How long would it take to complete all of the old Relic weapons?

[Fland]

ARR I haven't done in ages but I don't think it has a lot of overlap, either.

You can get Nexus light in CT raids. So you can do the 3 CT raids for aether oil quest (HW relic) while also getting Nexus light (ARR relic) and memories (ShB relic).

[Duskane]

took me 5 days start to finished with Alexandrite prepped to finish Ninja ARR relic

[alibutterfly]

Once you've unlocked your various relic materials by going through it the first time, my suggestion is, if you think you're going to do more relics, be very cognizant of your poetic and GC seals at any time and burn them on future relic materials whenever you're close to cap. That way whenever you get around to the next one you want to work on, you've already got a stockpile of materials waiting for you and can just burn through the easier steps very quickly with those.

[Terin]

I'm pretty much ALWAYS capped on GC seals and tomes, if anyone could tell me the exact items I need to buy, I'd definitely appreciate it!

For some reason, I find it a lot more difficult to track quest-chains in FFXIV than I did back when I played WoW.

[AngeliouxRein]

Just google relics ffxiv and a wiki will pop up with all the info and material lists you need. That’s what I do every time I start one. If you don’t like the wiki, there’s tons of other guides that should come with it.

[lezard21]

Completing all relics at a level appropiate range would take you at the very list a month per weapon with very intensive playtime for the ARR and HW relics.

Your first SB relic will probably take you a month too while you level through Eureka, but afterwards it's a lot faster and might take you a week per weapon.

Current ShB relics are also fast after completing the one time quests, except for the Timeworn Artifact step, which would require you having a static to run through floor 101-200 PoTD a minimum of 27 times assuming you get a drop every 10 floors. So that's a pretty sizeable time sink there too.

[Catwho]

The other day I decided to start the OG Relic Weapon quests on my new character. So far, it's definitely proven fairly time-consuming, and I still don't even have the Atma version yet.

Part of me would like to complete that, then move onto Heavensward, and so forth until getting caught up to whatever the most recent Relics are. But I also wonder what I'm getting myself into?

I've heard the old Relics would take months MINIMUM to complete, and considering I still get stressed pretty easily trying to Tank group content (ironic, given the DRK is my main, and I've been thinking of leveling PLD), I kind of wonder if I'm making a mistake? Especially since Curtana, for example, I actually think the Zenith (first) version looks the coolest, and from what I gather, you don't unlock the ability to glamour until you finish the ENTIRE chain?

At the very least, how long would it take to get to each part in the chain, where you get the "head-start" on the following expansion's Relic? Like, getting far enough in the ARR Relic chain is supposed to let you skip certain steps when starting the Heavensward Relic and so on, right?

I've completed all the ARR relics, and I'm 2 steps away from completing the last of my HW anima weapons.

It took me about four years, although I always made sure to sync up light steps in tandem on jobs when i could so I could run a roulette and have a good chance of putting light on one or the other.

is it worth doing this? I honestly don't know. I only did it because it gave me an excuse to play the game more. It's a pure grind with a glittery weapon you'll probably use in a glam once in a while. That's it.

At least with the HW Anima, there are achievements for finishing each of them.

[grinkdaboy]

The other day I decided to start the OG Relic Weapon quests on my new character. So far, it's definitely proven fairly time-consuming, and I still don't even have the Atma version yet.

Part of me would like to complete that, then move onto Heavensward, and so forth until getting caught up to whatever the most recent Relics are. But I also wonder what I'm getting myself into?

I've heard the old Relics would take months MINIMUM to complete, and considering I still get stressed pretty easily trying to Tank group content (ironic, given the DRK is my main, and I've been thinking of leveling PLD), I kind of wonder if I'm making a mistake? Especially since Curtana, for example, I actually think the Zenith (first) version looks the coolest, and from what I gather, you don't unlock the ability to glamour until you finish the ENTIRE chain?

