Why I retired from woodworking...

[Ayukawa]

This is probably more of a rant than a useful post, but I'm curious as to what other woodworkers have experienced.


When I started playing the game, I knew that I'd eventually need a set of elemental staves. In my naive-ness, I decided "Okay, I'll make my own by leveling woodworking as my primary craft!" Well obviously, the time to get my staves has come and gone and I purchased them from the AH rather than making them myself.

My woodworking skill is currently level 75. It's been 75 for atleast 9 months now (I've only been playing a year and a half). It's occured to me that this is a dead-end craft for me, and I've since retired it to take up Alchemy.

- There are no reasonable synths to skill with past 75. Any synth I've tried to skillup requires making non-stackable items, and/or items that are a significant loss of gil to make. Even making commodes or cabinets which will profit me a whole 2-3k, i can only make about 10 per week if I sell them on the AH.

- No elemental staves. Yes this was something I assumed out of being a naive beginner, but unless you're 100+3 in woodworking, there's no point of even attempting to make these things. The prices of ore make NQing them a HUGE loss. And if you can't seem to reach 100+3... Blah.

- The arrow "nerf". I don't think I've seen anybody but myself call this a nerf, and I'm sure many people will disagree. The changes to arrow/bolt making skills were a nerf to woodworkers in my opinion. With arrow/bolt head stacks increased to 99k, it is nearly impossible to find stacks of heads on the AH, and they have asinine prices when I *do* find them. As a result, unless I make my own heads (which requires additional leveling of other, somewhat expensive crafts), I can no longer readily obtain my synthesis materials.

Boltmaker is pretty useless too. If they made it possible to HQ with boltmaker, then overall the change may be worthwhile. But as it stands right now, the only I have left that I can really make any sort of profit on, is shihei.


So I've retired woodworking. I've surrendered my accumulated GP (which admittedly wasn't a huge amount), and started to take up Alchemy. At the very least, I can make useful items for myself and my linkshell.

[Shishimura]

Re: Why I retired from woodworking...

Sorry to see you left.

There are some new synths thanks to the expansion.

You could have gone

Marid Arrow x33 81 Earth Dogwood Lumber, Apkallu Fletchings, Marid Tusk Arrowheads
Cermet Lance 86/Alchemy(57) Fire Ash Lumber x2, Cermet Chunk x2
Kabura Arrow x33 91/Bonecraft(53)Earth Bamboo Stick, Karimata Arrowheads, Giant Bird Fletchings, Ram Horn

Those are just a few...

[TheTruth23]

Re: Why I retired from woodworking...

Have fun competing in a gil selling / undercutters united craft. WW is a good money maker if you're not retarded. From 75 isn't hard at all, sounds like you just like to complain, but have fun with Alchemy lol.

[Caspian]

Re: Why I retired from woodworking...

No need to be a dick about it.

Besides alchemy and cooking, all crafts get expensive to level up. Woodoworking can actually be a lot better than others to do. As for boltmaker, well yeah it does suck, but lumberjack is awesome. Most key items for other crafts suck. Atleast we got one good one.
As for arrows, it may suck on your server, but its still fairly easy to find arrowheads on Fairy. Yes you have to pay more up front, but you can use that one stack for much longer. I can see how you don't like it, it does require you to have more liquid cash at the beginning, but in the end it evens out. HQ staves, well, yeah, you need to be a much higher level to get the HQ"s and since so many people make the NQ trying to get the HQ, then the NQ bottoms out and HQ goes for millions. Its the economy, it works the same way for other items in different crafts. Staves are use by many as a major money maker down the line.

TheTruth23 actually had it right, though he did say it rather rudely. Despite the messenger, the message is sound.
You can make money on alchemy, but later on it doesn't have near as many of those high end, one synth, lots of money items. Most of your money making will be done on crafting in bulk.
Good luck though, but you will run into some of the same problems. Skilling a high level craft just sucks.

[TheTruth23]

Re: Why I retired from woodworking...

No need to be a dick about it.

Besides alchemy and cooking, all crafts get expensive to level up. Woodoworking can actually be a lot better than others to do. As for boltmaker, well yeah it does suck, but lumberjack is awesome. Most key items for other crafts suck. Atleast we got one good one.
As for arrows, it may suck on your server, but its still fairly easy to find arrowheads on Fairy. Yes you have to pay more up front, but you can use that one stack for much longer. I can see how you don't like it, it does require you to have more liquid cash at the beginning, but in the end it evens out. HQ staves, well, yeah, you need to be a much higher level to get the HQ"s and since so many people make the NQ trying to get the HQ, then the NQ bottoms out and HQ goes for millions. Its the economy, it works the same way for other items in different crafts. Staves are use by many as a major money maker down the line.

