FFXIV Crafting Guide

FFXIV Crafting Guide by Nichi789

Intro:

Hello and welcome to my crafting guide!  This guide will assume that you are new to crafting, so I will be explaining every detail I can.  If you have any questions, feel free to comment, or feel free to contact me in game.   Who am I? Leviathan Server, Quan Markon, Omnicrafter extraordinaire!  I am capable of HQ’ing every item currently in the game (as of 2.3), and do so without the Supra tool or the new Belt, Earrings, or Neck.  In this guide, you will learn in this guide the properties of crafting, common crafting terms, material management, ability useage combos, and much much more!  One thing I will only touch  briefly on is the leveling itself.  If you are looking for a leveling guide, there are plenty out there, but this guide will focus more on the crafting itself.

Before we start though, I wanted to remind everyone that this is what I personally do to get HQ’s.  One of the wonderful things about Final Fantasy 14’s crafting system is the open ended nature of it.  You may find your own way of doing things, the important thing is that they work for you!  Everything in this guide is my opinion, based off of my experience.  Feel free to try your own rotations, ability useage, and techniques!

What is crafting and what do I get out of doing it?

This might sound like a stupid question, but its still one that you should address before you sink a lot of time into it.  I will start off by saying that Crafted Gear is not even close to the best gear in the game.  If you are hoping that leveling up crafting will be a cheap way to obtain BiS gear, I am sorry to disappoint you but it will be neither BiS or Cheap.  That said, the crafted gear is a good place for new 50’s to start, and for alt jobs to get geared up.  There are many markets to work, Gil to be made, and allies to help if you become an Omnicrafter.

You personally stand to make a lot of Gil from crafting.  While it takes investment, both time and money, the payout from just standing in a city responding to tells LF melds is always satisfying.  You can also repair your own gear, make your own raid food, earn Gil from vanity and combat gear sales, and much more.  The grind will be long, but at the end you will be a welcome addition to any FC, and your friends list will be filled with people that want you on call.

The 8 Crafts

There are currently 8 DoH and 3 DoL in the game.  The gatherers supply most of the raw materials for the crafters, with a few exceptions.  In addition to the materials, each craft that you do also requires a number of elemental shards, crystals or clusters.  The primary element will be used for every single item in the list, while the secondary element will not be used for items that are materials for other items, such as Cloth, Leather and Ingots, but will be used for finished products.  Recipes commonly use materials only obtained from other crafting classes, so bear that in mind while leveling.  Here is a brief description of each class, its elemental requirements, which gatherers it relies on, and which other crafters provide mats for them.  Feel free to pick any to start with, but I would recommend starting with WVR, LTW, or GSM for reasons I will explain:

Alchemist, ALC:

Alchemists have 3 main items that they provide; Caster Mainhand items (SMN, SCH, and WHM specifically), Potions, and Glue/Oil.  Glue sounds like ALC are paste eaters, but when you notice how many recipies need glue or oil of some kind, you realize how valuable they are.  ALC also have the most prerelics of the 8, providing the SMN, SCH, and WHM.  They also can make Terminus Putty, a 3 Star level item that is used in EVERY finished 3 star combat item.  In the grand scheme of things though, ALC is mostly used to supply your other crafting classes with mats.

Primary Element: Water

Secondary Element: Lightning

Raw Mats From: BOT, MIN, FSH, Combat Drops

Cross Craft Mats From: CRP, BSM, ARM

Armorer, ARM:

Armorer, as you would expect, makes armor and shields for the Tank Jobs.  They also provide gear for the DRG and MNK jobs, but not nearly as exclusive.   They share many Ingot  recipes with Blacksmith, and even relies on BSM to provide them with their highest level materials.  Notable items include several vanity pieces, the Light Steel Galerus, Light Steel Subligar, and the Tidal Barding that makes your Chocobo into Leviathan.  One thing to note is that for whatever reason, ARM gear sells at a slower pace than LTW or WVR gear.

