Synthesizing

[Aeni]

Re: Synthesizing

More test results...

When performing crafting leves, try to not take any leve that is less than 2 ranks below your current rank (i.e., try to only obtain leves that you are at least 2 or more ranks above) I found out that the "randomness" of the failures scale with the differences in the ranks between your own and that of the leve and that when the leve rank is higher, your failures scale tremendously.

I also find it quite advantageous to use Wait on Red glowing synthesis and to perform Standard on White and Bold on both Flashing and Yellow (This increases your appraisal through the roof!) If you feel that you're either cutting it close or might not make it to completion, use Rapid on Flashing but do not use Rapid on White. You can get away with Rapid on Yellow but you'll need that ability from Culinary Rank 10 to reduce risks involved with a synthesis. Optimally, you should try to avoid Rapid and use Standard on Flashing instead if Bold is out of the question (i.e., you're not doing well)

That's my own experience and I'm sure other players will have slightly different experiences from me. Take my results with a grain of salt ... I'll keep testing things and posting my results.

[Aeni]

Re: Synthesizing

Crafting is very frustrating right now for me in that I cannot reproduce results consistently and that it doesn't seem like one factor or another influences the outcome in any meaningful manner.

These are facts:

1. Adjusting your stats (in other words, when you distribute your stat points) affects the outcome of synthesis.

2. Adjusting your elemental resistances (in other words, when you distribute your elemental resistance points) affects the outcome of synthesis.

3. No particular stat or elemental resistance enhances any particular craft in any predictable manner (dispels some rumors that stacking stats or elemental resistances boosts your success rates)

So here are my own observations.

-I noticed things changed after I stopped stacking strength and dexterity for my marauder. When I started to add some points into Piety, Mind and Vitality, my success rates for crafting in general went into the gutter but my blacksmith successes suffered the most.

-When dumping more points into Lightning and Wind resistances, my HQ chances went up in Weaving and somewhat increased a tad bit in Leatherworking, but decreased my chances in Blacksmithing.

-I reassigned my points just recently and redistributed them (30 points each) into Strength and Fire as I have read a lot of people saying that their success in Blacksmith went up. I noticed the EXACT OPPOSITE. Everything from rank 5 to rank 11 recipes became more difficult, unwieldy and prone to failure streaks. I once failed 8 times in a row across two attempts. This means that results from Physical level < 10 and Physical > 20 are very, very different. However, with success greatly diminished for higher rank recipes, I noticed that my HQ chances had gone up tremendously (in other words, even when my success rate is low, if I do managed to succeed, I almost always HQ'd)

There's a lot to test and figure things out. I've also noticed something which has bothered me a lot to this day. My success in Blacksmith generally became far more favorable when I worked out of Ul'dah and usually was very mediocre in Limsa. So far, this is what I've seen to affect synthesis:

-Region
-Weather
-Time of day
-Resistances
-Stats

Having an offhand also increases your success a tad bit more than without one so people need to buy that offhand and deal with inventory issues as best as they can. I generally look at it this way; by having less failures, you'll need less inventory space in the long run.

---------- Post added at 12:15 PM ---------- Previous post was at 11:59 AM ----------

I need to also add that maybe I'm experiencing bugs within the crafting. I mean that's always a possibility and that I'm probably doing serious analysis on a flawed system. But no one really knows whether or not the crafting functions properly and SE hasn't made any official comments yet.

[Taskmage]

Re: Synthesizing

This sounds like FFXI crafting revisited. So random with so many factors possibly coming into play that ultimately crafters will be left chasing superstitions. In a way stats coming into play makes sense, but I hope that's not the case. It would suck if someone decided to shift focus from melees to mages and ended up gimping their blacksmith in the process.

[Raydeus]

Re: Synthesizing

Would it be too easy to cheat on a game that required actual skill on the part of the player?

Like those hacking/unlocking/decrypting games in mass effect. Or fishing in Ryu ga gotoku 3.

You get help from stats in terms of action window and crafting results, but in the end depending solely on your twitching skill. So if you AFK you simply fail, but if you are paying attention, with practice, you have little chance of failing unless you do something dumb.

[Aeni]

Re: Synthesizing

Would it be too easy to cheat on a game that required actual skill on the part of the player?

