What Skills are you all using to get a high % chance to HQ?

[Wulfies]

Been mulling over this for a while and trying to get the best set of skills to maximize my chances for getting an HQ but I am failing miserably, only getting to about 17-22% chance. People are telling me that they get a median of like 55-65% on the high end non-stared stuff.

I am guessing it has to be about combo-ing out the right skills in the right order, which for the life of me, can't seem to get. My problem lies in that I run out of CP before i run out of durability. My current opening line is:

Comfort Zone --> Inner Quiet ---> Waste Not II ---> Steady Hand II ---> Great Strides ---> Hasty Touch x4 ---> Comfort Zone ---> Careful Synth II ---> Rumination ---> Waste Not II --> Inner Quiet --> Steady Hand ---> Hasty Hand x3 and finish off any Careful Synth IIs to finish off the task....

What am i missing?

[Aceill]

Don't use Great Strides that early as it only works for the NEXT TOUCH that you use. Use Tricks of the Trade on any Good you get early on as they provide very marginal increases to quality and is better to harvest the 20 CP.

I usually follow an order of the following (Tricks of the Trade is used as much as possible. Reduce Touch/Synth use to not exceed Waste Not/Manipulation durations):

Comfort Zone -> Inner Quiet -> Steady Hand -> Waste Not -> Hasty Touch x4 -> Manipulation -> Careful Synth x2 -> Comfort Zone -> Steady Hand -> Waste Not etc

(Msg 2 long why squeenix)

I don't have Steady Hand II yet, but finish with Great Strides -> Advanced Touch for that super oneshot on quality from the stacks of Inner Quiet you build up. This is just a portion of the entire rotation but if you know what to do you can carry a 40 durability item past 30 steps easily and past 50 steps on 80 durability items. It depends on your luck with getting Good condition though.

[Arale]

I have a macro I use when crafting non expensive items (where I need to be manual about it) it goes something like this:

Inner Quiet > Great Strides > Waste Not > Steady Hands II > Standard Touch x4 OR Advanced Touch x3 then you have 100% chance on any progress ability you use because of SHII, so you can complete the synth then and there. For materials, this typically nets me enough quality for more exp (NQ) or if using HQ mats, enough for a HQ item. If its not a material, and an actual item, I use Inner Quiet > Great Strides > Waste Not > Advanced Touch or Standard Touch > Steady Hands II > Innovation > 3x Standard Touch, Careful Synthesis II or Standard Synthesis. If I need CP for the macro I pop Rumination. If I manual the above, I take advantage of 'Good' and use Tricks of the Trade when it's up, but usually I dont need it.

[Mikita]

Comfort Zone --> Inner Quiet ---> Waste Not II ---> Steady Hand II ---> Great Strides ---> Hasty Touch x4 ---> Comfort Zone ---> Careful Synth II ---> Rumination ---> Waste Not II --> Inner Quiet --> Steady Hand ---> Hasty Hand x3 and finish off any Careful Synth IIs to finish off the task....

What am i missing?

If you have Byregot's Blessing you might want to try using that instead of Rumination right before finishing off the synthesis. And it is even better if you have enough CP to use Great Strides before Byregot's Blessing.

Prior to that change in my skill rotation I was similarly getting to around 20% chance of HQ. Now I can often get to 80% or 100% even on 40 durability recipes unless I just have a string of failed Hasty Touches.

[McLeech]

You are using waste not 2 to save a total of 20 durability and 15 durability second time. Seems very wasteful. Switch places for great strides and waste not in first part and waste not with inner quiet in second part and use waste not 1 in both cases. That will save you a ton on CP.

[SeleneVenizelos]

When people ask me how to HQ, I always tell them to level Carpenter to 50. Byregot's Blessing is where it's at. Every time you raise your control it gains 20% to it's efficiency and it only costs 24 CP. Three or more control raises and it's the most efficient quality raising ability available. In some synths, especially combining Hasty Hand with Steady Hand II, you could raise your quality nearly a dozen times. For each time you do, you're gaining 20% efficiency on Byregot's Blessing.

So if you raise your control, say, 10 times (certainly easily doable on 80 durability synths) you'll be raising quality with 300% efficiency. It can fail (90% success rate), so swap out your last Hasty Hand with Byregot's Blessing for a 100% successful, massive boost to your quality. Use it with great strides or on a 'Good' and 'Excellent' and you're all but guaranteed to reach 100%. The most I have gained was using Byregot's Blessing @ 320% efficiency on a Good rating for over 1700 quality.

[Wulfies]

Thanks for the input, I will have to try this weekend when i have time to play.

[Swag]

http://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/commen..._let_crafters/

This will explain how to HQ everything with normal mats. It's time-consuming and there's a small element of luck involved, but it's very much worth doing for most items.