Primary Element: Ice

Secondary Element: Earth

Raw Mat: MIN, Combat Drops

Cross Craft Mats: GSM, LTW, WVR

Blacksmith, BSM:

Also known as Weaponsmith, Blacksmiths provide almost exclusively main hand and off hand tools.  Despite this, they only provide 2 Jobs (PLD and WAR) with their prerelics.  They also share many material recipes with ARM, but have exclusive access to the highest level of material recipes.  Unfortunately, this recipe list does not include any Item Level 90 weapons outside the insanely expensive / grind heavy Primal Weapons, which are mostly used for Glamor.

Primary Element: Fire

Secondary Element: Earth

Raw Mat: MIN, Combat Drops

Cross Craft Mat: CRP, LTW, ALC, GSM

Carpenter, CRP:

Carpenters are in the weird spot of essential, yet nondescript.  You need the lumber that they provide, but they have very few meaningful high end crafts.  That said, they do provide both BRD and DRG with prerelics, and most of the craftable main hands for these 2 jobs, so they aren’t entirely a material provider.  They also have one of the largest housing lists.

Primary Element: Wind

Secondary Element: Ice

Raw Mat: BOT

Cross Craft Mat: ARM, ALC, BSM

Culinarian, CUL:

Culinarian is unique among the crafters, as they have no housing tab, and no non-consumables.  They are among the most reliably profitable given the constant need for raid food, but prices are also the most fluctuating out of the crafters, and because you must create multiple items to sell, it can also be the most time consuming.  Another thing to note is that CUL is the only crafting class entirely independent of all others in terms of cross class materials.

Primary Element: Fire

Secondary Element: Water

Raw Mat: BOT, FSH, MIN, Combat Drops

Cross Craft Mat: None

Goldsmith, GSM:

Goldsmiths deal mostly in jewelry.  Be it for battle, gathering, or crafting, chances are you will be using a GSM piece.  GSM also provide BLM with their prerelic, FSH with lures, and Whetstones for BSM.  On top of providing every class with at least one peice of gear, Rosegold Nuggets are used in a HUGE number of recipes as well, so its worth getting GSM up early.

Primary Element: Wind

Secondary Element: Fire

Raw Mat: MIN, FSH, Combat Drops

Cross Craft: LTW, BSM, ARM

Leatherworker, LTW:

Leatherworkers provide gear for a large portion of the jobs, both combat and noncombat, making them another good choice to level early.   Like GSM, they craft such a wide array of gear, its difficult to list all of them.  Stand outs include the MNK prerelic, an entire swimsuit line, and the Levin Barding from Ramuh.  Hippogryph Leather, like Rosegold Nuggets, is used in almost everything.  One unique quirk is that unlike the other crafts, LTW gets most of its items from world drops, so keep that in mind if you choose to gather them yourself.

Primary Element: Earth

Secondary Element: Wind

Raw Mat: Combat Drops, MIN

Cross Craft Mat: WVR, BSM, ARM, ALC

Weaver, WVR:

Weavers provide cloth gear for casters, and more importantly most of the crafting gear comes from WVR.  This is what makes WVR such a compelling choice to level first, since you can make your own gear as you go.  They also are one of the more consistent sellers of 2 and 3 star items, have a larger array of vanity pieces than any other crafters, and Twinthread is used in a large number of high end crafts. In my opinion, WVR is the safest for beginners in terms of difficulty and profit.

Primary Element: Lightning

Secondary Element: Wind

Raw Mat: BOT, Combat Drops

Cross Craft Mat: LTW, GSM, ALC

The Crafter’s Stats

Just like battle classes, Crafters have their own set of stats that help them make gear.  High level gear can only be attempted after you reach certain stat requirements, so be sure to consider that when you meld your gear.  I’ll go in depth with gear choices later in the guide, but for now, I will explain the 3 stats:

Craftsmanship: Craftsmanship is you stat that determines how quickly you can finish an item.  It is the least affected by small stat bonuses, so generally you never want more than the minimum stat requirement.  If your target item wanted 391, then get 391 and don’t worry about any more.  This is because in order for you to see the benefit of having high Craftsmanship, you need to be able to finish the craft one step sooner than you would have without that buff.  Think of it as if your goal was to make it to 100 and your options were to add 50+50, or 60+60.  Both get you to your goal, in the same amount of steps, but you waste the extra stats in the 2nd example.