TheTruth23 actually had it right, though he did say it rather rudely. Despite the messenger, the message is sound.
You can make money on alchemy, but later on it doesn't have near as many of those high end, one synth, lots of money items. Most of your money making will be done on crafting in bulk.
Good luck though, but you will run into some of the same problems. Skilling a high level craft just sucks.

Wood Purification is good as well especially once you get WW to 98 and need to double synth Adaman Ingots. Note to mention Warp Cudgels are good gil as well. Ya I said it rather rudely but I dislike people that quit and complain about it. I just loved WW since I started it so I didn't think twice about gil. If I wanted to be deep in pockets I'd go level BC on a mule, but I hardly play anymore.

[Caspian]

Re: Why I retired from woodworking...

Yeah, I forgot about wood purification for warp cudgels. Also nice for making money. I looked through some of the other crafts 10k gp key items. For the most part they suck, bad. Lumberjack is a definate rarity in that regard. Can buy arrowwood logs from the guild, or ash logs from port person and synth to your hearts content. Can usually make over 200k in an hour.

[Eseuldor]

Re: Why I retired from woodworking...

1) Cabinets/Commodes go to fishers. This is your target audience for those. Learn to use your mules to there max effectiveness and market them.

2) Never take up a craft just to make one single item

3) Your gonna pay more for that 99D of arrowheads but the price is about the same as buying 9 stacks of those same arrowheads in D's of 12.

4) Bolstmaker was made for people without high level woodworking skill and do not have the room needed for enough bolts during a long xp session. Or the RNG and THF who don't want to level wood.

If you couldn't cut it in wood (excuse the pun), alchemy will be a bigger bytch. Trust me...

[Tirrock]

Re: Why I retired from woodworking...

Everybody's said pretty much what needed to be said... I'll just toss in that on my server it's pretty easy to find most arrowheads/boltheads on the AH. There were even some venom boltheads on the AH before I logged off tonight.

And yeah. Boltmaker = waste of 10k GP. I could almost see it's point for people with 28 wood who wanted inventory space (despite being at the first HQ teir anyway)...until they made bolts quiverable... Now it's just easier to mass-produce bolts, quiver them up, and store them.

[Shishimura]

Re: Why I retired from woodworking...

Something that seems to be overlooked almost constantly...

CARPENTER'S LANDING!

That is where I go to make all my lumber not to mention they sell the bundling twine right there.

[Haggai]

Re: Why I retired from woodworking...

That is where I go to make all my lumber not to mention they sell the bundling twine right there.

Stuff is cheaper out there, too.

I've been woodworking since I started, and I've gotta say that I love it. I'm glad I didn't get boltmaker, now that I know it's pretty useless. I'm saving up for my carpenter's gloves.

I got up to 63 and noticed that woodworking is pretty much dead-end. Unless you level sub-crafts. I think that's the key to any craft (except maybe cooking). Woodworking can benefit from Smithing, Goldsmithing, Clothcraft, Bonecraft, and Leathercraft as sub-crafts.

I just recently took up clothcrafting. I found what seems to be a painless guide to leveling it. If I farm most of the items, I should have to spend very little money in getting it to 60. It seems as though clothcrafting is very similar to woodworking in crystal use. That's a big help, because I already know the nice places to farm Wind and Earth Elementals. I'll also be using some lightning crystals, but I hang out in Delkfutt's Tower farming Thunder Elementals for fun.

I know that my woodworking isn't as high as yours, but I see great potential in it. Providing that I get some sub-crafts under my belt.

[Turiel]

Re: Why I retired from woodworking...

Yeah, sub crafts are pretty much a must. The scarcity of bolt heads will work to your advantage if you level the alch and smithing required for them, since subless WWs won't have access to bolt heads all the time. Two good things come from this fact: first, the low supply will keep the price of bolts higher, making them more profitable; second, when there are few quivers of bolts in stock, and none of the corresponding bolt heads, that's your opportunity to price jack. I call it price jacking, but on Ramuh, its more like getting a fair amount of money for it. Only thing you can't make is bloody bolt heads. No big loss on my sever, since a 99D of bolt heads will only make you 100k-150k. The lowever level ones are more profitable.

As for skilling up, again, subcrafts. And patience. And a legion of mules.

[perry]

Re: Why I retired from woodworking...

