Synthesizing

[Freelancer]

Re: Synthesizing

YG is starting to screw up, synths I've been making at 30 are listed as 40 (Lantern shield, was easy as hell at 33, so why is it ranked at40? it didn't even give me decent sp) and so on.

And good find on the shards synth, Ima try that out ASAP.

[Aeni]

Re: Synthesizing

YG is starting to screw up, synths I've been making at 30 are listed as 40

Here's the problem ... there's a bunch of WHINERS over at YG pissing and moaning about not able to do a particular synth and then saying that it's way higher than it really is. There's a bit of skill with crafting and I'm afraid a bunch of these WOWers are pissing about how they can't set it to craft 100 of X while they go play with themselves.

/rant

[Aeni]

Re: Synthesizing

There's a lot of changes made with the most recent patch and I want to confirm with others that this particular I'm experiencing is part of the change.

It seems that all recipes listed as Rank 20 or higher now require their specific training (i.e., mesa-red cotton cloth requires Dyeing Training) and you will experience a lot of failures and botched syntheses as a result. I've "tested" the waters and have come across two items that seem to support this theory.

-Iron Nails (Nailcasting Training)

About several weeks ago I attempted this recipe for a leve at R19 on my BSM and didn't notice any extraordinary hardships and did manage to complete the requirements for the leve ... twice on separate occasions. Just recently I was experiencing the same amount of failure and botching and I'm currently R21. The only thing that I can point to would be the training requirement as my gear and (obviously) rank has improved significantly over this time period.

-Colored (Dyed) Cotton Cloths

10 days ago I grinded out nearly a 1/3 of a full stack of celestial dyed cotton cloth without too much issues (one botched, but that was because I was careless) and usually ended with quality of around 50-60. Today, I'm trying to grind out mesa-dyed cotton cloths and am experiencing some excruciating failures and botches. So far I've only succeeded twice of over half a dozen attempts and SP gains hovered around 310 to 322 with under 10 durability left (and quality no higher than 20) Two things ... SP gains are about roughly 20% higher than prior which usually means that the recipe rank was increased somewhat (1 or 2 ranks) and also my failures are far more frequent than I would like them to be. Whether this is a direct result of rank increase for the recipe or the result of training requirement due to the change in ranks ... I'm not sure. Once I hit 18 I will see what kinds of results I get. If it's more of the same than it's training and if my situation improves noticeably than it could just be a question of rank.

(To figure out recipe rank, you generally follow a simplified formula: (1000 - [exp gain]) / 50. A negative value means you need to add the absolute value to your current rank while a positive value means you need to subtract it from your current rank -- highly recommend that you use NON-LEVE syntheses results AND more than one result)






EDIT:

I just dinged 18 and what do you know ... requirement for Dyeing Training disappeared from the synthesis window! WTF?

More theories:

-Trying to attempt a recipe more than 2 ranks above (needs further testing) will force you to use additional training.
-Bug.

[Zempten]

Re: Synthesizing

Does anyone know what causes the elemental to go wild? I've been getting that alot recently on my 24 BSM making iron needles. Is it because of not enough control? craftsmenship? etc?

[Luna Flower]

Re: Synthesizing

Does anyone know what causes the elemental to go wild? I've been getting that alot recently on my 24 BSM making iron needles. Is it because of not enough control? craftsmenship? etc?

Some people think it has something to do with your elemental resistance.
Oh and I put together a crystal / shard recipe area for the new alchemy recipes that require fish. It does come handy for converting shards / crystals you dont use to ones you do.

http://www.ffxionline.com/forums/ffx...emy-chart.html

I just hope a mod moves it to the Alchemy section ><. If anyone has any recipes that are not listed feel free to let me know so I can add them. It is relatively new so some are still out there waiting to be found.

[Aeni]

Re: Synthesizing

Does anyone know what causes the elemental to go wild? I've been getting that alot recently on my 24 BSM making iron needles. Is it because of not enough control? craftsmenship? etc?

What is your affinity like?

The way I've heard of it and what I've experienced myself is that beyond Physical level 20, you're accumulating a lot of points towards attributes and elemental affinity. When you get to Physical 30 and then 40, the points increase dramatically, and therefore you have a lot of points in that how you are spending it can start to affect your crafting. Remember, at the lower levels, your point accumulation isn't enough to make any kind of impact and the differences are barely measurable.