Control: Control is your most important stat.  Similar to Craftsmanship, there are minimum Control requirements before you can attempt most high level items.  But unlike Craftsmanship, you want your control as high as you can, even past that cap.  While crafting, Control affects how easily you can HQ an item.  Due to RNG and random chance, you won’t always have 100% on every craft ever.  So every point of Control you get can sometimes get you that extra bit you need to get the HQ.  If you think 1 or 2% isn’t going to make a difference, I can not begin to tell you how rude an awakening you are in for once you start crafting.

CP:  Most of your abilities cost CP.  CP is your resource and you want it as high as you can.  While you won’t see any minimum CP requirements on gear, you want to plan out your rotations so that you will always have enough CP to do them.

Your first craft, aka: WHY ARE THERE SO MANY NUMBERS!?

So you have picked a class, and now you have started your first craft.  Unlike other MMO’s, the crafting system in Final Fantasy 14 involves just as many skills and statuses to manage as any primal fight. All of this can be overwhelming for a beginner, so I will break it down.  The 4 statuses that determine success are Durability, Progress, Quality, and Condition.

The first thing to keep an eye on is the Durability score.  Each craft begins with a Durability ranging from 40-80.  If the Durability should ever reach zero, they Synth will fail and your materials will be lost!  Therefore, it is critical that you never allow your Durability to deplete.  You have 2 goals to reach before you hit 0 Durability: filling your Progress bar and filling your Quality bar.  Its easy to fill one or the other, but you will need to fill both to be able to consistently put out HQ gear.  Actions that directly affect either the Progress or Quality decrease the Durability by 10, so be careful!  There are several abilities that restore Durability, the 2 that every class has access to are Master’s Mend and Master’s Mend II.  While these are very helpful they (as all Durability restores are) are among the costliest CP abilities in your arsenal, so use them sparingly!

The first priority of any craft is to fill the Progress Bar.  This bar is what determines if your craft is successful or not.  Once you reach 100%, your synth will end and you will receive the item.  You are safe if your durability is 10 and you finish out the Progress bar, you still receive the item.  Typically, abilities that end in Synthesis increase the Progress Bar.  Progress is independent of all other statuses and RNG, so it is the most reliable in terms of how long it will take to fill.  One thing to watch out for is Housing items.  These items can not be HQ’ed, have very high difficulties, and very large progress bars.  They are deceptively difficult if you just use your Synthesis abilities without also managing your CP and Durability.

The second goal is filling the Quality Bar.   While not necessary to finish the craft, the higher your Quality goes the better chance you have of synthing an HQ item.  One thing to note about the Quality bar is that it follows an X2 type of progression.  Meaning that achieving 50% Quality only grants a 15% HQ chance, but from there the HQ rapidly increases.  Most abilities that increase Quality end in Touch. While not necessary to do so, using HQ materials helps immensely in making an HQ item, each item increasing the Quality that your craft starts with.  The higher level of mat the item is, the higher the bonus Quality is, so keep that in mind when choosing your materials.   Even assuming you do use all HQ materials though, you’re starting Quality will never be higher than 50% of the maximum.  Some items, especially those used in high level crafting from Mythology tokens, can not be HQ.  This means that you just need to punch through the Quality portion you didn’t get on your own.

The final thing to keep an eye on is the Condition of your synth.  Condition is unique as you have zero control over what condition will come up.  Condition is therefore the hardest element to plan for, but you can predict it a bit if you know what you are looking for.  The 4 Conditions are:

Normal (White): Kinda what it sounds like, the most common Condition where there isn’t anything going on.  A Normal Condition is followed by (in order of frequency) another Normal, a Good, or an Excelent Condition.

Good (Red): Good Conditions increase the amount of Quality received after using a Touch ability.  They also allow the ability, Tricks of the Trade to be used to replenish 20 CP.  After a Good Condition there will always be a Normal Condition

Excellent (Rainbow Disco): Excellent Conditions are rare and you won’t see them every synth.  They are similar to Good Conditions that they boost the amount of Quality granted, but by a far greater number.  Unlike Good though, there are no other uses for an Excellent Condition than Quality increase.  Excellent is always preceded by a Normal condition, and is always followed by a Poor.