At level 75 if you are feeling the pressure, then quit now. I am 96.3+6 and have been for over a year. At this level, my synths cost 260K each in order to get good skill. I estimate that it will take me close to 40M to finish WW. When I hit 96 there were two NA 100+ Carpenters on Lakshmi. Now there are about 10, so its totally doable if you are willing to stop leveling and bust your hump farming.

I've never found a way to compete with gilseller crafters when it comes to making money via crafting, so I just farm.

[mikesjustice]

Re: Why I retired from woodworking...

Well, I'll add my experiences from this craft.

As you can see from my sig, I've been at this crafting game a long time. Long enough now that I'll be taking all relevant crafts to 100.

The thing that I noticed, like most people do are the HQ staves. It's the high lvl synth, the potential gil maker of this guild. The problem with these staves, is that there is no longer any profit in the piece, as they are controlled by a market of gsellers. If your not raising this craft specifically to sign HQ staves for yourself, be careful. The illusion is that these pieces are attractive to make a profit, but once you get their first hand is when you realise.

In my experiences, I specifically target tier 11 and tier 31 pieces. Those items are SH, hauberk, haubergeon, Ele rings, Triumph earrings, HQ staves, Brig , Amemets, etc. Without mentioning a word about lower lvl synths within any of my guilds, I can clearly say that woodworking is the least profitable guild in my possession, nearly to the point that I don't use it other than for specific purposes.

Now I've synthed 60 staves at one time, I've also gone and synthed in batches of 12, 24, and other smaller numbers. This is why HQ staves are not, or are barely profitable, even for gsellers.

I'll give an example of two specific tier 31 pieces, and these are Odin prices.
Amemet mantles vs HQ staves.

1.) HQ staves are approx 4x the cost of ele ores.
2.) Ele ores either break 1 in 10 when making beads, or cost more in bead form than ore form, upping your overhead.
3.) Ebony lumber costs 250k

Right off the bat, your put into the negative through ebony lumber purchases, or ele ore breaks/ele ore purchases. Depending on your batch, it could be in the millions of gil.

Amemet mantles are approx 4x the cost of amemet skins, yet you start at ground zero and never in the negative.

What we know about tiers, often over time HQ averages will be reached regardless what HQ factors we deem to be important. What we think is irrelevant, HQ average according to tier > all.

With that, the only way to make gil on items like this is to find a break in which you can push ahead of the HQ averages. If you can push one or two extra HQ, you can profit on this run. Also keep in mind that future runs you will average back out again, potentially making that profit run "now", a losing run "later".

Clearly you can see when starting out in the negative, which HQ staves generally offer, your chance to make a profit is slim. Should you make a slim profit, usually it's only from the NQ staves, the insignificant extra's. On top of this, should you cut your own beads, your muling these over, literally doubling your work vs other tier 31 pieces.

It's just not worth it imo. I just laugh at our server's gsellers. They might bank a million gil with a full days work. How do I know? I've walked their path and I know I have significantly more experience on the topic.

Follow what feels right, but I do not recommend WW to anyone under these economic conditions.

[Xylaa]

Re: Why I retired from woodworking...

I've found woodworking to be a nice profit while working on other crafts. Right now, my wood is lvl 47, and I plan on taking it to 67. I either broke even or made a little bit of gil taking it to 47, and at 47 I can HQ status bolts enough to make an ok profit. I get 4 stacks of quivers from 99 bolt heads. I have a friend craft the bolt heads for me, so I can spend around 40-50k, and make about 260k. At WW 67, I'll make even more.

But I agree, don't take woodworking to 100 for profit. I started it because for some wierd reason, I enjoyed it more than the other crafts. But I hadn't really tried them all, and I'm thinking of blacksmithing or goldsmithing.

[Andvari]

Re: Why I retired from woodworking...

First of all a thankyou to "mikesjustice" for your input, that's a real eye-opener, I was planning on stopping WW at 60 and then saw people HQing staves and it seemed a good gil maker, but I guess you're right, Elemental Beads sell around 600k on Unicorn although Ebony Lumber is on 60k on AH to my surprise but the risk of losing so much gil if you just NQ and with my previous luck of HQing I think i'd be wasting my time and gil getting to 100.

I'm curious as to which craft is the best money maker, does anyone have any suggestions? I know to make gil you have to use gil, that's the way it works for everything but on Unicorn for WW you are kinda plodding along happily to 60 and then the next crafts are like 500k x.x and as highest job WHM (63) and next highest NIN (42) you can imagine it's a chore farming so I really have to depend on crafts to make my gil, I whore on Scorpion Arrows at the moment, the prices are very unstable though, one day a stack of 12 quivers is 70k, the next 45k.

can anyone suggest a more profittable craft in the high levels?