I've heard arguments for and against theories surrounding affinity and crafting but I do believe that affinity DOES affect crafting. How or why is beyond me to answer at this point in time. But how your affinity looks like with your points spent will affect events such as elemental instability. Many players have chosen the safe route of spending points equally. This is the similar to spending points equally amongst your attributes. I really strongly advise against this kind of playstyle but it is a personal choice and it is up to the individual to decide.

What's worth looking into are how the crystals/shards that are used in a particular recipe will react to the player's affinity. For example, I seem to encounter a lot of issues surrounding the usage of earth shards. What's been happening lately is that I'm getting a lot of earth instabilities as well as occasional secondary instabilities if the recipe uses another selection of shards to support that synthesis. If this is water, then I'll see water instability. My affinity was designed to mirror my base stat distribution and so earth is one of 3 affinity that is the lowest of the ones I have. Ice is the highest. I do not seem to have as much problems as Ice as I do with Fire, Wind, Earth and Water.

Again, this is probably worth looking into and testing for, but I don't have any conclusive evidence to make any claims.

[Aeni]

Re: Synthesizing

Orz ... you know when it's messed up when your main craft falls behind a subcraft and you're struggling to make tools for that subcraft. What's worse is that the tool for your main craft is also a titanic struggle since parts for the that tool (made by the same main craft!) is ranks ahead.

SE needs to fix this ... grrr.

(Pleasantly surprised with the 369 sp/ 1517 xp on doming heads at r21 ... not so happy about this since it means YG is giving out false information)

Edit:

I did a quick calculation and have determined that Iron Doming Heads are not Rank 22 as YG is reporting but somewhere around R29-31. Since Lodestone is listing this within the 21-30 category I'm wagering a safe bet that it's either R29 or R30 and this is ALL of the iron tool parts that BSM can craft. I'm getting around 1,510-1,525 exp consistently at R21 for doming heads (and probably similar for the other iron heads) which is (1,5xx-1000)/50 = ~10 ranks difference between me and the recipe. And yes, it's an extremely difficult synthesis to attempt at R21 and would probably require a ton of luck, HQ gearset, and mad skills with your abilities. If this was a leve attempt, a success would mean a whopping 800sp/3,000exp reward.

Edit 2:

I stand corrected ... it seems SE had the decency to at least give a break to BSM's to craft their own tool 300 sp/1077xp on Iron Cross-Pein Hammer Heads which puts it at about R22/R23, which is quite doable for an R21 BSM. They've also modified some of the parts list to make it more friendly to craft on your own (at least for BSM tools) I'll update if I come across any other differences with YG's list.

[Zempten]

Re: Synthesizing

Ah I see. Also can anyone tell me where I get guildmarks? i haven't seen any.

[Luna Flower]

Re: Synthesizing

Ah I see. Also can anyone tell me where I get guildmarks? i haven't seen any.

You get them from leve's ^^. They are pretty much random lvl 10+.

[ChocoboBunny]

Re: Synthesizing

I thought you could only get guildmarks after you have surpassed the lvl 20+ Rank? I haven't been able to play much so I am slowly learning everything and couldn't believe i had to hit lvl 20 before I could craft but those are the breaks.

[Luna Flower]

Re: Synthesizing

I thought you could only get guildmarks after you have surpassed the lvl 20+ Rank? I haven't been able to play much so I am slowly learning everything and couldn't believe i had to hit lvl 20 before I could craft but those are the breaks.

It used to be that way, but they changed it to lvl 10 in the Nov/Dec Version Updates.

[Aeni]

Re: Synthesizing

It used to be that way, but they changed it to lvl 10 in the Nov/Dec Version Updates.

To be more precise, only Leves R15+ hand out guildmarks (at random) and you can start working on R15 leves at R10.

The rules are fishy but I'm starting to collate my experiences neatly into this theory:

"Guildmarks are usually rewarded for completing leves which are higher than your current rank. The amount of guildmark you receive can vary but it is loosely based on your appraisal value in proportion to the difficulty of the leve coupled with success of leve completion (appraisal values are based largely upon quality of the finished product as well as durability where having too high of a durability can also affect the amount of skill points you receive for completion)"

^ But that's just a work in progress and all it takes is for one turn-in to completely change this so take it with a grain of salt.

I've also noticed that there's a trend in which if you botched just once in any of your turn-ins, you do not receive any marks. I need someone to prove to me that you can receive marks regardless of how many items you botched because this is my experience so far and I have not had anyone remember if they did or did not receive marks on any turn-ins where they had one or two botches.