Poor (Blackish Purple): Poor Conditions are reverse of Good (imagine that).  They Reduce the amount of Quality that a touch gives you.  The touch still adds a stack of Inner Quiet though, so you should still use a touch if you are looking to build for a Brygot’s Blessing charge (see cross class abilities).  Alternatively, you can use a Poor Condition as a window to put in some Progress since it isn’t reduced by Poor in anyway.  Poor Conditions only come after an Excellent, and are always followed by a Normal.

Your Skills:

Every crafting class has a set skill set that they receive at the same levels.  The only difference is that each of the 8 crafters learns an ability unique to their craft at levels 15, 37, and 50.  This Skill can be cross classed into the other 7 classes, and is the main reason that serious crafters have most if not all the crafts maxed.

General:  All Class Gain their own Version of these

Basic Synthesis: Basic Synth is your go-to for your first few levels.  While not the best Synth ability, it is available early and most importantly, costs no CP.  It is made obsolete later by the WVR cross class abilities, but until then you will finish most of your crafts using Basic Synth.

Standard Synthesis: It costs 15 CP, but has a higher effectiveness and success rate.  Everything works as advertised for the most part.  With the exception of very rare instances using Brand abilities, Standard Synth is your heaviest hitting Progress gain.  You will still be using Careful Synth II from WVR more, but this is a nice fall back to have for when you just wanna whip through a bunch of items.

Basic Touch: The first Touch ability you get is actually the best of the non-cross class touches.  Because of how Inner Quiet works, you generally wanna use Basic Touch over all others to conserve CP.  Bear in mind that you still have a fail chance with it, even with Steady Hand active (at least until you get Steady Hand II from CUL)

Standard Touch: Standard Touch is the middle child of the touches.  Basic Touch is better for spamming, Advanced Touch is better for speed crafting, and Standard Touch falls awkwardly in the middle.  There may be times in a rotation where your CP works out that you will be able to use a Standard Touch over a Basic, but these are rare and far between.  Still, until you are high level, this ability is a nice one since it allows for guaranteed Quality using it and Steady Hand.  Use it while you can, spend lots of quality time with it, for soon Standard Touch will look back on these times and wonder why you haven’t called in forever.

Advanced Touch: At 48 CP, Advanced Touch is a pricey investment, but it makes up for it by being the most effective raw Quality booster in the game.  It makes a good finisher until you get Brygot’s, using it at the end with high Inner Quiet stacks.  Still, you generally shouldn’t use it for High Level crafting since the CP cost can be prohibitive, counting instead on Hasty and Basic Touches to charge Inner Quiet.  Advanced Touch can be used to help quickly HQ low level items though, so you will never really stop using it.

Inner Quiet: This is the ability that you will be using at the beginning of every craft you do.  Its cheap, only 18 CP, and will give you a massive bonus to Control if used correctly.  Each time you SUCCESSFULLY implement a Touch, you gain a stack of Inner Quiet, granting bonus control with each stack, boosting subsequent touches.  Even more importantly, there are abilities that interact with Inner Quiet, particularly the cross skills from CRP, Rumination and Brygot’s Blessing.  Brygot’s in particular is one of the most important skills to have for high level crafting (explained further in its own section). Propper Inner Quiet management is crucial to success.

Steady Hand: This buff is great.  I can’t stress how bad it is to fail a touch or synth ability.  Not only do you lose the CP from that ability, but you now lost Durability, which spirals into needing to spend even more CP to get it back.  Steady Hand helps get rid of that pesky RNG that will always conspire to make sure you want to punch through your monitor.

Great Strides: At first glance this ability looks stronger than it is.  Doubling your touch’s strength is great, you are making so much Quality and lowering the amount of touches you need!  In truth the high CP cost and the fact you don’t gain any extra Inner Quiet stacks make spamming this ability a no-no.  Great Strides is still great (heh) for 2 things:  First it can be used to turbo charge your final touch in the synth (usually Brygot’s or Advanced Touch).  Second, it can help you blow through low level items, turning out HQ’s.  Either way, I wouldn’t recommend using this ability more than once, maybe twice per synth.

