Critical Break is our crafting and economics column written by Qtipus. Q is an experienced crafter and also well versed in using the Auction House to turn a decent profit. Enough so that he was able to fund his own relic, Gungnir. Every Tuesday you will find Q's rants, raves and good crafting practices here. After spending hours upon hours writing eight 0-60 guides, Q shows he's a glutton for punishment by starting another series; 60-100. The first in this series is Bonecraft.
In the 0-60 Bonecrafting guide I wrote, I mentioned the fact that Bonecrafting was one of the easiest and cheapest crafts to level. This holds especially true for this craft up to about 70. Beyond 70, it gets a lot more risky, but the end result will still show you being around the break even point.
That's what I hope to demonstrate in this guide. Yes you will need some working capital and a little luck avoiding breaks (Artisan's Advantage is your friend), but the amount of time you'll spend farming up items for this trek is slim to none. This guide mostly relies on the availability of materials on the Auction House.
Each of these guides will ask three questions. These questions will revolve around where the money is made. Here they are:
Does this craft have consumables?
Yes, Bonecrafting has a number of consumables. The most notable of which are reraise hairpins/gorgets and arrowheads. There are a couple other odds and ends consumables, but these are the primary ones and they are consumed enough to make a living off of them.
Does this craft have in-demand end-game gear?
Yes, quite a bit actually. The Neptunal Abjuration set has 3 common pieces dropping from sky and are pretty much still among the best pieces you can get for the slots. The other two pieces drop off Fafhogg and out of Einherjar and generally sell for a loss due to spammage, but you may catch the AH at times for a little profit. There's also the hydra gear commonly used for damage reduction sets. A couple pieces of the unicorn set are decent and there's the ever popular Igqira set.
Lastly, does this craft have in-demand mid-range items?
Yes. While Beetle gear is probably a notch or two below "mid-range", some of it is good until those mid levels. There's also the Scorpion Harness and a host of weapons that are decent.
Before we really get into the guide, we need to go over what you will need in order to follow this guide. Details after the jump.
First, you will need to get Bone Purification. If you're serious about taking this craft to 100 and making money off of it, you're going to be using this particular key item a ton.
Second, Filing doesn't hurt. It's cheap from a GP standpoint and saves some time. There are some that will argue against using this since they feel it minimizes the number of chances you have to HQ various arrowhead synths, but from my testing, the end results are about the same.
Third, get your Protective Spectacles and your Bonecrafter's Ring before you start on this guide. Won't hurt to be doing GPs along the way so you can pick up your Boneworker's Apron once you hit 68. The reason for this relates specifically to a 25ish level stretch between 68-96 depending on which items you choose to synth.
Fourth, learn the value of the offset. Spending a little time killing for some of these materials early on (or fishing if it's high enough in level) and it will pay dividends later when the inevitable breaks occur. This doesn't mean farm up every single material you're going to use (unless I say otherwise...), but it does mean that you'll need to understand there's a value in working with time spent vs. gil earned/saved. The idea behind these guides is to have you at or over what you started with in terms of gil.
Lastly, patience. Don't overload yourself on too much stock. This causes materials to inflate and product to deflate.
Phase 1: Let Me See Your Patas
These are commonly picked up by woodworkers for making the arrows. If you have a buddy skilling on these arrows or that simply uses them to make money, sell them to them. Otherwise, just put your stacks up on the AH. They usually sell for a little above cost even if you NQ every single one of them.
Also be mindful of the single horn prices (4k) versus the stack horn prices (60k, or 5k ea). It will take 17 successful NQ synths to make one stack. Buying the horns at 5k each and farming up your bone chips will result in a cost of ~85k. Current AH prices at the time I'm writing this guide (early Sept) show stack sales at ~120k. As you continue to skill up, you can use these as a bit of a fall back for a bit of a quick cash grab as long as material costs stay pretty steady. Filing helps with this process.
Recipe: Wind Crystal, 1x Demon Horn, 1x Bone Chip
Cap: Level 63
This is just about the only item I will say "Go out and farm up your materials" for. Your main goal here is to keep your costs below 1k. Crab shells and giant femurs are usually in decent supply and cheap on the AH, but the carbon fiber will usually eat up your budget. All of the materials are cheap enough where if you want to lose some money on these, feel free. You probably made enough on the demon arrowheads to cover it. Make your own carbon fiber if your alchemy is at 45, but it will likely end up being cheaper just to buy off the AH. I hope you have a lot of mule room.
