Guild Wars 2

So I am relatively new to this game. I only started playing a week or so ago, and currently I am working on two characters: a lvl 39 engineer and a lvl 29 warrior.
I’ve been working on crafting on both of them for a total of 4 crafting professions all around level 125 or so. I’ve been reading the wiki, reading the forums and Andrew McLeod blog post on crafting itself…
My question is whether I am doing something wrong or if I am mistaken in thinking I can keep the level of gear I am crafting even with my characters level?
Gathering basic materials is no problem, but the fine and rare ones seem rather absurd… I seem to rapidly out level the area just trying kill enough to gather them and buying them on the market has left me too broke to buy the skill book I need for my trait points.
Should I give up on crafting until I am level 80 and then waste time making a bunch of junk I don’t want even though that seems to be the exact opposite of the intent of the games makers?
Also just reading about the mystic forge stuff depresses me.

Any guidance would be greatly appreciated.

you level up so fast in gw2 that you will not be able to keep up with your crafting lvl to get lvl appropriate gear at all times. unless you spend a lot of gold buying materials, which isnt worth it.

in 99% of the cases its cheaper to buy the items you want from the trading post compared to making the item yourself. the reason is that the finished product is cheaper on the trade post compared to the cost of the materials.

right now the only thing crafting is good for is when creating a legendary weapon or just to get achievement points, which do nothing.

very hard to do that even now. also focus on only one at a time as the mats crossover

No, levelling alongside crafting doesn’t really work very well. Especially when you get your crafting to level 375, you’ll either need some heavy farming or to use ~1.5g to get to 400. You’re not going to be able to do that alongside levelling.

If you PvE and roughly follow your level (and perhaps your story) you’ll find that you keep on getting gear at your level, and you shouldn’t really NEED to craft your gear. It’s a luxury. Heck, think of it as a minigame alongside the real game, where the reward is that you can make your own. But you’ll end up finding that farming the stuff you’d need for level 400 gear and then selling it, will make you enough money that you can then buy the gear on the trading post that you’d otherwise craft.

So, yeah, in short: Only farm for crafting, if you really want that master crafter title.

And you’re not the first person to have been wondering that either…

I only craft consumables, like food.

I bought some ingredients off the AH cheaper than their actual retail price … selling goods/items cheaper than their actual sale price to a merchant seems to be a norm.

Thanks

I have only one character. I’ve always loved crafting in WoW, so when I made my character in this game I decided to start crafting right away. As a mesmer, I went for tailoring and jewelcrafting. I leveled it a little ahead of my actual levels. So I always had the best gear I could get with each level. I found it to be really rewarding. The leveling gear you create with crafting is probably better than any thing you’ll find on monsters. That being said, I was also the poorest out of all my friends in game. But to me it was worth it.

I leveled crafting along with my main and I was totally broke until I figured this out:

Gather everything. sell the mats you don’t need, buy the ones you do.
buy only the cheapest fine materials and use discovery to make them count.

salvage all whites, vendor blues and greens for extra money.
anything higher see if it sells on the TP- if not vendor/ salvage.

map completion of an area gives you crafting mats.

I hope this helps you- I have managed to level all my crafts with my characters and I find it really rewarding.

try getting 1 to 80 first then you’ll be able to keep up(even get ahead of yourself). I’m lvling an alt right now and my crafting is constantly higher than what i can actually wear…

A few secrets (promise me not to tell anyone):

You only get the big boost on discovery once, so you only need to discover the insignias once. What often happens is that people make too many low level insignias, and then try to hock the excess ones on the trading post. So make a habit of farming mats for only one insignia and then check the TP for the cost of the rest. I found that saved me a lot of money and time, when I was leveling up my crafts.

Also: There’s a crafting booster out there – you know, one of those yellow ones you get in boxes and don’t know what to do with? If you can get them, they’re totally worth it.

I’d suggest leveling w/o crafting on your first char. Crafting is sort of like the rich man’s leveling system. If you want new gear, I’d suggest buying blues off the TP every 10 levels or so or, if you’re in a level appropriate area, heart vendors should have stuff you can buy with karma.
If you really want to level crafting, then do something like Armorsmithing/Chef or Tailor/Jewelcrafting. You want as few crossover mats as possible. You could do Jewelcrafting and Armorsmithing or Weaponsmithing, but you’d need to farm a lot of copper and mithril. I don’t think any of the other mats cross over.
Crafting boosters are your friend as well, if you’re lucky enough to get one.

It’s hard to craft if you’re doing multiple professions at the same rate since they all use the same rare/fine crafting materials (except cook and jewelry). I’d suggest focusing on armor and getting that up to the next tier. Also you can usually buy insignias and dowels on the trading post cheaper than it costs to buy the materials and make them yourself.