Master’s Mend: Your primary Durability replenishment tool early, this is another example of an ability doomed to be replaced.  As advertised exactly, you regain 30 Durability for a very high 92 CP cost. You can’t gain more than the max Durability of the item, if you use this ability at 20/40 Durability, you will only gain 20 back.  Manipulation from GSM will replace this since it is 4 CP less for the same effect, and you CAN be at 20/40 Durability and still receive the full effect from it since the recovery is periodic.

Master’s Mend II:   The highest CP cost in the game, this is the final word in Durability recovery.  While the level 50 LTW ability, Waste Not II, is comparable in terms of amount of Durability recovered (or conserved as it were) as a personal preference I prefer Master’s Mend II.  There are plenty of successful crafters that use Waste Not II, and I encourage you to figure out which works better for you.

Observe: You have messed up so you spend more CP to stare at your Synth and hope that the problem fixes itself.  The problem has not fixed it self, but you still have lost 14 CP for the staring contest.  There really is no reason to plan to use this skill, but in a pinch you can hold out hope of getting a Good or Excellent condition with it.  This is risky and should only be attempted if you have zero faith that your current track will give you an HQ.  Later this ‘zero faith skill’ is replaced by the level 50 CUL ability, Reclaim as your fall back “oh crap” button.

Cross Skills: Unique to their class, up to 10 cross skills can be chosen from this list

ALC

Tricks of the Trade: Abbreviated as ToT, Tricks of the Trade is your main CP recovery tool. It is especially handy in between steps that you don’t lose stacks of buffs, such as after activating Inner Quiet or after you run out of Steady Hand stacks. GENERALLY its always better to use ToT over a touch, but there are exceptions. Early on, before you build up Inner Quiet, ToT is good to use, since each ToT lets you replace a Hasty Touch with a Basic Touch later when the extra control will net you more Quality.

Comfort Zone: This is your secondary CP recovery tool. After 10 steps, you net gain 22 CP, which might not seem like a lot, but it is free. After obtaining it, you should use it first every single synth you do. This is because in the event of a Good quality, you can follow up with ToT. If after the buff wears off you think your synth will take longer then 10 more steps, reactivate it for more CP recovery.

ARM

Rapid Synth: Rapid Synth is generally not worth using outside of emergency situations when you miss count your steps. Its easier to just not make the mistake, but they do happen so keep it if you feel nervous. Try to have Steady Hand up when you use it to make up for the abysmal fail chance.

Piece by Piece: While essential for housing crafting, Piece by Piece isn’t overly powerful otherwise. It can be used to help with 3 star crafting, but it can be easily subbed by Careful Synth II and Ingenuity II. Remove it from your bar when not in use, and remember to reapply it when you start a Housing item

BSM

Ingenuity: The wording on this ability is somewhat confusing, but I cant stress enough how important it is for completing 2 and 3 star items. One thing you will notice with crafting is that as you level, items lower level then you are easier to make even with the same gear. Ingenuity essentially takes this concept and makes it into an ability. Use this toward the end of the Synth, right before Brygot’s Blessing to fully capitalize on the bonuses it gives you to both your Quality Increases and Progress.

Ingenuity II: Everything that was Ingenuity is made better in Ingenuity II. After getting this, you will most likely never use rank 1 again. As with the prior, use right before you are about to finish to get the most out of the buff.

CRP

Rumination: Rumination consumes your Inner Quiet for CP. This is a double edge sword since more CP means you can keep working the item longer to get the quality up, but you also won’t progress as quickly since you miss out on the bonus Control from Inner Quiet. Use this until you get Brygot’s Blessing, then remove it from your bar, never to touch it again.

Brygot’s Blessing: Of all the cross class abilities, this one is the most important. Using Steady Hand > Great Strides > Innovation > Ingenuity II > Brygot’s while having around 7 Inner Quiet stacks will finish up pretty much any craft. After, you will have 4 stacks remaining of Ingenuity II to use for Careful Synth II, so your Progress will be buffed too. This ability will help you HQ things even without all the other buffs, so be sure to get it asap

CUL

Hasty Touch: Hasty Touch will be you spam button for most crafts. Put up Steady Hand II over Steady Hand I if its an option, and make sure you trigger Inner Quiet first. ToT when appropriate, keeping in mind that CP is generally more important then a low Inner Quiet stack Hasty.