You can also dump a few of these up on the AH for sale if you choose to and try to get lucky by catching a goldsmither who is skilling up. Save one of these to turn in for your Artisan rank.
Recipe: Fire Crystal, 1x Crab Shell, 2x Giant Femur, 1x Carbon Fiber
Cap: Level 68
This is only here because it's a relatively cheap synth to make. It's a loss if you buy your ram horns off the AH, so if you elect to use this as a synth, head out to the highlands or the plateau and start raping some rams.
Recipe: Wind Crystal, 2x Ram Horn
Cap: Level 69
Phase 2: Reraise Items Are Your Best Friend/Worst Enemy
You need Bone Purification here. You also need a friend who can make some animas for you. Buying stacks of animas off the AH will rape your wallet. Not that buying the somber, startling or radiant clusters/memories will be easy on it, but definitely not as hard as the end product. This begins a series of synths that you will be selling on the AH.
Your Bonecrafter's Ring comes in mighty handy here too. HQ'ing below the cap is rare as it is, but killing that chance while increasing your chances of NQ success will definitely pay huge dividends for you.
A staple of your next 12-14 levels. Save all of your results. Good thing they stack. Cap on these before you move to the next synth. Also, once you cap, buy a crapload of Shall Shells or Istiridyes off the AH for 7k/stack or less. If they aren't that low, hopefully your fishing skill is somewhere around 25. You can park yourself in Nashmau and fish up the Istiridyes all day long.
Since you're at 71, you're now in HQ Tier 3 range for the pearl and black pearl synths. Making your own always works out to be cheaper than buying off the AH, so keep this in mind. If you want to mass produce these to make money off of them through volume selling, buying the black pearls off the AH can be offset somewhat by making sure you made a couple stacks of your own. On average, for every 8 stacks of shells I burned down, I ended up with approx 3 stacks of pearls, 1 stack of black pearls and 4 stacks of pebbles. You can do the math from there as to how many stacks it will take for you to get to the 10ish stacks of black pearls you'll need to cap at 80 here. NPC the extra pearls you have (1,235 gil with max fame in Windy) along with the pebbles and I hope you have a ton of storage space.
Recipe: Wind Crystal, 1x Light Anima, 1x Water Anima, 1x Lightning Anima, 1x Coral Fragment
Cap: Level 71
These will ultimately get turned into Reraise Hairpins. Start using the aforementioned Pearls and Black Pearls you hopefully made before starting these synths. Try to get up to around 73 before you start putting the results together with the Vivified Coral you made earlier. If you have both of your +skill armors and synthesis support, you won't experience many breaks. Hold onto one of these to turn in for your Adept rank once you hit 78.
Recipe: Wind Crystal, 1x Coral Fragment, 1x Pearl, 1x Black Pearl
Cap: Level 77
Around 73-75, you'll start making these and selling them on the AH for profit. On Odin, the profit margin is usually around 5-10k each and they sell fast. Unfortunately, the market is pretty saturated with undercutters. Be mindful of this as you list them for sale. You will likely be undercut within 2-3 sales.
Skilling up between 73-80 will pretty much consist of alternating between Coral Hairpins, Reraise Hairpins and Coral Gorgets as you need the supplies. You will be revisiting the Vivified Coral synth quite often, so again, I hope you have at least 2 stacks of each anima and I hope that you get a little lucky with the skillups.
Recipe: Wind Crystal, 1x Vivified Coral, 1x Coral Hairpin
Cap: Level 80
You will be making these primarily for the next synth. If you get completely pissed off with the Shall Shell/Istiridye synths to make Coral Hairpins (I don't blame you if you do), then this is a good way to cap at 80 too. Farm up your sheep leather (you do have Leathercraft at 4 don't you..?) or buy off the AH if it's 8k/stack or less. Save your materials for the next synth.
Recipe: Wind Crystal, 1x Sheep Leather, 1x Coral Fragment
Cap: Level 80
Cap on these and sell them on the AH. They don't sell as fast as the Reraise Hairpins due to their job limitations, but they still sell at a good pace. These are almost always listed a little cheaper than the Hairpins as well due to a slightly lower cost.
Recipe: Wind Crystal, 1x Vivified Coral, 1x Coral Gorget
Cap: Level 82
Phase 3: Trumpeted Fanfare
In most guides, the area between 82 - ~86 is usually a complete wasteland of money. The general consensus for these particular levels consist of making the various parts of dragon armor. These are generally still good to make, but they sell super slow and often for well below cost. They serve no purpose other than to provide a material for an Alchemist who is perhaps trying to HQ some of the cursed Wyrmal gear. The skillups through this area will be slow, but fortunately, SE has given Bonecrafters a better way forward.
