Crafting - If I knew then what I know now

memworld

With the R&D event soon to be ready, I'd like to poll the people who have been grinding away at this since day 1. What would you recommend people do if they are starting out this weekend. And more importantly what should they avoid.

If I knew Cryptic was going to kill our ability to post more than one 20 hour project in the same field, I would not have giving each of my 8 toons a specialty to research.

For me I think this weekend is going to be about grinding STF's for mats. Don't see anything else that would be more beneficial.

garaks31

i would like to know which class should be first max level ?

rodentmaster

garaks31 wrote: »

i would like to know which class should be first max level ?

Depends on what you want to craft most. If you're looking for beam weapons for your ship? Or DHCs? Or warp cores? Look at what you want out of it, and then focus on that catogory to work towards your end-goal.

memworld

I agree. Figure out what you need and plan for going down that category.

ankokuneko

I would actually suggest to find which trait you want and aim for that on your main, then get an alt and just do the 20h projects for the items you need

redvenge

garaks31 wrote: »

i would like to know which class should be first max level ?

Currently, I recommend to most people that they should get one character to level 5 in Ground Equipment. Having 10% chance to ignore 100% of your target's personal shields is sexy. Also, giving my Elachi weapons a second chance to bypass shields is tasty goodness.

memworld

redvenge wrote: »

Currently, I recommend to most people that they should get one character to level 5 in Ground Equipment. Having 10% chance to ignore 100% of your target's personal shields is sexy. Also, giving my Elachi weapons a second chance to bypass shields is tasty goodness.

That is a very nice piece of advice. Thanks.

centaurianalpha

It appears that the consumption of materials for equipment components has very little to do with the rated rarity of the materials. I don't know whether to call this a bug, or naked greed on Cryptic's part, but it stands to reason that a "common" material would be used in higher proportion than a "rare" material. However, the "recipes" for components seem to be heavily weighted to the uncommon & rare types, and the quantities consumed also seem exceesive for the given item.

I'll have to post an update when I record more specific ratios for exact components, but one component I carfted last night used 2 uncommon & 4 rare materials (no commons) to produce a rare component. It seems to me that given how few rare material drops are encountered in missions, that the projects would not require so much rare material to build, or at least would use a much greater quantity of commons.

I can accept that some items will need greater amounts of rare materials, but to not use commons at all is illogical. My R&D storage will soon contain nothing but commons, because they are so seldom used for the recipes... :mad:

memworld

centaurianalpha wrote: »

It appears that the consumption of materials for equipment components has very little to do with the rated rarity of the materials. I don't know whether to call this a bug, or naked greed on Cryptic's part, but it stands to reason that a "common" material would be used in higher proportion than a "rare" material. However, the "recipes" for components seem to be heavily weighted to the uncommon & rare types, and the quantities consumed also seem exceesive for the given item.

I'll have to post an update when I record more specific ratios for exact components, but one component I carfted last night used 2 uncommon & 4 rare materials (no commons) to produce a rare component. It seems to me that given how few rare material drops are encountered in missions, that the projects would not require so much rare material to build, or at least would use a much greater quantity of commons.

I can accept that some items will need greater amounts of rare materials, but to not use commons at all is illogical. My R&D storage will soon contain nothing but commons, because they are so seldom used for the recipes... :mad:

I did start coming across this issue as well. I have been farming as fast I can, but I can see my consumption of rares is far outstripping my ability to find them. At some point I will have to stop crafting and just wait for the right mats to come in from the proper locations.

mightybobcnc

You should not be consuming rares during leveling. Craft mk VI gear that only consumes commons and uncommons. You can easily get 2-3 slots unlocked to craft 2-3 pieces of VI gear per hour which will give you more XP than doing the 20 hour projects. Then kick off the 20s when you're done for the day or have to go to sleep or whatever. It will take no time at all to get 3 schools to level 5 and unlock all but 1 of the R&D slots.

stofsk

If I knew Cryptic was going to prevent slotting more than one 20hr upgrade project for every school I would have had each one of my characters specialise in a single school each. Given I have 8 characters that would have meant I'd be level 9 by now in all of them.

ddesjardins

mightybobcnc wrote: »

You should not be consuming rares during leveling. Craft mk VI gear that only consumes commons and uncommons. You can easily get 2-3 slots unlocked to craft 2-3 pieces of VI gear per hour which will give you more XP than doing the 20 hour projects. Then kick off the 20s when you're done for the day or have to go to sleep or whatever. It will take no time at all to get 3 schools to level 5 and unlock all but 1 of the R&D slots.

