A Place for Everyone - An Open Letter on the Future of Crafting and Gathering

[Aurelle_Deresnels]

In this time between Shadowbringers and Endwalker, come walk with me and see how crafting and gathering are faring.

TL;DR

- If you don't enjoy crafting or gathering, you shouldn't feel like you have to do it! You should be able to easily make gil doing what you like and find people who will sell you the crafted and gathered products you want. The hidden Holy Trinity is crafter, gatherer, and customer.
- If you do take up crafting and/or gathering, you should be welcomed by a system as easy to pick up and hard to master as combat, with something for every skill level throughout the process.

[Illmaeran]

Making Gil by doing quests, weekly challenges, and roulettes is very easy. You don't get the large hits of income from selling a big ticket item, but you do get steady income just by doing the things you'd normally do. I've been an omnicrafter and gatherer since ARR and until the advent of Coffee Biscuits, made comparable money from routine PVE content. I'm about as casual as it comes concerning crafting and playing the market. I don't care to spend the time needed to make and manage sales of super high-end or rare things and consider myself fairly representative of the general crafting/gathering populace. I still make reliable, if more modest, income from desynthesis and crafting the occasional thing to put on the MB and leave the Marketboard Extreme to those with the inclination. Could I make the kind of money they do? Sure I could, but the return isn't worth the effort.

The system of getting into crafting and achieving the level/gear required to make everything if you want is stupidly easy. Mastering the use of skills and point resources is harder. This is where the highest-end crafters live and they get the financial reward for their effort in the way of making big ticket items to sell.

For the rest of us there are things like GC turn-ins, Custom Deliveries, Levequests, and Marketboard (Story Mode) available to make good money over time.

As far as finding people to buy your stuff, that's what the market board's for. Lately I've been making gear for new retainers as they level and don't want to spend the time collecting and processing the raw materials so I buy them from the MB. Keep in mind, I can gather and craft anything I want or need. I wanted to play what I liked/felt like doing and used the MB to find people who would sell the crafted and gathered products I wanted. A good way to think of it is the MB is the intermediary that introduces the supplier and customer to each other. Is this a face to face exchange of request and product? No, that would require a dedicated trade chat channel and we all know how well those work out.

The things that are killing the market for low-end and mid-core crafters are valuable crafted items now coming from lockboxes and ventures. The sheer volume of these items hitting the market by non-crafters tanks the price in short order after people are able to craft them. The other cause is bots. The legitimate crafter player now has game design itself and a horde of mindless competition flooding the market.

What are our options as mid-cores? Find a niche to exploit and utilize the above regular turn-ins for steady money. They're dependable, predictable, non-competitive ways to earn gil.

tl;dr - Entry into DoH/DoL and progress to mid-core are easy. Mastering is hard. Banging your head against the MB competition is insane, but is where the big money comes from. Making good money as mid-core is 100% possible, if slower but more steady.

[Aurelle_Deresnels]

As far as finding people to buy your stuff, that's what the market board's for. ... A good way to think of it is the MB is the intermediary that introduces the supplier and customer to each other. Is this a face to face exchange of request and product? No, that would require a dedicated trade chat channel and we all know how well those work out.

My very first example is of one person locking up the MB on an essential item, preventing suppliers and customers from matchmaking. Isn't that a problem?

The things that are killing the market for low-end and mid-core crafters are valuable crafted items now coming from lockboxes and ventures. The sheer volume of these items hitting the market by non-crafters tanks the price in short order after people are able to craft them. The other cause is bots. The legitimate crafter player now has game design itself and a horde of mindless competition flooding the market.

My Examples 7 and 8 cover exactly that! Isn't that also a problem, that players who want to have fun in the markets can't?

(continued below)

[Aurelle_Deresnels]

(continued from above)

The system of getting into crafting and achieving the level/gear required to make everything if you want is stupidly easy.

Then why are new players constantly stumbling over it and frustrated, as in Example 6? Why are players not being taught even the fundamentals of crafting, as in Example 2?

Mastering the use of skills and point resources is harder. This is where the highest-end crafters live and they get the financial reward for their effort in the way of making big ticket items to sell.

Except that they don't - in Example 4 I noted how the hardest tradeable crafts have their markets flooded within hours. Even the hardest untradeable crafts get completely crushed by high-end crafters, people stunt run them using the previous expansion's gear. "Hard to master" isn't happening either.

Making Gil by doing quests, weekly challenges, and roulettes is very easy. You don't get the large hits of income from selling a big ticket item, but you do get steady income just by doing the things you'd normally do. ...

For the rest of us there are things like GC turn-ins, Custom Deliveries, Levequests, and Marketboard (Story Mode) available to make good money over time. ...

Making good money as mid-core is 100% possible, if slower but more steady.