Steady Hand II: 3 CP more for an extra 10% is a no brainer when you use it with Hasty Touch. It also means that Basic Touch is a guarantee, so replace your Hasty Touches with Basic Touches AT THE END of the Steady Hand. This is because of the fact that more Inner Quiet stacks at the end is when you want your touches to land. Just make sure you have enough CP to turn out all your buffs for Brygot’s (around 128 if you have all of the cross skills)

Reclaim: RNG happens, sometime you just get unlucky. You can fail 10/10 80% success rates, it happens. Thats when Reclaim is worth its weight in gil. You generally will know when you will have a very low quality, even after Brygot’s. Thats when instead, you activate Reclaim and intentionally fail the synth. You might still lose the mats, but when you would otherwise have a worthless NQ item, thats the least of your problems. Just restart, and hope for the best.

GSM

Manipulation: Same amount of Durability recovery as Master’s Mend, but cheaper, this is a must have for 40 Dura items. One big warning, is that it registers the repair AFTER the the step. So if you are at 10 Dura, activate the ability, and then do a synth, YOU WILL FAIL. After activating it is a good time to reapply Steady Hand or to use any ToT that come up.

Flawless Syth: Also known as the “I forgot about that Skill”, there is no instance I can think of that this is worth using.

Innovation: Cheap CP cost to massively buff your Control, as mentioned this is excellent to use before Brygot’s. Also useful for speed crafting low level items by using Steady Hand > Great Strides > Innovation > Advanced Touch.

LTW

Waste Not: Essentially, this is a Condition healer that is preemptive. At max, you will keep 20 Condition, but its worth noting that only using 3 of the buff stacks will come out to the same amount of Condition saving, since being at 5 condition and then finishing up the craft will be successful. I like to use this on 40 Dura items because of the premptive nature, and the cheap CP costs. Steady Hand II > Waste Not > Hasty Touch x4 > Manipulation > Steady Hand II > Hasty Touch x3 > Brygot’s Combo

Waste Not II: Waste Not’s older brother, there are rotations that use this that are perfectly successful, but I personally don’t use them. Since this ability handcuffs you using Durability reducing steps for at least 7 steps to get the maximum effectiveness, I find it can sometimes lead to problems given its high CP cost. It is a love it or hate it ability, try it out for yourself before choosing on a high end rotation. Ultimately it will be either this or Master’s Mend II, its simply a matter of preference.

WVR

Careful Synthesis: As any crafter will tell you, NEVER TEMP THE GODS OF CHANCE. Careful Synth takes the guess work out of how much Durability you need to leave to finish the craft. Its also a CP saver since you don’t need to use Steady Hand on Synthesis abilities.

Careful Synthesis II: You will be relying on this ability for the bulk of your Progress needs. Decent efficiency and a 100% success rate, couple this with Innovation II on difficult crafts to save Durability.  You will never need to use Basic Synth or Careful Synth again once you get Careful Synth II

My BRAND!

I wanted to make a separate note here about the Brand (Fire, Ice, Earth, Wind, Lightning, Water) special Synth abilities.  On paper, these skills sound and look really cool introducing elemental Aspects into crafting.  In reality though, there are MAYBE 3 or 4 crafts on each list that take on an aspect.  On top of that, the Brands are not much better than Standard Synth.  You will never NEED to use these abilities, but if you really want to play around with them, you can see if the craft will be an aspected on in the text box below.  The items will normally be a random Green background in the otherwise White list, or be an item that uses a rare drop from a Primal.