Great advice

memworld

You should not be consuming rares during leveling. Craft mk VI gear that only consumes commons and uncommons. You can easily get 2-3 slots unlocked to craft 2-3 pieces of VI gear per hour which will give you more XP than doing the 20 hour projects. Then kick off the 20s when you're done for the day or have to go to sleep or whatever. It will take no time at all to get 3 schools to level 5 and unlock all but 1 of the R&D slots.
Yesterday 12:57 PM

ddesjardins wrote: »

Great advice

I'm with ddesjardins here. This is a great piece of advice. Right now, you are getting 900 xp for every VI piece you produce. It will take each of those projects an hour or about 2 or 3 STF's (more probably for all you monster players).

Thanks for that tidbit mightybobcnc.

@stofsk - I feel the same way. I did use this weekend to start one school on each of my alts. And I have to say it's moving along pretty well. However, I am wasting a bunch of resources in the short term.

memworld

Move your refined dilithium to the exchange. This will prevent you from accidentally hitting the complete now button and losing some of the hard earned dil. Just make sure you post a bid for a really low price, otherwise you will find yourself with more zen.

sussethrai

I just blew through half a mil of hoarded dil in an ill-considered attempt to get one character leveled in one school. Despite the 'crafting weekend' bonuses and the fact that I had been running 20 hour projects daily in this one area, I started at level 7 and just cracked level 14 after flushing most of my refined dilithium into finishing the projects immediately. I have only myself to blame, but I really wanted to be able to build useful things for my fleet, and still haven't gotten to that point. This was a bad investment. Even cautious people can get sucked into Cryptic's shell game.

pottsey5g

Crafting MK X items seem to be the most efficient way to level up. Not the fastest mind you.

memworld

sussethrai wrote: »

I just blew through half a mil of hoarded dil in an ill-considered attempt to get one character leveled in one school. Despite the 'crafting weekend' bonuses and the fact that I had been running 20 hour projects daily in this one area, I started at level 7 and just cracked level 14 after flushing most of my refined dilithium into finishing the projects immediately. I have only myself to blame, but I really wanted to be able to build useful things for my fleet, and still haven't gotten to that point. This was a bad investment. Even cautious people can get sucked into Cryptic's shell game.

Sorry to hear that. I've been running dual level VI projects all day, while trying to catch up rep and STF grinding. I as starting to think about using some dil, but now you talked me out of it. Thanks.

@pottsey5g Mark X's keep you from having to come back every hour to craft. But the resources needed compared to the Mark VI's are substantial. Of course if you have the rare resources, might as well use them, right?

pottsey5g

I found the MK X dirt cheap to craft as they only use the cheap resources. No spending 600k+ to craft one item. Ok I had to spend a few 100k buying stacks of 40 resources. But on the whole it’s not that bad. The price to craft only gets bad at Mk XI and higher in my mind.

memworld

pottsey5g wrote: »

I found the MK X dirt cheap to craft as they only use the cheap resources. No spending 600k+ to craft one item. Ok I had to spend a few 100k buying stacks of 40 resources. But on the whole it’s not that bad. The price to craft only gets bad at Mk XI and higher in my mind.

I'm going to try it tonight, see what it costs. Thanks.

I like the three hour window, but the time involved to get the rare mats is too long for me. If you have the mats either from stf's or buying from exchange, then this is a viable option. Otherwise it's much easier to get the resources for the tier VI's.