There's some skill with fishing, mining/prospecting and harvesting/logging but no real challenge. I guess you can also say that there's skill involved in crafting if you want to figure out what affects what and then try to make all the pieces work together. But I really do not want to spend my hours trying to figure out what that magic combination might be ... I can only spend 2 hours a night and most of it is spent on leves. >.<

Edit:

After refunding 3 times and not spending my points just yet, I noticed that they gave me all of my points back except for the stat/elemental resist that I put most of my points in initially. Is this a bug? Maybe ... and this may be what is causing problems with the game. I'm emailing SE about it because it's such a weird mechanic. Note, you may not have this problem if you distribute your points normally. I was testing stuff and was stacking everything into just one stat/resist and is the only way I discovered this problem.

Edit2:

I have a strange feeling that Piety is very, very important in crafting. It might affect stability of the synthesis, possibly by reducing durability loss no matter what the outcome of the synthesis. Last night, failure on standard on a recipe in flashing usually meant just 9-15 durability loss ... but right now in the state I'm in, the losses go as high as 25 and closer to 30.

[Malacite]

Re: Synthesizing

I don't even get why your primary stats affect crafting. I don't care if crafts are classes now, it's still phenomenally stupid. It's annoying enough balancing my stats for combat roles without worrying about crafting and gathering as well.

And I still say they should have done away with shards in the beta. The rehauled the combat system, why couldn't they have done the same with crafting? Did no one in P1 or P2 speak up against it?

[Aeni]

Re: Synthesizing

I'm frustrated that I require undyed canvas to complete a rank 12 item in blacksmithing (which requires a rank 21 in weaving to make) Here's the kicker. There exist an item called a bronze axe ferrule which isn't even being used right now.

[Bricklayer]

Re: Synthesizing

I don't even get why your primary stats affect crafting.

I kind of treat crafting in this game like any other DoW/DoM class, so it makes sense to me that different crafting classes would rely differently on the various attributes. That said, I wonder if the DoH mini-game could be made to be as diverse as the DoW/DoM mini-game they've developed? It takes parties to defeat certain mobs. Maybe they should make crafts that require a party of crafters? Pie in the sky, I suppose.

[Aeni]

Re: Synthesizing

Birdsbeak Hammer - Recipe - Final Fantasy XIV Database - ffxiv.yg.com

I'm still searching for this elusive Undyed Canvas. What really gets my goat is that the cloth can sometimes be found for 25-30,000 gils ... and yet people are selling their finished product for 15K (I'm talking about the Cross-Pein Hammer which incidentally costs the exact same in materials as the Birdsbeak Hammer and the only difference is 1 or 2 ranks in skill to craft ... how messed up is that?)

I can craft everything (and I already did) for both types of hammer with the exception of the canvas. But if I'm going to drop that kind of gil for one cloth I'm just better off paying someone 50K for the Birdsbeak Hammer.

So ... screwed ... up.

---------- Post added at 08:30 PM ---------- Previous post was at 07:19 PM ----------

OMG DAK ... or anyone, for that matter ... HELP ME TO UNDERSTAND WTH I'M DOING WRONG!




Okay ... I give up on crafting. I mean, I give up on trying to figure out the mysteries of the crafting system and I give up on trying to figure out how to beat House Odds. I'm just going to take my lumps and eat 70% failure rates on synthesizing < 4 ranks difference on recipes. Plus I'm just going to face roll elemental resistances. I just want to play the damn game and not fight the video game gods over Random Number Generators.


I can't seem to duplicate my results before the last patch:

synthesis

I could get really high appraisals because I was able to have a lot of success with these syntheses. After patch, the same syntheses would barely produce a higher score than 25 and it has been fraught with failures after failures. I've even busted several rank 1 attempts ... with a rank 14 in BS.

[Dux]

Re: Synthesizing

Hey Aeni

Whilst I am not as far into the crafting as you I do have some suggestions and observations to share.

From where FFXIV is right now with no established economy and no way to efficiently isolate and purchase goods the best solution (with a longer term view hat on) is to level every craft and make everything yourself. Whilst this sounds quite an arduous task I would say that now is the best possible time to consider such an undertaking as there is little else available to do anyway.

Alternatly you can take the socialistic approach and establish a crafting network so you can ensure cheap prices and resource availability I.E. crafting community gathers everything and make at zero cost with a "I'll scratch your back if you scratch mine" philosophy.

The only other option I can think of is to invest the time you could have spent leveling the other crafts into painstaking checking bazaars and market wards to find your goods instead, in the long run this doesn't appear to be the better solution.