The Karakul leather portion of this synth isn't super cheap compare to it's sheep leather counter part. This is due to SE's stupidly implemented Imperial Tea Leaves. If you happen to catch a few stacks of these leaves on the AH, definitely swoop them up. The Karakul skins are commonly available for 1k or so each and this makes your Karakul leather synth cost around 2-3k each instead of paying the ~7k that they're currently selling for. Wivre Horns are usually available too for around 3k and the end result of this synth sells decently for profit around 10k ea.
Have a set of Coral Bangles ready to turn in for your final rank: Veteran
Recipe: Wind Crystal, 1x Karakul Leather, 1x Wivre Horn
Cap: Level 86
Easily the best gift SE ever gave to Bonecrafters. This is a HUGE level gap, but well worth it when you consider the alternatives. If you've picked up the 3 pieces of available gear from GPs and can get the trumpet shells off the AH for less than 21k/stack, you can just park your patootie right in front of a vendor and NPC your results for a slight profit. There will be breaks yes, but if breaks are your only loss at this level in any craft, you're doing wonderfully. My experience through this phase saw me HQ 3 rings and break around 20 synths. I know I got lucky, but my pointing this out is really just to show that this level gap isn't anything to be super worried about. Definitely make to cap.
Recipe: Wind Crystal, 2x Trumpet Shell
Cap: Level 96
Phase 4: Final Push
The path to 100 here gets rather tangled up. You're either limited by AH supply or you're taking rather large monetary risks. Hydra greaves material prices have come down quite a bit since the implementation of ZNM along with the Orochi Nodowa. Both of these pieces sell decently paced on the AH (especially the latter) and for a profit, but the issue is catching the scale. For the path to 100, I tried to go with items that were relatively cheap and had materials available for short burn sessions.
If you manage to nab these on the AH for 2.5-3k ea., you can NPC the results for 2.7k. Not a huge loss at all. You might even be able to sell a couple on the AH for a decent-sized profit since it's used in one of the most commonly upgraded relics; the Gjallarhorn. The material for it isn't always available though.
Recipe: Wind Crystal, 1x Colossal Skull
Cap: Level 100
At this level, you can HQ the piss out of some Titanictus for the shells. Make sure you take advantage of this. NPCing the results here will be a loss no matter what, so try to make sure you keep your costs to a minimum since this thing doesn't sell on the AH at all.
Recipe: Wind Crystal, 1x Titanictus Shell, 1x H.Q. Pugil Shells, 1x Sheep Leather
Cap: Level 100
There you have it! You now have a craft at 100 with mostly profitable consumables and end game gear sets that have managed to stay in demand all these years. Between the Neptunal Gear, Igqira Gear and, to a lesser extent, Hydra gear, Bonecrafting has a lot to offer in terms of making money as long as you're mindful of the fact that HQ money is a bonus and not a way of life.
If you brought this to 100, then it's obvious you're wanting to make money at it. If you haven't already done so, your next priorities should be getting your Leathercrafting and Alchemy subs capped. Picking up Tanner's Gloves will enable you to reach tier 2 for both portions of the Scorpion Harness synth (with Adv. Leather support).
The 60-100 series will follow the same pattern as my 0-60 series. One thing that I will be doing, as I have not actually leveled all crafts to 100, is that I will be getting contributions from experienced crafters for these guides. Next week, we'll take a look at Clothcraft.
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
Critical Break: 60-100 Series: Bonecraft
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
Critical Break: 0-60 Series: Bonecraft
Critical Break is our crafting and economics column written by Qtipus. Q is an experienced crafter and also well versed in using the Auction House to turn a decent profit. Enough so that he was able to fund his own relic, Gungnir. Every Tuesday you will find Q's rants, raves and good crafting practices here. This week, Q starts a series of do-it-yourself guides that update how to go from 0-60 in various crafts.
While digging through Wikipedia the other day, I ran across some guides again that I haven't looked at in a while. Some of them are rather outdated given the rather seismic shift in the economy since they were written. Because of this, I have decided to write up a series of crafting guides to get all your crafts to 60 as cheap as possible.
Before I get started though, I need to point out that I tried to stick with items you could farm up with relative ease to actually ease the cost of burning a craft to 60. I also need to point out that what may be "burning" to some people is not necessarily "burning" to me. My definition of burning a craft combines the all out mauling of game critters in conjunction with AH purchases and the synthing process itself.
