Gil Sinks?

[Aeni]

Re: Gil Sinks?

Naked crafting and gathering between Rank 1 and 12 is fairly acceptable but I did notice a dramatic increase in successes and HQ once I've put some actual gear on. I remember advocating shedding the clothes back in beta to avoid unnecessary repairs and it's still a solid advice for new players or those who are ranking up a new craft. But as you start to go up in ranks the amount of control necessary to remain stable in your craft starts to be a minimum requirement. If you solely rely on outranking a recipe to see success then you should check out the other thread in which I discovered that outranking a recipe by too much can also spell disaster.

[Sekighara]

Re: Gil Sinks?

well the thing about FFXIV is that caught me as odd is it has multiple currency systems at low levels. So while gil making might be substantially large (Which if you ask me makes sense because I am not going out there to get slaughtered by tommy machine gun cactuar if it isn't worth it) but faction credits are not. So gil being there really makes the normal items that npc have seem accessible and from an RP stand point your not living hand to mouth (I don't rp in FFXIV I am just going by my DnD days).

Now it is possible that Choco might have a set rental fee for such and such time, but they could be like taxis they stay until you are done with them or your money is gone charging you at set intervals. Which could easily clear you out. So I don't think there is a need for gil sink yet as players are happy to help you detach from your money. But the repair npc will have long lasting effects especially if some gear comes into existence that require rare drops to get. And there is the use of large scale requirements you get from the npcs. I am unsure if there is anything above common but they could put you through the ringer with the higher versions of forges, tannery, ect. Also if they add the secondary retainer at gil per day, or require retainers to use up gil to up level (Which as we have no idea why they even have levels yet) or retain level.

So its not that the game is devoid of them, but it seems like need isn't there as of yet. And if that is bad planning then I think Layer Cake put it best

"But this is now, so until prohibition ends make hay while the sun shines."

[Yygdrasil]

Re: Gil Sinks?

I don't want my retainer to level up... she says mean things to me... I want her to stay squishy so she can never beat me. Her words hurt enough.

[Aeni]

Re: Gil Sinks?

So its not that the game is devoid of them, but it seems like need isn't there as of yet. And if that is bad planning then I think Layer Cake put it best

"But this is now, so until prohibition ends make hay while the sun shines."

I agree with you on all of your points. There isn't a whole lot of gil and there's no cause for alarm just yet. Initially, a few people were cheating the system with gil exploits and then there were some con artists using time-tested techniques to part gil from fools. The game is nearing it's 3rd month and so many players have adjusted accordingly. Now that people are a bit more smarter they become less irrational with buying decisions. I noticed that many retainers now just sit stagnate with high level gear and people who raced to the top are paying for it by sitting idly and grinding away leves (and complaining the loudest about the 36hr cooldown) for cash.

Also crystal and shard prices have shot up and whether or not you agree with this trend the fact remains that people are beginning to see the worth of such materials. Basically the difficulty curve has caught up and players who were enjoying the further end of the curve are now receiving the backlash. Such is the harsh realities of an economy that is trying to get back to a more stable and rational place.

I've always advocated patience and for people to just save their gil up and not make irrational purchasing decisions. I also abstained from the "feeding frenzy" of fellow crafters and tried to rationally price my own goods relative to the materials on hand as opposed to just "sensing" the general level of inflation. As materials continue to fall in price, I try to match that trend, by pricing down my goods. Sure, I could be "smarter" and rake other players over coal and sending them to bankruptcy, but for what? In the end, you need to deal with these players down the road, either in end game activity or some crafting relationship. It's better not to burn bridges before you've even built them.

[Dux]

Re: Gil Sinks?

... as you start to go up in ranks the amount of control necessary to remain stable in your craft starts to be a minimum requirement. If you solely rely on outranking a recipe to see success then you should check out the other thread in which I discovered that outranking a recipe by too much can also spell disaster.

I would be very interested to see any data behind this, specifically the relationship between control<->synthesis stability and craftsmanship<->HQ success. Purely from personal experience I have noticed no significant change in crafting conditions since level 1 apart from the very occasional instability of an element, which is usually fixed by 3 consequtive waits (6 durability loss).

[Yygdrasil]

Re: Gil Sinks?

At lease on Selbina, I can attest that the prices of shards/crystals have actually gone DOWN. They used to be 300-500 per unit (lol... unit) and now they're hovering around 150-200 (200 mainly for Wind). As for crystals, they were around 4000-5000 per unit (rofl... it doesn't get old) and now its coming to a rest at closer to 2000-3000 (3000 being more for Fire). I'm happy with the changes and have taken it upon myself to dump nearly 500k into buying a stack of each shard to use/resell later if the market goes back up. Either way, if they take another dip in price, it's not as though they won't do to good use in my own crafting, but if prices go up, I could turn a profit. It's one of those no-risk investments... the way Echo Drops were in FFXI. If you profit, great... if you don't, your mage-class will undoubtedly use them eventually.

Either way... time will tell.

[Aeni]

Re: Gil Sinks?

which is usually fixed by 3 consequtive waits (6 durability loss).

I can tell you from fact that this is not the case with elemental instability. I once tried it out when an elemental instability occurred and kept waiting. Using your abilities refresh the durability loss timer with wait (i.e., it goes back to 1) I went all the way from 66 to 0 (and breakage) with the instability going on strong after using 2 abilities.

But the stability I'm talking about is both failures from synthesis and the durability loss. Control handles these two quite effectively, while magic craftsmanship and craftsmanship I think both handle the quality gains from success and increased chances of HQ. SE already stated that both magic craftsmanship and craftsmanship are one in the same, just that each one affect different recipes as the recipes (apparently) are segregated into either normal or magical types.