Crafter Leveling

In terms of which crafter to level first, that is a matter of preference.  If you are only crafting for the express purpose of getting to Omnicrafter, I-can-make-anything status, I would recommend the following order:

WVR, GSM, CUL, ALC, CRP > all to > Level 15

CUL > Level 37

CRP > Level 50

WVR, GSM > Level 50

LTW, ALC > Level 50

BSM, ARM, CUL > Level 50

This order is based solely on becoming HQ possible as quickly as possible.  The first step grants you the first round of Cross Skills, followed by the 2 essential high level skills from CUL and CRP.  From there, WVR and GSM both have end game crafter gear and highly useful level 50 abilities.  LTW has crafting gear, but its 50 ability isn’t necessary and ALC has a decent ability but no gear at all.  BSM, ARM, and finishing CUL is last because none of the abilities from BSM and ARM are necessary nor do they have gear (outside BSM offhands), while CUL doesn’t have gear and its level 50 ability is more of an insurance then an aid.  There are several ways to level, and I won’t go too far into detail on them.  There are already plenty of other guides out there, but I will touch base on each of the ways to get to 50.

Crafting Items: No surprise, you gain XP by just finishing crafts.  This is the long way to level though, think if you were to get from 1 to 50 on a battle class by just killing enemies.  If this is how you intend to level, and you have heaps of Gil to dump on it, you can put a bunch of mats and Quick Synth them all, but I wouldn’t recommend it.

HQ’ing items:  Not only do HQ items sell for more, but they also grant triple the normal XP.  Quick Synth may be faster, but nothing is more cost effective than HQ’ing a bunch of items as opposed to just a bunch of normal ones.

First Time Completion Bonus: The first time that you complete an item, HQ or not, it grants you a hefty chunk of bonus XP.  This XP means a lot more the first few levels then it does later, but you can easily get to level 20 buying raw mats from the guild suppliers and making one of everything.

Leve Quests:  Leve’s are the most popular method of leveling for a few reasons, but the major one is the ability to power through without stopping.  On average (but results may vary) it takes 50-60 Leve’s to get from Level 20 to Level 50.

GC Turn Ins: While you can only do one per class per day, turning in items to your GC will give slightly more XP than a Leve, and sub out the Gil reward for GC Seals.  These seals can be turned in for rare crafting mats, so this is an easy way to multi task.  Be sure to have HQ turn ins, as they grant double the normal XP and Seals.  Always check to see if there is an Orange Star next to the requested item.  This item will give double the XP for the turn in, and if it is HQ, will double again for 4 times the XP!  This is good for a slow and steady approach since you can level all 8 classes at the same time without worrying about dividing Leve allowances.

Challenge Log: Eh. Bonus XP is Bonus XP.  After unlocking the Challenge Log, you will most likely get the completion without really trying.  You can make progress in the challenge by crafting in a maxed class, just make sure you craft the final item on a class that isn’t maxed so you don’t waste the XP.

Ixali Beast Quest: I can’t personally say how effective the Beast Tribe will be to level crafters since mine were maxed long before its release.  However, similar to the Challenge Log, free XP is free XP.  If you are going to do the Beast Tribe quests make sure to turn it in on a crafter that isn’t maxed.  You also eventually get rare crafting mats from doing the dailies after rank 5 rep, so its worth doing for that alone.

Materia Melds: Yes you gain XP from melds, no you shouldn’t go buy materia to meld to do it.  The amount of XP you gain isn’t worth the Gil, and since you probably won’t get meld requests until level 50, this isn’t a reliable method.

Repairs and Desythesis: Repairing items USED to give XP, but it was patched out a while back.  Desynth uses an entirely separate system and therefore doesn’t give XP either.  Neither should be used with intent to hit 50.

Your first few Synths

The first thing to do after you pick up a crafting class is simply play around with it a bit.  Get familiar with each skill as it unlocks.  Maybe get to level 20 or so buying materials off the guild provider near where you unlocked the crafter.  If after you reach level 20 you still don’t feel comfortable with the basics, go ahead and do another class!  This might sound weird to say in an in depth guide, but figuring out how to do those first few Synths on your own is very helpful.  I have given you all the information you need about the 4 things to watch for on your crafters window, as well as what you need to finish the craft as an HQ.

I would recommend upgrading your gear about every 5-7 levels or so.  You dont need to be obsessively updating every piece of gear as it becomes available, but it does pay to keep yourself up to date.  One big tip is to NOT sell back your old gear.  You have 7 other crafters to level that all use the same gear set until level 50.