Sure, you're making money, but are you having fun? Did you really enjoy feeding the Crystarium levemete hundreds of Coffee Biscuits, or was it a boring routine?

Could you be having more fun with a better system? We come to Hydaelyn to have fun, the gil is merely a part of the system in which we might do so.

I wrote this to both ask and answer how all players might enjoy the game more. It's not just long to be long.

[Miette_Marfil]

I read most of your doc. It just sounds like you have an idea of how you want the market to be, and it isn't. Everyone can choose to be a crafter and gathering. You have to be competitive; it's as simple as that.
I do agree that lockboxes should have different items in them as you do.

[Aurelle_Deresnels]

It just sounds like you have an idea of how you want the market to be, and it isn't.

I want the whole game to adhere to the principles that we are all here for, that combat so ably demonstrates. Is that such a radical idea?

[Saraphin]

As someone that started in ARR, and seeing the firmament come into fruition...it has allowed MANY PLAYERS to come into DoL/DoH on an entry to mid-tier level.

it is BECAUSE of the firmament that many crafters do not know such things like Inner Quiet. I'm not saying that power leveling is a bad thing, but, like any other class/job, it's coming to an understanding of the job skills, which to use and which not to use optimally.

Look at crafting like one would any sort of art:
Level 1: Introduction to the craft. A Novice.
Level 50-last level beneath current Cap: you're getting there, learning more and more. a Journeyman
Current Top Level (adjust as needed for level cap) you're an expert.
Top Level AND knowing what your skills do: "you're a Master".

It's just like learning any skill in life. you have to learn and while the firmament is a good quick tool (I do use it for leveling those in my alts) for getting levels, but you have to learn the skills, look at your skills and develop those skills, just like any other job and class.

and if your Endgame is an Omnicrafter, you have to learn to play the market. it's that simple. you have to gather mats, hold onto some because they're cheap right now but make a special item...and wait. putting them up either at a high price, or at a logical price.

Using the "Other" Tab of the PF is also a way to get your goods sold at a reasonable pace.

RE: Crafted High Level Star Gear: sometimes, it is BiS for raiders (not often) however...it's not meant to be the end gear, it's for getting butts in the door to get the higher gear/get into 8 and 24 man content to be able to get the better gear. it's the "Foyer to Content/Tomestone Gear" so to speak.

[Aurelle_Deresnels]

it is BECAUSE of the firmament that many crafters do not know such things like Inner Quiet.

I agree! I have a subsection covering exactly how the Firmament trains new crafters OUT of learning how to craft!

Using the "Other" Tab of the PF is also a way to get your goods sold at a reasonable pace.

How do you think I take preorders and patch day orders?

RE: Crafted High Level Star Gear: sometimes, it is BiS for raiders (not often) however...it's not meant to be the end gear, it's for getting butts in the door to get the higher gear/get into 8 and 24 man content to be able to get the better gear. it's the "Foyer to Content/Tomestone Gear" so to speak.

I'm completely aware of this and so are the raiders who buy my crafted gear. They want it for the item level to get into third and fourth floors on week 1.

(It's important to distinguish crafted combat gear from crafted noncombat gear here. The crafting and gathering gear is generally BiS when pentamelded!)

[Jojoya]

- If you don't enjoy crafting or gathering, you shouldn't feel like you have to do it! You should be able to easily make gil doing what you like and find people who will sell you the crafted and gathered products you want.

I know many players who make lots of gil doing what they like. They don't craft or gather.

Sorry, I don't believe that players should be able to make gil by AFKing at the Limsa Aetheryte. If you want to make gil, do something productive to earn it.

My very first example is of one person locking up the MB on an essential item, preventing suppliers and customers from matchmaking.

There are no essential items that can only be acquired from the MB. You're already twisting things

[Aurelle_Deresnels]

There are no essential items that can only be acquired from the MB. You're already twisting things

Raiders very much have essential supplies. You don't have to take my word for it, go ahead and ask Thoughts Per Second or some similar top static if they would go without food, potions, or crafted gear.

And what is a raider to do when they want 3 food and the MB is blocked up, shout in Limsa? Commissioning such a small quantity is obviously unreasonable for both sides. (And yes, there are people who clear the entire tier week 1 in PF.)

I know many players who make lots of gil doing what they like. They don't craft or gather.

Then why does every third raider I meet ask me what to grind to sustain the price of their raid supplies? Clearly they're not making much gil doing what they like.

Sorry, I don't believe that players should be able to make gil by AFKing at the Limsa Aetheryte. If you want to make gil, do something productive to earn it.

You're the one twisting things and trying to put words in my mouth. How could you miss that the opening picture is the start of the virtual walk? (Where on Hydaelyn would it start other than the main market hub?)