I just...don't care anymore.

[Alahra]

Like those of you saying you're not crafting for X reason and doing more raids, I'm the opposite. I'm so tired of the same GD grind with raiding...

To be honest, I've mostly stopped participating in other content, as well. The design of Savage has killed my desire to raid in many ways as well. I cap Esoterics every week and don't do much else.

But on topic, I hate gathering too, which is another reason I'm not doing much with crafting now. I don't even craft my own component mats most of the time, as I hate the tedium that comes with it.

[Caimie_Tsukino]

This is a social game.
Make allies. Form long term working relationships with gatherers (extra mats for gear, bulk purchases etc). Look for crafters to mentor or the ones that arent interested in doing high end crafting for extra tokens.
Yes you need some sort of capital at first till you get the ball rolling but you guys here are high end crafters, you know how to make moolah.

The only gathering i did for the past month is to cap red scrip, i just couldn't stand favors lol.
But still i manage to make 20-30 pieces a week (for me ,and others), and make some profit to boot.
I realize most people want to be able to self-sustain but one look at the system is enough to figure out that you simply aren't supposed to do this alone.

The relationship between crafters and gatherers rely a lot on the idea of "helping each other out". Right now gatherers dont need crafters' help. They don't just "give favors" to crafters. Crafters either pay them in cash, or do them some other "favors" like supplying glamor gear.

Right now, the gil flow is pretty one-sided.... only from crafters to gatherers... And crafters are just making lower level crafters' money by selling everything below 2 star.

[Lastelli]

I feel you...it's the same for me.
Right now I'm just capping my weakly red scrips and that's it. I'm trying to endure this tedious work until 3.1 comes out hoping that some major changes will be made...but if nothing happens by then I'll just stop crafting and gathering.
Luckily my main interest in this game is raiding, my lvl60 CUL and ALC are more than enough to craft what I need for that so it's not such a big deal for me, but I know that there are a lot of players whose main interest is crafting and I'm very sorry for them...devs should really do something if they don't want to lose all those players.

[Katlyna]

or a lover of all things glamour (Lets be honest, Crafting AF2 blows Combat AF2 out of the water right now)

Thank the chocobo fairy for a good art team, because this is the one redeeming factor of the red scripts. At least the gear looks pretty! Unfortunately it also makes me wish we could glamour our new goodies combat gear >.< CRY!!! This would be a fun-tastic feature.

[Porkchop]

The relationship between crafters and gatherers rely a lot on the idea of "helping each other out". Right now gatherers dont need crafters' help. They don't just "give favors" to crafters. Crafters either pay them in cash, or do them some other "favors" like supplying glamor gear.

I do not quite agree with you on this point. Every gatherer worth their salt knows that future proofing is always worth it. First week gathering is *really* lucrative. You can make one or two months' worth of cash in the first week if you can grab new stuff ASAP.
Also, gatherers can only reach 700gp with the new accessories, which gives them additional options on their rotation. The offhands also give significant boost that will be needed for the new nodes. If previous patches are any indication (since SE loves following patterns and tweaking them), this is up to par. Minimal stat requirement for x.0 patches, stringent ones for the new stuff.
Of course, most gatherers don't know about this, but you just need to convince them to. If they prefer short term profit (selling favor mats), you can still take advantage of that.

The relationship between crafters and gatherers rely a lot on the idea of "helping each other out". Right now gatherers dont need crafters' help. They don't just "give favors" to crafters. Crafters either pay them in cash, or do them some other "favors" like supplying glamor gear.

Right now, the gil flow is pretty one-sided.... only from crafters to gatherers... And crafters are just making lower level crafters' money by selling everything below 2 star.

This is true for the most part. I admit, high end crafters are dealt a shitty hand this time around. But in the long term it will benefit us. More people are getting into gathering, since it is pretty much the only way to make serious cash right now. When new recipes come, if we have a geared army of gatherers, the competition between them will drive the price of mats down. That means more mats available at market board at affordable prices, more 'catch-up' people to sell gear to (including crafters lol), bigger market in general.

The only catch is if the new recipes somehow managed to be poopier than the current ones (tinkers calm v2?), then we're utterly screwed. But I have faith on SE, they aren't stupid. I'm sure the current system is here for a reason.

Thank the chocobo fairy for a good art team, because this is the one redeeming factor of the red scripts. At least the gear looks pretty! Unfortunately it also makes me wish we could glamour our new goodies combat gear >.< CRY!!! This would be a fun-tastic feature.

Me too... I wish I can glamour the pimp coat onto everything.

[Sollux]

This is a social game.
Make allies. Form long term working relationships with gatherers (extra mats for gear, bulk purchases etc). Look for crafters to mentor or the ones that arent interested in doing high end crafting for extra tokens.
Yes you need some sort of capital at first till you get the ball rolling but you guys here are high end crafters, you know how to make moolah.

This is excellent advice and it is EXACTLY what I did near the end of my sets, granted almost none of this was possible when Red Scrips first released as almost everyone saved their Scrips for the i180 turn-ins, Gatherers and Crafters alike. Even if you had Crafting Scrips, any Gatherers willing to use theirs for Favors were selling the mats for 150k-200k each and early Crafters without millions of gil were forced to gather themselves, turning Crafting into a solo activity once more. 2 months+ down the road it has been much easier to find Gatherers willing to sell in bulk at a reduced price or Crafters willing to sell their Scrips, but this has been a long time coming.