/Important Side Note/

I will note this here since this is where you might start coming across HQ materials.  Each HQ material you use will start your Synth with bonus Quality before doing anything.  The amount of bonus Quality depends on the level of the item you are Synthing, and the level of the HQ mat, but no matter what your starting bonus Quality will never be more than half of the maximum.   Note that some items in the game, particularly rare ones used in 2 and 3 star crafting can not be HQ.  Using HQ materials is essential to make HQ finished products.  As you gain levels, abilities, and gear, you’ll need less and less HQ materials to still guarantee your success.

C-c-combos!

So you have your skills, you have a few class skills, but how do we put them together?  Well, it depends on the level and type of Synth you are doing.  That might sound unhelpful, but truth be told, a lot of crafting comes down to trial and error, judgement, and proper preparations.  After you have done this a few times, you can start setting down Rotations.  Your own rotations are created after you establish 2 things:  How many actions you need to fill the progress bar, and how many touches can you fit into the remaining Durability without going below 128 CP?  Ultimately, your high level rotations will look similar to this:

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Boosting up your Inner Quiet stacks as high as possible, then turbocharging a Brygot’s, then using the remaining Steady Hand and Ingenuity stacks to finish the progress.

Below, I list a few of my rotations, with my recomended CP level for each.  Generally if you can meet the minimum Craftsmanship and Control requirements to craft the item, you can HQ it given HQ materials and proper ability useage.

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End Game Gear

Obtaining an HQ il55 piece in all slots should be your first goal.  Almost all of your gear comes from another crafter.  In fact, the current BiS gear for all DoH classes is 15/17 crafted gear.  If you only have 1 class maxed (WVR or LTW being the most likely examples) you probably won’t be able to HQ these items without buying the HQ mats off the Market Board.  You technically don’t NEED the new il55 Belt, Earrings, and Neck peices, but they are easier to meld and who knows if in future patches if they will become necessary?  You can either buy the pieces or wait until you have a few more crafting skills to fall back on to make them yourself, its up to you and how fast you want to start crafting high level items.  Obtaining your first main hand requires you finish your Crafters Quest line, so go back and do them if you power leveled it.

Your secondary goal should be your melds.  There are a few strategies that you can do here to help minimize the cost.  You could start with one class at a time, but I prefer melding out your off set pieces first.  Your Rings, Wrists, Belt, Neck, and Earrings might be the hardest to overmeld since they only have one slot, but they also are used among all 8 crafters.  Every time you upgrade one of those pieces, you are essentially upgrading all 8 crafters at once.  Your melds don’t need to be perfect, but you should be able to craft 2 Star Items HQ before attempting the next step.

Obtaining your crafts first Masterbook requires a turn in of 5 HQ of your classes 2 star material.  Vanya Silk for WVR, Hard Hipp Leather for LTW, Darksteel Ingot for ARM and BSM etc.  The Master Book will contain an item that is Untradeable item  that has a difficulty halfway between 2 and 3 star.  You must make a total of 50 HQ of this item to obtain your Artisan’s Tool for that craft.  This will take a huge amount of time and  materials.  Since you can’t even trade these, you can’t eve commision your more geared friend to do it for you. You also can pick up a pair of Artisan’s Spectacles for 10 HQ of this item.  These Specs are essentially a slightly better version of your fully melded Head peice, so you can feel free replacing it.  Even better, you can use these Specs on every class, not just the one you earned it on.  If you have to pick a class to make 10 extra, I would recommend CUL since their turn-in item is the least mat intensive.

Your final step after obtaining this Artisan’s Tool is to review your gear.  You want to have 391 Craftsmanship, 374 Control, and 340 CP without any Food or GC buffs.  Having these numbers will allow you to make 3 star items with ease.

If you REALLY don’t want to do the Artisan’s Grind, there is an alternative, but it is an investment of gil.  If you can obtain 3 Mastercraft Demimateria, and a total of 10 Fieldcraft Demimatiera III, you can craft up tokens for your Crafter Relic, or Supra.  While its stats are slightly better than artisans, unless you desynth the Demimateria yourself (which you wouldn’t since I just mentioned this is the non-grind option) the cost can be unbelievably high.