It's very disheartening to get a Hi-Elixir when your retainer is il170, since stats on gear don't apply to the type of item you get from the venture it's safe to say that leveling a retainer up is close to pointless in 3.0. Can't speak for any gathering retainer since I won't level one but I'm guessing it's more the same if not worse. The percentage of getting unique items has to be abysmally low, I've sent my poor retainer out for a month and she only brought back 1 unique item level 60 pair of shoes so far...