For those in it for the glamour or personal achievement, if you really want to craft 2-Stars RIGHT NOW then you'll need to either farm the Favor mats yourself or invest gil into them. I despise Gathering as much as the next Crafter but I'd be lying if I said glamour wasn't a BIG motivator for me and my love of Crafting/glamour outweighed my hatred of Gathering by a mile. It's GOING to take a long time, it just boils down to whether it's worth it to you. I'm sure they'll make the grind easier in the future, but how far in the future no one can say.

For those in it for the gil, if you're looking for a profit from 2-Stars the gil is definitely there though it is few and far between and requires a large investment of time/gil in order to reach consistent HQs. If you want a guarantee that all of it will be worth it in the end gil-wise no one can say. I believe it definitely will be and I'm not worried at all about crafting any of the new recipes in 3.1 because of the work I've put into my sets, and I expect to make a pretty penny once they drop. This being said, I highly doubt SE will release anything that isn't craftable by someone in full i180 and overmelded whites since they want Crafting to be more accessible, though as to the reliability of HQs I cannot say.

At the risk of sounding Elitist, it just boils down to how much you want it, whether the grind is worth it to you personally either as a personal achievement, glamour-wise, or for the gil. If neither of these things outweigh your disdain for Gathering or spending gil then there isn't anything that can be done short of another change to the Red Scrip system which I personally don't see happening in 3.1 or at least until the next few floors of Alex are released, though I could be wrong.

[Alahra]

The only catch is if the new recipes somehow managed to be poopier than the current ones (tinkers calm v2?), then we're utterly screwed. But I have faith on SE, they aren't stupid. I'm sure the current system is here for a reason.

The recipes themselves aren't even necessarily the issue. By and large, it's that making them is far too restricted by time gating and material scarcity given the place they're supposed to sit in progression. If crafters are supposed to help people catch up, the recipes need to be designed so that they can reasonably be available to people trying to catch up, not progression raiders who spent the last six months of ARR selling FCOB runs or omnicrafters.

The system is here for a reason, of course. They didn't like the impact that crafting had on progression. The problem is that they implemented several solutions all at once, when any one of them probably could have dulled the impact enough (especially given how much more tightly tuned Savage is). They went way overboard. Now instead of having *too much* impact, crafters now essentially have *no* impact.

[Sollux]

Every gatherer worth their salt knows that future proofing is always worth it.

Unfortunately, this is difficult to find (At least on my server). Most Gatherers I've dealt with believe their i180 sets will carry them through any new Gathering in 3.1, and they might be right. It's difficult to find a serious Gatherer who actually thinks with the long term in mind and is willing to take a pay cut now for a possible profit later or a discount/free 2-Star craft.

[Alahra]

Unfortunately, this is difficult to find (At least on my server). Most Gatherers I've dealt with believe their i180 sets will carry them through any new Gathering in 3.1, and they might be right.

If I had to guess, the 180 sets will work through 3.1, yes. Then progression will "reset" in 3.2, and they'll need a new set of scrip gear to get the rarest stuff again. The same will likely be true for crafters. A fully-pentamelded i170 crafter will probably need fewer upgrades come 3.2 to get to the new (presumably) 3-star stuff. However, if they continue to gate materials the way they've done so far, being ahead on crafting, at the least, probably won't hold too much value.

[Porkchop]

The recipes themselves aren't even necessarily the issue. By and large, it's that making them is far too restricted by time gating and material scarcity given the place they're supposed to sit in progression.

Its both. The current combat gear recipes are i180, which makes them pretty much worthless for progression raiding, even as starter gear thanks to the secondary stats nerf. However, they do look good. I've been selling pieces of this and that for glamour purposes, and there is demand for them (like all good glamour pieces). Not many people can afford it though, due to reasons you stated. I believe this issue will be solved once the mats are more available.

Unfortunately, this is difficult to find (At least on my server). Most Gatherers I've dealt with believe their i180 sets will carry them through any new Gathering in 3.1, and they might be right. It's difficult to find a serious Gatherer who actually thinks with the long term in mind and is willing to take a pay cut now for a possible profit later or a discount/free 2-Star craft.

Even if that is the case, its no skin off your back. That means when they figure out they'll need the 700 gp later on, they'll be a potential buyer for the gear (which will be marked up due to demand :3). It's a win-win situation.


As an afterword, my thoughts are that the current system is only hostile if you insist to go omnicrafter come 3.1 . If you just buy i180 gear, you can reach the coveted "ez 2-star" status with minimum effort and cost. There are pros and cons of doing that, of course. Such as... the undyeable gear (yuck), and the inability to go omni till much later. But you save money on melds and the total cost is much cheaper per piece.
It is my belief that they put up so much roadblocks on the road of going omni because we will reap the most benefit when the new stuff(s) come.

I think I've said too much and starting to compromise myself lol ( alot of ultros crafters read the forum apparently >>) .
Whichever path you take, I wish you all success and a lot of fake internet money coming your way.