In short...the cheapest and fastest way to your goal.
So without further adieu...Bonecraft, 0-60.
Bonecrafting is one of the easiest and cheapest crafts to get to 60. If you spend the time farming up bone chips (especially for the first 17 levels and middle-end 30-50ish...), it will cost you virtually nothing sans crystal costs. Even then, there are enough creatures floating around that simply leveling a job from 1-10 will net you a good portion of the wind crystals you will end up using. Should you not want to do that, buy your wind crystals in Windurst from the AH conveniently located next to the guild. Buying them off the Jeuno AH will usually mean you're spending twice as much.
Phase 1: Bone-Chip-A-Palooza
For this phase, you will be spending a lot of time farming in Gusgen Mines.
Some guides suggest using shell powder to level 3. That's perfectly fine and all, but I found if you pick up your bone chips for less than 1k/stack or farm them up, it works out to be about the same. The true advantage to doing shell powder instead of this relies on guild prices being cheap enough to justify it and AH prices for a stack of sea shells being in line as well. NPC the results of either for break even or profit if you farmed up the chips.
Recipe: Wind Crystal + 1x Bone Chip
Cap: Level 4
Same deal as the Hairpins. Farm up your bone chips or buy them off the AH for 1k/stack or less. You'll lose a little gil here if you bought solely off the AH, but not much. Certainly little enough that you can go maul a few gigas in Xarc to make up for it.
Recipe: Wind Crystal + 2x Bone Chip
Cap: Level 9
Turn in a Shell Ring and welcome to the next level.
This is the only recipe that I will list that requires a sub craft. Don't be dumb and buy your Brass Ingots off the AH. It will literally only cost you about 500-600/ingot if you take the time to buy zinc ores off the AH and the copper ores from guild or Denvihr (inside the Airship Dock). You're going to have to level the Goldsmithing sub at some point anyway too, so make yourself 2ish stacks of these ingots and go to town making the earrings. AH the results in the starter cities as they're relatively popular earrings for leveling new jobs.
Recipe: Wind Crystal, 1x Brass Ingot, 2x Bone Chip
Cap: Level 12
Spend some time in Konschtat Highlands mauling sheep. Having 3-4 stacks of sheep teeth should be enough for the 5 levels you're about to cover. If farming isn't your thing, buy off the AH for relatively cheap or buy from the guild. Either way, as long as you buy the bone chips and the teeth for 1k/stack or less each, then you can NPC the results for pretty close to break even. Save one of these for your rank item when you hit 18 during the next synth.
Recipe: Wind Crystal, 1x Bone Chip, 1x Sheep Tooth.
Cap: Level 17
Phase 2: Beetle-Parts-Palooza
Pick your favorite spot to maul beetles. I found the ones in Crawler's Nest to be the most friendly when it came to the beetle jaw portions. Most beetles have friendly shell drop rates, so picking a spot where respawns happen in 5 minutes would be most beneficial. Jugner Forest tends to be the best spot for the shells since there's an area in the central-north region that beetles seem to be present in spades. Save those insect wings too, you'll be using them in the Clothcraft burn.
Take some wind crystals with you and just farm the shells for these. The shells are cheap on the AH as well, but the drop rate is such that there really isn't a need to buy them unless you're just in a hurry. Carapace powder really only has one use, so AH'ing your results here will be a slow and painful process. Buying shells off AH will usually result in a net loss of 1k or more and given you have 4 levels to cover here, that can add up pretty quick if you NPC the results.
Recipe: Wind Crystal, 2x Beetle Shell
Cap: Level 21
Popular among the lower level rangers and pretty doggone cheap to make to boot. Farm up your beetle jaws and AH the results for 1k or more unless you get lucky with an HQ.
Recipe: Wind Crystal, 1x Beetle Jaw
Cap: Level 25
Need more beetle jaws for this portion too. These actually sell faster than the beetle rings on the AH. It's entirely possible to skip the rings entirely and just go straight to this, but I opted to put those in there due to the fact that there's more risk of loss should you bust a synth. Buy your silver earrings from Adelflete in the Lower Jeuno shop called "Gems by Kshama." These sell as fast as they do for two reasons:
1. They're damn good for the level, especially the HQs.
2. Bonecrafters making a living on these will buy them to desynth for silver ingots.
Again, skip the beetle rings altogether if you want as there is risk of loss trying to cover 6 levels here. Save one for your guild item. Hopefully your fame is high enough in Jeuno to take advantage of the lower earring prices.
