Can we just remove shards from the game?

[Frysia]

Low on shards? Nope..... t Luminary tools.... getting those forces you to gather a ton of shards so...

[StouterTaru]

Actually I would love to see the ability to break higher grade crystals into lower... say a Cluster -> 10 crystals; 1 crystal -> 10 shards (or whatever exchange rate). Same with Darkmatter and carbonized matter. The prices are similar enough, I should be able to buy a few of the highest grade to save inventory space and use what I need, when I need it. Alternatively, just have repairing cost 5 basic darkmatter instead of a single G5 darkmatter.

You can use higher level dark and carbon than is needed. I just buy grade 5 dark from the NPC, and use it for any gear I repair. When I'm low on carbon matter, I send my minebot retainers out for 30 grade 3 each. There's no reason to take up inventory space for grade 1/2 when it costs the same as grade 3.

[Ravno]

In my opinion, a good way to deal with the problem is to create some node who drop more shards and cristals but with a two star difficulty.
Something reasonable, like all node nodes droping 4 or 5 shards and cristals. Enought to ease the pain of collecting this stuff, but not enought to make rtm use fully melded crafting gear.

[Xavier_Fanesthre]

I used to think gathering shards was such a chore until a friend in the FC suggested I use the wards while doing it. Prior to that, I thought the gathering rate on retainers didn't justify them collecting shards. Retainers gathering crystals on the other hand is leaving me with a plentiful supply...

[EvianEverdeen]

I used to think gathering shards was such a chore until a friend in the FC suggested I use the wards while doing it. Prior to that, I thought the gathering rate on retainers didn't justify them collecting shards. Retainers gathering crystals on the other hand is leaving me with a plentiful supply...

What wards? I don't have a gathering retainer leveled up yet, so I'm not sure what you mean.

[gornotck]

What wards? I don't have a gathering retainer leveled up yet, so I'm not sure what you mean.

Between leveling Botanist and Miner, not a retainer, you get six Wards that increase their specific aetheric attribute shard collection (and eventually crystal and clusters) by 2 for 400 GP. So it increases the amount of shards you can get from a single node to between 12 and 15 as you get 3 shards per gathering action.

[LukeStuz]

Between leveling Botanist and Miner, not a retainer, you get six Wards that increase their specific aetheric attribute shard collection (and eventually crystal and clusters) by 2 for 400 GP. So it increases the amount of shards you can get from a single node to between 12 and 15 as you get 3 shards per gathering action.

or if you're like me, when i gather shards, i use the elemental gathering bonus that some nodes give so i can get 16 as you get x4 shards from 1 node, and i believe you can do that with crystals but cannot confirm that, but what i would love is a way to get x4 of the clusters since they are a timed node and i hate having to wait for them when i have dailies to do which can take upto 3-4 hours if i do all my beast tribe quest, DR bonuses, and then trying to do my coil / ex primal farms / win.

[Synestra]

Shards seem too expensive. A level 1 item should not be 40-50 per shard.

Whaat! D: On my server im not selling any shards less than 120gil each and that is usually the normal price for high-demand shards(like wind and lightning). But anyway have you tryed to use DoL specced retainers to go for some shard ventures? they should bring approx 200 shards in hour or so.

[Xavier_Fanesthre]

What gornotck said! Just add the second set of wards as cross-class skills to the class you're using!

[Xavier_Fanesthre]

I'm working my armourer at the minute (with blacksmith left to go). I should look into this elemental gathering bonus as I am desperately short of ice shards (and a little cash at the minute, trying to finish overmelding my GSM).