Novus Weapon Cost

[Donjo]

I very highly doubt that anyone is expected to spiritbind for all 75 of the Materia they wish to use for their Novus. The economy exists for a reason.

Let's go over the Materia relevant to the Novus.

The Materia we can Actually Infuse(Most Important)
Critical Hit Rate
Determination
Skill Speed
Spell Speed
Piety
Accuracy
Parry

Uninfusible Materia that can still sell well
Strength
Dexterity
Vitality
Intelligence
Mind

Useless Materia
All Elemental Materia

Materia we should never get during this process
Gathering
Perception
GP
Craftsmanship
Control
CP

So, what's the idea here? Obviously, it's to spiritbind things. If you get a Materia you're looking to infuse, great! Stockpile it. If you get an infusable Materia that you don't plan to use, okay! Sell it. If you get an uninfusable, hope it's selling well and toss it up there. Whenever you have five of the useless Materia, attempt to transfuse it into a new Materia. It's another chance of getting something useful. Alternately(I don't know the market well enough to quantify this), the elemental materia might have actually gone up in price lately due to being able to bind materia to a piece of gear to hasten spiritbinding speed.

In theory, sufficient unluckiness with spiritbinding will give you enough money to just buy the materia you couldn't get. Meanwhile, you're providing others with the means of doing the same.

Something Else Worth Noting

Going all the way up through Tier IV Materia to completely max a stat is completely optional. If you're really strapped for cash, skip them and invest in an additional stat. If you're only slightly strapped for cash, infuse Tier IV's until the infusion chance is no longer 100%. Losing 7-11 off of your favorite stat will not be the end of the world; secondary stats hardly matter and they are especially negligible on weapons, where Weapon Damage trumps all other stats by such a huge margin. Besides, is there really a huge difference between 44/31 and 38/37, for instance? It would probably be the same number of infused IV's, but more, if not all, of them would be 100%. Investing in 3 stats might actually be beneficial for some classes as well, and that would make it effortless to avoid IV's.

[RunaRugar]

CT spiritbonding is back \o/

[aerolol]

I had tons of materia from leveling my alt classes and changing their equips as soon as they spiritbond and not relying on unconvertible green gear from dungeons...

I have a crapload of Materia with my retainer, enough for 2 Novus with any stat.

So I don't think this is the worst system in game. It's way better than Atma stones and books which required cursed FATEs.

[LexSunfire]

i remember there used to be this complaint on the forums... that gil in this game was pointless.

there also used to be a complaint that materia was pointless too, beyond the three needed for each relic weapon.

SE just gave gil and materia a greater purpose and made it important.

[Giantbane]

The heart of the problem is that the spiritbonding system sucks. A gear based game that encourages you to wear crappy gear for something repetitive like farming (not for an achievement or trial), is bad. Other games (particularly ones you run around farming hordes of demons from a top down view...) have already learned this lesson.

It's worse when the game is encouraging you to wear crappy gear in a group setting since gimping yourself will effect others. This is especially true when the wearing of that gear is purely for personal gain (spiritbonding your own materia) and has no benefit for the group.

I find it really strange that SE refuses to make the very well designed crafting and gathering systems effect core game play (beyond the singular crafting of a component of a relic weapon, that isn't required to be HQ so just about anyone can do it once they hit 50) for fear it will encourage RMT sales. However, they're willing to throw in this massive dependence on their horrible spiritbonding system, which is no less prone to encouraging RMT sales.

With that said, I'm going to go the cheap route and not use any Tier IV materia. You can put more than 2 stat types into the novus weapon, so I'll be splitting the stats on my Bravura between Parry, Acc and Det. Never putting enough into a single stat to need the Tier IVs.

EDIT: I personally am annoyed by spirit bonders who like to do their thing through DF (talking full sets, not a piece here or there). Doing SB groups through PF or with FC/LS mates seems more considerate). But again, to me this is hypothetical as I haven't actually encountered it since CT days.

It will be back with CT2

[Borland]

Seemed like it was quite a problem that there wasn't any reason for lower level materia or even a lot of max level materia for a long while, and now there is, and it's creating a market for materials and gear for just spiritbonding.

This all seems like a great way of getting gil moving around.

[Ginga_K]

On estimation
Cost : Scroll + Ink = 1500myths

Alexandite Map
Shop - 800myth each - Total 60,000myths
Dude - FOC - limited 1 per day.
Materia - 75 pieces X Gil

Hence: if 2hrs game time only per day,
FOC : 7/week + Purchase : 2/week = Total 8.3wks(58 days) for 75 pieces

[Guevara]

they finally put in place a system which values gil and .... people complain because you need gil in order to progress.

SE do us a favour, take gil out of the game already!

[ServerCollaps]

the gil only change the owner


anyway, I like the novus system

[TomTom1968]

Buying the Materia is only for the impatient players. You have 75 days time if you login and do your Expert roulette each day. Might be shorter if you are willing to invest your Myth tomes but I guess for the majority it will take longer than 75 days. You do not need to insert them immediately. The Alexandrites stack (Thanks God) and you can even wait till you have them all before you insert the first one.

What I do each day is to equip myself with 3-4 items where I know a Materia I, II or III will come out of it. Then I do the daily beastmen quests. The items with Materia I are bound to 70-80% after doing six quests. Add 1-2 FATES without a moss mob to it, and you have 3-4 Materias in under an hour. Of course, the Materia II or III will take longer but not that long. I craft these items in HQ by myself and insert the cheapest Resistance Materia to speed up the process.

Additonally, I harvest or buy crap items from the market and let my crafters do a mass synthesis while wearing SB items. Even for Materia III items (Level 45+), it takes only 2 x 99 item mass synthesis to reach 100%. This can be done while you surf or do other things. Shards to craft them can be gathered from your retainers so no extra work needed. This way I am getting at least 20 Materia per week. 75/7 = almost 11 weeks time = over 200 Materia. Surely there will be a lot of Earth resistance or sec. stats I do not need and can sell or make other use of them but I am confident that I will get the vast majority of the Materia I need without buying it on the Market board.

Materia IV will be the only ones where you may have to invest money because chance to bind one (and to get the correct one) is quite low. But you can avoid Materia IV to a certain extent if you add more than 2 secondary values. Relly do not see a problem here since you can get almost all the Materia you need by doing things you would do anyways.