Airship Guide

[BonzaiFerroni]

Personally, I prefer using these forums over wikis (until they finally permaban me). Until I quit the game (which could happen soonish because baby), I'll be updating my airship and desynth guides on this forum every patch with any new information.

If other people want to copy/paste my guides to other places, please don't copy the text portions verbatim? I don't really care about people copying the data, but when stupid jokes or specific quirky turns of phrases I make in my guides turn up in other places without attribution, it's really kinda irritating.

Why would they permaban you, for being too helpful? =D

If anyone wants to copy/paste mine, feel free, just don't remove any of the exclamation points. In fact, add more exclamation points in!!

[Nyalia]

Why would they permaban you, for being too helpful? =D

I've been temp banned twice so far for commenting on their RMT policy, and i've come really close with my comments on the game's minimal off-character storage. Criticizing SE is literally against the ToS, but what really got me banned was a specific phrase that I said both times, though I'm not quite dumb enough to repeat it here. Just consider what SE's RMT policy is and what it makes RMTs do to continue peddling their services and the phrase should be obvious. xD

[Wizel]

I am having a lot of trouble unlocking sector 18 for the last airship, I have had both our main ships visiting it for the past 3 weeks and nothing. I just want to be 100% that visiting sector 17 unlocks it right?

Does just visiting the sector by itself do anything or do you need to visit it first then another sector or something?

[Arcticharm]

I am having a lot of trouble unlocking sector 18 for the last airship, I have had both our main ships visiting it for the past 3 weeks and nothing. I just want to be 100% that visiting sector 17 unlocks it right?

Does just visiting the sector by itself do anything or do you need to visit it first then another sector or something?

So far as we know, this is the only way to obtain sector 18. Sorry you're having a bad time with it, keep at it though!

[Nyalia]

Does just visiting the sector by itself do anything or do you need to visit it first then another sector or something?

It's pure RNG. As far as we can tell, nothing affects it, at least not enough to be clear. Just visit that sector every trip, and eventually you'll get it. The only way I know of to speed up discovery is to put your best rigging and worst aftcastle on the ship (maximizing speed) and hit just that sector over and over. That'll give you the most chances for discovery. But, you'll be giving up loot by doing that, as your retrieval will be terrible and you will only be hitting one sector. It's an extremely inefficient use of fuel and time though.

So, you have two options:

1. You can either hit that sector while hitting other sectors that you actually want to visit. I recommend this option. This gets you normal amounts of loot and doesn't slow down your gathering efforts, especially since sector 17 has good materia in it (grade III/IV crafter materia). You'll hit 17 once every ~60 hour trip. If you like Gatherer Materia, I recommend SC16 -> SC17 (68 Range), SC10 -> SC16 -> SC17 (80 Range), SC16 -> SC17 -> SC22 (93 Range), or SC10 -> SC16 -> SC17 -> SC22 (105 Range). If you like Crafter Materia far more, I recommend SC13 -> SC17 (82 Range) or SC07 -> SC17 -> SC13 (98 Range). The shortest of those would take about 50 hours, the longest would take about 80 hours. Speaking personally, SC17 is the sector I hit the most because it drops the best materia. All three of my rank 50 ships hit that sector every trip.
2. You can hit just that sector in the fastest ship you can make (bronco aftcastle, best rigging you can make). With Odyssey rigging, that's one chance at discovery every 30.5 hours. With Tatanora rigging, that's one chance every 28.5 hours. You'll probably get almost no loot from it though.

So, up to you - normal loot from three sectors, or no loot but double the chances of discovery over time? You can also meet somewhere in the middle - hit just SC17 (or SC16->SC17) with good rigging and a moderate aftcastle, having a trip time of about 36 hours (closer to 48 if you hit SC16 too for gathering materia and far eastern coins) and a much better chance at getting some loot.

[Wizel]

Ok will keep at it, been hitting 16 and then 17, I want to get this thing before the patch.

[Jade-Nephrite]

Got a quick question, if I use all HQ materials on the first 2 stages, how much of a reduction in mats is the 3rd stage? %-wise?

[Thrustie]

Using HQ mats won't reduce the number of mats for subsequent phases. It will just give you an exp bonus.

[Ranzan]

First let me say thank for this guide it help me get started quick. Any advice on maximizing xp cause I'm behind in the airship game.

[Phantasmage]

I recently got my solo FC 1st airship to 50 in less than 1 month and half maximizing loot stats. What I liked to do was maximize the Range before any other stats whenever possible. That was so that I can always send it to the max amount of highest level sectors and thus, get as much XP as possible from every trip.

I would suggest following this gearing plan:

Upgrade Hull>Forecastle>Aftcastle then only upgrade Propellers/Sail if you can't already upgrade the Hull again. I made sure to leave the speed stat the lowest for the bonus range if I needed it. (You might not need it in the Bronze sectors)

When my Range started allowing for 5 sectors trips, all the subsequent trips included 5 sectors until I got to Rank 50.

Doing that while not neglecting forecastle and aftcastle upgrades allowed me to also have a crap ton of materials after each 4-5 sectors trip. Which helped me never run out of Airship crafting materials. (Except fucking Cassia logs, they don't exist)