting is easy and you max gear week one of a patch, there's nothing to do with it anymore.

I'm also not sure SE actually intended it to be like this either. I'm sure they wanted a bit more accessibility, but more in making it streamlined, easy to pick up and learn, rather than handing it over on a plate. There's a reason craft materia costs a lot of scrips or you only get 2 materia clusters for a 24 man or new Normal raids have weekly lockouts on gear and so on. I doubt the plan was that we could just buy almost anything for peanuts on the market board and making items to sell would be pointless. They even made Exarchic impossible to 1-100% from NQ for once. There's probably a lot they misjudged and regret. Items having value or requiring some effort is part of any MMO.

[Jojoya]

Can you still make gil? -yes. Do you have to compete with literally everyone and sell at bottomed out prices? -yes. Is it fun? -no (at least not for me and problably most veteran crafters). I know you like to disagree and argue with everyone here Jojoya, but you have to give me this one. Admit it.
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I can't argue with your opinion about how you feel. That's subjective and personal to you.

I can argue with statements like "Crafting/trading is dead" because both are still valid forms of game play that are profitable for those willing to put in the effort.

Personally, I welcome competition in crafting and on the marketboard because I think the greater player community benefits from it. Competition might drive down what I personally earn but it also means I don't pay as much when I choose to buy instead of farming whatever myself.

It also makes items more accessible to newer players who don't have the years invested to have accumulated a lot of gil. That helps to make the game more fun for them and keep them invested in the game for stronger communities.

Was some change needed to crafting to lower the bar to entry? Yes. Did SE go overboard with how low they put it? Also yes and especially with respect to the difficulty level of Master crafting. But crafting is not dead.

[Prrringles]

For me it's mainly the bots that are the problem. I don't care about other players playing "robin hood" or selling cheap to move items fast or whatever, that's a part of any free market in any MMO and supply and demand always balances it out. Other players can sell for whatever price they like.

Except when said robin hood keeps flooding the market at break-even prices 24/7. He says he does it to fight the bot rings but in reality he is no better than them. Seriously, all calf and frontier glamour is sold in batches of 3-5 at break-even on Chaos. Updated 24/7 so literally no one else can sell at a profit unless you farm the materials yourself. How is that different from botting? At least bots are trying to make profit lol, this is even worse. If anything, he is helping the bot rings because he keeps buying their materials. The only losers here are the legit crafters. You guys don't see the bigger picture.

[Jojoya]

Except when said robin hood keeps flooding the market at break-even prices 24/7. He says he does it to fight the bot rings but in reality he is no better than them. Seriously, all calf and frontier glamour is sold in batches of 3-5 at break-even on Chaos. Updated 24/7 so literally no one else can sell at a profit unless you farm the materials yourself. How is that different from botting? At least bots are trying to make profit lol, this is even worse. If anything, he is helping the bot rings because he keeps buying their materials. The only losers here are the legit crafters. You guys don't see the bigger picture.

It's different from botting because there's no botting involved.

As long as the other player is using their personal time and effort, they aren't doing anything wrong. They are a legit crafter. It's a free market and we can set whatever price we want, including at/below cost to produce. Not everyone is motivated by profit.

The only losers are those who aren't willing to adjust as the market changes. There's always something that can be sold for profit even if that something isn't what you would personally prefer to craft.

[Kes13a]

Except when said robin hood keeps flooding the market at break-even prices 24/7. He says he does it to fight the bot rings but in reality he is no better than them. Seriously, all calf and frontier glamour is sold in batches of 3-5 at break-even on Chaos. Updated 24/7 so literally no one else can sell at a profit unless you farm the materials yourself. How is that different from botting? At least bots are trying to make profit lol, this is even worse. If anything, he is helping the bot rings because he keeps buying their materials. The only losers here are the legit crafters. You guys don't see the bigger picture.

thats the only way to make profit. if you are buying materials at inflated prices, you can never make a profit as the margins are too close.
so its MUCH different than botting
bots are cheaters, plain and simple. if someone farms the materials, and crafts the materials, then their cost is going to be far lower than yours, and they can sell far lower and make a profit. period. thats not cheating. at all. its wise time investment. as a legit crafter that farms all my own stuff to craft with, I really dont see your point about undercutting being worse than the bots. yes, I am selling things, yes, I may not make the same amount you do IF you sell something, but I do sell things more often I imagine, which works out to more profit in the long run.