[Dux]

Re: Synthesizing

Now that christmas and new year are out the way I finally have time to come back to this and do some more work on it. Unfortunatly I don't have a second set of data yet as Undyed Canvas is just so expensive, as soon as I have the 2,000+ earth shards required to repeat the test I will. I did however decide to go back to the data again and pull out some useful numbers about +Craftsmanship which I never did before specifically the amount of craftsmanship required per rank to maximise your progress.

Assumptions
There is a standard distribution therefore the properties of the negative pressure exerted when your rank is over the synthesis rank are the same as those exerted when you are below it.
Being on cap +Craftsmanship has no effect therefore there is no need to provide recommendations for on the cap.
Adding +Craftsmanship results in a linear increase of Progress and does not enter diminishing returns until after the average progress is maxed out.

Analysis
Below are base set of mean values and the benefit of +10 Craftsmanship, both are used to calculate the amount of +Craftsmanship you would need on average to max out.

The naive formula I am using is described below.
1) Maximum possible progress minus the mean actual progress gives you the amount you need to make up with +Craftsmanship.
2) Divide the result of 1 by the mean amount of progress you get for +10 Craftsmanship for this type of work unit.
3) Multiple the result of 2 by the amount of Craftsmanship under test to give you the actual amount of +Craftsmanship required.

One Rank Below Target Synthesis Rank
Sucess Generic = (((20-13.65) / 1.74)*10) = +36.5 Craftsmanship
Sucess = (((20-14.15) / 0.49) *10) = +119.39 Craftsmanship
Failure = (((10-5.45) / 0.49)*10) = +92.86 Craftsmanship

Two Ranks Below Target Synthesis Rank
As I have no data for two ranks below the cap I used the data for two ranks above as a guide, however this is not very good as Sucess seems rather optimistic compared to the other results this is due to the poor quality of the data captured for two ranks above.
Sucess Generic = (((20-12.65) / 1.93) *10) = +38.08 Craftsmanship
Sucess = (((20-13.35) / 2.03)*10) = +32.76 Craftsmanship <-- This is almost certainly not correct, the data is skewed as was previously identified.
Failure = (((10-4.65) / 0.38)*10 = +140.79 Craftsmanship

Conclusion
Once you have added enough +Craftsmanship to max out the mean Sucess Generic you are then into the realm of diminishing returns due to the increase in +Craftsmanship required to max out Sucess and Fail work units.
Sucess Generic which benefits the most from +Craftsmanship can be capped out for up to two ranks under with as little as +60 (+18 from Bronze Needle and +40 from other gear) Craftsmanship.
Sucess and Failure require three times more +Craftsmanship to cap out.
This definatly requires a retest on Undyed Canvas so I can get some data.
Given the impefect data I am using I still have low confidence in the results.


For the +control testing I still haven't worked out what I can make that is both useful to me and doesn't use up valuable shards I need for my own progression.

[Dux]

Re: Synthesizing

I need someone to prove to me that you can receive marks regardless of how many items you botched because this is my experience so far and I have not had anyone remember if they did or did not receive marks on any turn-ins where they had one or two botches.

Proven. I just got 579 marks on an R20 leatheworking "Camp Drybone Cares" leve after botching one of the synthesis.

[Aeni]

Re: Synthesizing

Proven. I just got 579 marks on an R20 leatheworking "Camp Drybone Cares" leve after botching one of the synthesis.

Okay, then that's good. Last night, I botched on 2 of 3 leves that were a lot harder than my rank (one of them I failed completely on ... was an R20 for Alchemy as an R16 attempting an R24 recipe ... so brutal) and I didn't get ANY Marks on those leves. The only one I got was for an R15 Alchemy which was easy peasy to complete.

I'm finding that I'm able to comfortably synth items that are roughly 7-9 ranks above my current rank with ARM. I'm not sure what's the driving force behind this because I can't do it quite well on my BSM (Maybe 4-7 ranks) or any of my other crafts. I'm even receiving recipes on turn-ins for R32-35 recipes on my ARM and recently completed successfully an R32 recipe. LOL

---------- Post added at 12:44 PM ---------- Previous post was at 12:05 PM ----------

I'm gonna do a naked versus gear test to see how effective gear is. I'm not sure how many total synths I can do w/o leveling. Gonna have to prep for this first which will cause me to pickup an extra 1,500 to 2,000 SP.

I'll give additional details and hopefully results later.