Quote Originally Posted by NorthernLadMSP View Post
Honestly, you will save yourself enormous amounts of gil if you level your miner and botanist to 60 first. I would also recommend leveling a miner retainer and a botanist retainer. That way, you can gather everything yourself without having to rely on other people or paying on the MB for your supplies.

As for crafting, I did most of my 1-50 leveling using leves. Then, from 51-56 I did a combination of mass crafting certain items (such as Mythrite Nuggets on GSM/BSM or Rainbow thread/cloth on WVR) and leves. At 56, I stopped doing any leves and did all the rest of the leveling by crafting collectibles and turning them in. It's massive XP plus blue crafting scrips which are used to purchased your Master 3 and 4 tomes.
I decided to keep DoL significantly higher than DoM. I won't take them all the way to 60, but will level them in increments of 15 opposed to 5 towards DoH after getting them all to 15. It's been a slow start due to some internet troubles over the last several days, and I prioritize my beast tribe quests atm. I did manage to get Carpenter to 10 so at least my hands are dirty, and I am finally learning how this all works. Naturally, every answer to my questions is replaced by two more lol, so I am allowing myself some self-discovery along the way.

I was a bit weary about leveling BTN and MIN retainers as I didn't want my inventory to explode. I'm sitting on a lot of old gear at 100% SB that I hope I can do something with, but creating and melding materia has only been mentioned thus far. DoL and DoH leveling this far has been a mix of leves, checking off gathering/crafting log, GC turn-ins, and just good 'ol whacking away at stuff to use up whatever time is remaining on any exp buff I have active, or to recharge GP between leves. Between all of that, the levels come very quickly.

I do know at level 56, I begin collecting blue scripts that I will need. That's a ways off though, but I am enjoying the journey so far