SE has deliberatly created the crafting receipes in this way so I have taken the long term view and am leveling every single craft except fishing and cooking in order to progress through the crafting system with some sense of self sufficiency. IMO this situation will change once the economy stabilises but in the mean time I don't see many other viable alternatives.

[Aeni]

Re: Synthesizing

SE has deliberatly created the crafting receipes in this way so I have taken the long term view and am leveling every single craft except fishing and cooking in order to progress through the crafting system with some sense of self sufficiency. IMO this situation will change once the economy stabilises but in the mean time I don't see many other viable alternatives.

That's the approach I'm taking (or gradually getting to that point now) I cannot wait another 3-4 months for the economy to stabilize while my crafting is in limbo. And it's nowhere near any cap so I'd like to continue working on my crafting. Part of the problem is essential material being rare or bought out completely (maybe by RMT ... they are loaded with gil already)

[Aeni]

Re: Synthesizing

After a hitting a few HQ results the past two nights (on stuff that really mattered ... shocking) and managing to make a tidy profit of about 200K for just a few minutes of work, I managed to get a feel for crafting. But the consistency factor is eluding me on HQ results.

I have a hunch that HQ seems to also hinge upon "hot streaks" and the amount of quality gains on a synth. I noticed that when I hit +1 on 2 items the night before, I seemed to have received quality gains on Bold synthesis of at least 50 points (one of them hit 62, I think it's in my screenshot in the Media forum)

The amount of quality really didn't matter, either. So weird. Quality determines (usually) the amount of skill/experience/appraisal values and that I can attest to. But if it actually factors into HQ? I can't say ... I've actually created a Bronze Cross-Pein hammer with a quality of over 300 once with almost 100 durability still and I didn't get ANY HQ result from that. So sad...

[Aeni]

Re: Synthesizing

Crafting is awesome ... when you've figured it out (roughly 70% now) At least I'm not plagued with failures anymore. I just put on Girls Dead Monster soundtrack and just tunnel vision.

Anyway, so I figured out that rank inappropriate gear not only does not work very well for combat classes, but can cause problems with hand/land classes as well. I noticed the string of failures was due to this one head gear I was wearing (Rank 18 Cotton Turban) Once I replaced it with a crafted Hempen Turban, things seem to be more smoother. I also went back and added a few more crafted hempen pieces on my person for the other crafts as they are not as high as my BSM (now at 17)

Yeah, level inappropriate gear on combat classes suck as well. I noticed a few things...

Defensively, you're prone to more critical damage, damage intake is increased and your chances to parry, dodge and evade drops. I think blocking is also reduced (or you get more partial blocks)

Offensively, you're prone to missing a lot, regardless of how much accuracy you're sporting and regardless of food or buffs you receive. You also have reduced damage output, less critical chances and, here's the real kicker (because I thought this was a bug, but discovered it might not be), that stamina drainage seem to occur more frequently. But this requires way more testing, obviously, to make sure it isn't just a freak increase of a buggy issue.

Anyway, this all happened because I wanted to see what would happen if I started putting on gear on my Marauder that had a high "optimal rank" on them. Things like a Bronze Chain Coif, Spiked Bronze Labrys (both of which I crafted) and a few other things. My Marauder is only 16. The first few minutes, it was hell against blue mobs, like Puk Hatchlings. Switched back to lower (rank appropriate) gear and all of the problems above seem to just disappear.

I think it's just a hidden "punishment" for people who think they can put on gear without considering the optimal rank just because the game allows them to.

I've seen Rank 15 gladiators going around in Rank 38 cuirass. WTF is up with that...

[Freelancer]

Re: Synthesizing

I wear high level gear on my gladiator as a mannequin for what I have in bazaar.

Sold plenty of haubergeons that way lol.

And with crafting so far the stats I'm focusing on are Control(less dura loss) > M.craftsmanship(less unstable junk) > craftsmanship (better chance to HQ?) in that order.

And so far its working pretty good, though I abandoned bold/rapid synths since trying to HQ anything worth while is too risky, and when doing leves all I want is to finish to get my EXP.

Though people report that the higher the quality of your synth the more rewards/better chance of getting marks.

I hope they'll have an "Ask the devs" about this.

[Aeni]

Re: Synthesizing

Though people report that the higher the quality of your synth the more rewards/better chance of getting marks.

This is true. I've scored over 200 on the appraisal and received extra items. Stuff like Bronze Nuggets or even crystals. But I'm not sure if it's worth the time because sometimes trying for the higher score can stretch a synthesis from 30s to well over 2 minutes.