Why you need extra retainers

[GenJoe]

I hear so many complaints about how hard it is to make gil in this game and that crafting is monopolized by the 1 percenters..

Just to prove a point, and because I was tired of having to change prices every 10 minutes on high competition market, I've done a little experiment over the past few weeks and here is the result.

All low level (don't need a level 50 crafter for this)
All low competition (don't need to babysit the MB all day long)
and also low demand (not a good thing, but it is the truth)


If you want to make gil in this game and you're having trouble.. Go make an alt, play for a couple days to unlock that extra pair of retainers and put them to work. You don't need to sell anything high-end or high competition, just stock up your spare retainers with whatever you see the market has a deficit of, let it sit for a few days and it will eventually sell.

P.S. Note the price difference between rose gold nugget and steel ingot
P.P.S. This works better on low to medium pop servers where not everything on the MB is saturated, I imagine it should still work for high pop servers as well, your choice will be limited though.

[Aeyis]

Your servers market is very interesting if you can sell full stacks of HQ steel ingots and horn glues with such regularity.

Why anyone would need large amounts of those items in HQ puzzles me.

PS: Considering the amount of time required to craft that many HQ items, I think its fair to say that the complaints regarding markets being dominated by the top 1%~ arent entirely baseless.


On the plus side, its a great way to get the required amount of crafts for the luminary achievements.

[GenJoe]

Well, if you check out the steel ingot prices from 10 days before, you can see that the price fluctuates, a LOT.. But even at that low price, it's still mostly profit.
As far as why anybody needs those HQ items, I have no idea.. I just know that if I sit on it long enough, it will sell.

Thing with horn glues is.. I seem to have a monopoly on them now, I didn't force anybody out, but I guess the thought of earning a profit of 2-3k each craft (25 sec) doesn't appeal to anybody else. But that's still ~300k/hr in profit.

It's certainly not the most time efficient method to make gil, but all the crafting can be done semi-afk with macros which is what I do with a dual monitor and playing another game at the same time.. I can churn out a decent chunk of stuff to sell.

[Niqote]

Well one reason could be they are not on your server.

Masamune (A Legacy server where most people sustain themselves and ''no one'' buys RMT Gil)

Stack of Steel Ingot HQ - 34k (470k~188k for your server)
Stack of Horn Glue - 38k (280k for your server)
22 HQ Rose gold nuggets - 30k (104k for your server)
99 Granite - 10k (47k for your server)

And your prices show the Net Profit, mine are still the Gross prices.
(But when housing was introduced my server was in the most expensive bracket!)

Also... when people complain about not enough retainers, it's because they lack inventory space. It has nothing to do with Gil.

[ElHeggunte]

Your servers market is very interesting if you can sell full stacks of HQ steel ingots and horn glues with such regularity.

Why anyone would need large amounts of those items in HQ puzzles me.

Doesn't seem so unusual to me. There are plenty of reasons why someone would buy a bunch of HQ mats.

[Aeyis]

Doesn't seem so unusual to me. There are plenty of reasons why someone would buy a bunch of HQ mats.

Those are very large amounts tho. High level crafters dont actually need or want low level HQ mats (because they are more expensive), unless its needed for a specific 2* (for use in macros, if the price is similar enough to the NQ) or higher.
Low level crafters dont have any use for HQ items of those amounts.

As a result on my server those kind of items typically sell in stacks of up to 10, while rarely in increments of 20-40.

Also... when people complain about not enough retainers, it's because they lack inventory space. It has nothing to do with Gil.

Pretty much, yeah. Altho + 1/2 retainers can help with selling if you go through large volumes of different sizes.

[SarcasmMisser]

Your servers market is very interesting if you can sell full stacks of HQ steel ingots and horn glues with such regularity.

Why anyone would need large amounts of those items in HQ puzzles me.

It's not regular though, that sales volume is pretty bad and we have no idea what the actual margins are. If anything he is proving a point by saying even if you do this horribly inefficient way of making money, one of many you can do without being a 4 star crafter, you will be able to make whatever you need.

Also as with above, Japanese servers actually have competitive prices since people tend to gather and craft their own stuff a lot more. The prices are closer to equilibrium, NA servers are a turkey shoot to make gil in comparison so I don't know what people are complaining about.

[Gamer3427]

While it's true that it'll eventually sell, this is because all of the other people selling said item have already sold theirs and now yours is all that's left on the market board. Again, yes, you do make the profit from it eventually, but it's largely based on how long it sits there and if other players decide to sell the same item. By this logic, you can put an item in your retainer for the maximum gil amount possible, and while it may take a long time, even years possibly, it will sell once no one else is selling that item....

Not really arguing with what you're saying, just pointing out a flaw with purposefully trying to make gil this way. More than likely in the time it took you to craft these items and sell them, you could have made just as much gil after costs by doing dungeons, FATES, and quests, while selling the excess items from those....

[Alistaire]

Horn glue I understand. http://ffxiv.gamerescape.com/wiki/Spruce_Plywood

The ingots...I got nothin. Both available in nq form from vendors and no high level synths. Iron ingot shows up in one 1-star synth, the i55 pvp shield. Steel ingots...nothing.

Without divulging names you blocked out, is it mostly different buyers or repeat customers?

Also if you need an answer to why people want (because using the word need is silly no matter what) extra retainers, having 3 covers all 3 cities. Quite often I'll move items to the city of the lowest priced guy. No point undercutting by a small amount if you're not selling in the city with the higher chance of certain things selling.

[DreadRabbit]

The ingots...I got nothin. Both available in nq form from vendors and no high level synths. Iron ingot shows up in one 1-star synth, the i55 pvp shield. Steel ingots...nothing

Here's the thing though: a lot of players will NOT look up where you can purchase mats from NPCs. If it's not available within a town vendor or their class' guild, they automatically assume you can't buy it from an NPC. I know quite a few people that will buy things from the residence districts' vendors and from beast tribe vendors and put those items immediately back on the MB at double or triple the price. And it sells. Quickly.