At the very least, how long would it take to get to each part in the chain, where you get the "head-start" on the following expansion's Relic? Like, getting far enough in the ARR Relic chain is supposed to let you skip certain steps when starting the Heavensward Relic and so on, right?

you're better off saving the ARR relic for last since it takes so gods damned long and requires you to do dozens of fates, leves, spend at least 300k gil, craft special mats, and farm dungeons dozens upon dozens of times

HW relic doesn't take nearly as long since you can farm up a lot of the prerequisite items needed (you will need a LOT of poetics or beast tribe currencies to buy stuff)

SB relic is a bit of a time investment too, similar to the SHB relic there is a bottleneck in the form of Eureka: Pagos

so all in all these will take quite a while to complete

in terms of length i'd say

ARR -> SB -> HW -> SHB

in terms of sheer monotony

ARR > SB = SHB > HW

[Terin]

Well it’s been a while, but I’m actually looking to start working on Relics again. I finished the ARR one for Paladin, but I want to try and complete one Relic from each expansion.

What I’d really like to know is, what items can I buy in advance (to prevent being capped on currencies), and is there any sort of time-gating where I might want to be progressing on multiple Relics at the same time?

For that matter, does it become any easier to acquire ADDITIONAL relics from a given expansion, once you’ve completed the first one? Heavensward has like three Relics that I still think are the coolest in the game, but if it’s anything as time-consuming at the ARR relic was, I doubt I get more than one, unless the others become easier?

[Mikey_R]

I was going to say you cannot pre-buy items, but you can for ARR and HW relics.

Since you have already done the Zodiac Weapon, I will give a list for the Anima Weapon:

Steps 1+2: you cannot pre farm any items (fate grind/hand in Zeta weapon and then run 10 specific dungeons).
Step 3: This is an item collectathon where you need to hand in specific items to buy the 4 mats you need. Items you can get with poetics are the 4 unidentifiable items you can see, of which you need 10 of each one, each one costs 150 poetics each (which, in total, is 6000 poetics), however, you can obtain these items in other ways, for example, via beast tribe tokens or clearing the floors in Gordias. 3 clears of a floor gives 1 unidentifiable item. You would likely need to be on that step in order for the tokens to trade in to drop however.
Step 4: 5 Aether Oils, 350 each, 1750 poetics for this step, only way to get them (the other method has been removed). This should be your first priority on where to spend your poetics.
Step 5: Hard one as there is some slight RNG to how many you will need. This item is Umbrite. You will need somewhere in the region of 60, but I would short change this so that you don't overspend. These are 75 poetics each and are again the only way to get this item. You will need another item, however, you can only start getting them once you are at that step and there are many many ways to get it that do not involve poetics.
Step 6: 50 singing clusters. 40 poetics each, however, once you get to this step, 2 repeatable quests do open up, one daily which gives 1 SC and one weekly which gives 18.
Step 7: Apart from the light grind, you will need Pneumite, which can be bought with poetics, however you might need to be at that step, alternatively, you can get the items from GC seals. You need 15 which costs 100 poetics each or 4000 GC seals each.
Last step: doing certain trials and that's it. That is your Anima weapon.

For SB, all items can only be obtained in Eureka, so you have to get all items in there, which also requires making progress through the story.

For ShB, again, you can do the whole grind in Bozja, however, there are some steps you can do outside of Bozja, though none require poetics, unless you want to make more than 1 (the first weapon is given to you for free).

For EW, it is just a causality grind. Each step so far has been 1500 causality tomes worth of items, of which you can only buy them when you get to that step. With 3 steps out so far, you require 4500 Causality per weapon.

As for whether the become easier, it depends on what you definition of easier is. ShB relics do have some 1 time steps that you only need to do once ever, but you cannot farm them other steps unless you have a weapon on that step already. For Anima/Zodiac weapons, once you have done one, you still have access to all the vendors and items you need, so you can start making stockpiles of items as you start capping currencies.

Eureka is 'easier' in the sense that you don't have to level again.

EW relics are already just easy, so there isn't much you can do to make them easier.