Recipe: Wind Crystal, 1x Beetle Jaw, 1x Silver Earring
Cap: Level 27
You're going to lose a little money here if you buy all the horns off the AH, but farming the ram horns themselves are a pain too. Skip to Beetle Arrowheads if you want here, but it probably wouldn't hurt to bridge the gap as Beetle Arrowheads are a loss as well unless you've farmed up all of the mats.
Recipe: Wind Crystal, 1x Ram Horn
Cap: Level 29
Phase 3: Arrowheads-A-Palooza
Once you get to 30, you can start taking advantage of synthesis support and picking up key items. Picking up the Filing key item here allegedly makes skilling up through this section go faster, but given I was already well beyond this point when Filing actually came out, I have no way to really verify it.
Farm up tons of Bone Chips yet again, you're going to need them.
Popular arrow for skilling up Woodworking as well as for leveling up jobs that can actually use it. Unfortunately, they sell for a loss per stack if you buy up your mats off the AH.
Recipe: Wind Crystal, 1x Bone Chip, 1x Beetle Jaw
Cap: Level 33
Same deal as the Beetle Arrowheads, only they don't sell as fast and sell for even more of a loss. Good news is that the fangs are easier to farm up than the jaws.
Recipe: Wind Crystal, 1x Bone Chip, 1x Black Tiger Fang
Cap: Level 38
Pick up a horn ring off the AH or make one and turn it in to reach level 4.
Same boat as the Fang Arrowheads. Not very useful to many people and slow sellers. They will sell though, so have patience.
Recipe: Wind Crystal, 1x Bone Chip, 1x Ram Horn
Cap: Level 43
Hopefully you still have some beetle jaws laying around and some ram horns. Some will consider this synth optional and go straight for scorpion arrowheads due to the ease of farming. If you do nothing but farm your mats, I say go for it, but if you want to use a bit of a bridge synth, this is best way to go.
Recipe: Wind Crystal, 1x Ram Horn, 1x Beetle Jaw
Cap: Level 47
Here's where it gets easy. The vast majority of scorpions have a very high drop rate on their claws. Some of them in Crawler's Nest have a 100% drop rate on a claw, but their 16 minute respawn and limited number of spawns make it a bit of a nuisance to deal with. Should you pick up scorpion shells as well (and you'll pick up a few for sure), save them for a later synth.
Recipe: Wind Crystal, 1x Scorpion Claw, 1x Bone Chip
Cap: Level 53
Turn in a Carapace Gorget to reach the final level of this burn when you hit 48.
Phase 4: Almost There...
I have no idea why a level 1 piece of gear is a level 57 synth, but such is life. It's also such that this is a very cheap synth. Farm up some Yagudo Bead Necklaces and turn them into grass thread (part of the clothcraft burn). Farm up some Giant Femurs from the Dhalmels in Buburimu Peninsula and either go farm up fiend blood or buy it off the AH. AH the results for 1k or so in the starter cities. There isn't much of anything available at level 1 for the waist slot, but most people don't care about that slot at that level anyway. Use this as a bridge synth mostly.
Recipe: Wind Crystal, 1x Fiend Blood, 1x Grass Thread, 1x Giant Femur
Cap: Level 57
Due to drop rates being not-so-great on the shells, I recommend doing as little of this synth as possible due to the annoyance factor. This is why I listed the Blood Stone. There's also the option of the Beetle Knife to 59 as the materials for it are readily available and not so hard to farm up. However, given the fact that these shells make their appearance on the AH rather frequently and are priced anywhere from 1-2k generally, it's a mostly reasonable synth to deal with. Farming up the shells can be pain-staking work at times, but if you stick with it and farm up all you need, then you're not going to really spend anything other than crystal costs. These sell somewhat decently for close to cost on the AH. These will take you to 60 as well.
Recipe: Wind Crystal, 1x Scorpion Shell
Cap: Level 60
Conclusion
This is the first of this 0-60 Series. Most crafts aren't all that expensive to get to 60, even if you buy all your mats off the AH and can recover the gil lost from it relatively easy through other means. However, gil-burning a craft to 60 (or even 100 in some cases) often times will wreck the market for certain items. Bonecrafting (up to 60) is fortunate enough to have a rather unwavering set of recipes that only require you to spend a lot of time farming 2-3 certain items that are used in nearly every one of them if you don't want to waste a lot of money. On top of that, they're rather common items to boot and are readily available through farming or the AH.
Next up: Clothcraft
#1 ~ Monk
#2 ~ Samurai
#3 ~ Ninja
#4 ~ Dragoon
Chaotic Pellucidity
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