Retainer gathering requirements

[Roth_Trailfinder]

Thanks for the advice, I'll look into it and see if I want to invest the materia. Thinking about it, grade IV should be easy enough to come by these days, so I'll probably just do what you suggested.

Grade 4 can be obtained by spending Red Gathering Scrip, and as a quest reward for Ixali dailies (random which you get though).

Grade 1, 2, 3 can be obtained by doing Ixali dailies and spending the Oakknot on the materia, you get multiple materia though quantity depends on tier.

That said, I’d really only advise melding the top gear for an expansion, not the starter or middle gear. Retainers don’t need melded gear right now, they need gear i190 or higher.

[Espritduo]

Quick ventures don't have stat requirements, so you can just spam those while you work towards 70. From 60-70 especially quick ventures give about the same and usually more than regular ventures, sometimes even more than an 18hr venture. I'm re-leveling a botanist retainer and they're level 66 with level 5 gear and moving along nicely towards 70.

[Gemina]

Spending your red scrips on anything? I'm not in SB yet and might be missing something, but I easily got my retainers to over 600 gathering when I handed them down my i200 augmented tools after obtaining the glowy blessed versions. They add an additional 90 gathering over the HQ lv60 adamantite tools. Here is one of my retainers. She has no melds.