Guild Wars 2

just thought i would post what is probably common knowledge. or maybe people will have ideas. i have 6 characters ranging from level 58 to 5. what i have noticed is that the drop rate of blood vials etc, really prevents you from leveling more than one craft as you level up. i guess i mean the crafts other than cooking and jewelcrafting, as they are kind of their own thing and actually not too bad to level up.

and i am not rushing by any means. i do my best to work on all maps of each level for my main character before i move on. but if i am armorsmith/weaponsmit or leatherworker/huntsman or pretty much any combo like that, there is not chance i can see in normal gameplay to level up two such crafts. you just wont find all the blood vials, venom sacks etc, to keep both going.

and i use discovery almost exclusively to level up crafting. i find that i struggle to just keep my armorsmithing going while ignoring everything else (it is almost 225 now). it would be great if the formulas and/or drop rates could start being adjusted so it would be feasible for a character to level two crafts while leveling up at a normal rate.

Do an extra zone or use the silver you’ve been getting from farming those hearts.

I did an extra 1-15 and an extra 15-25 zone and after that I was able to make LW stuff above my level and dump all the wood/metal into huntsman.

i have been doing all the zones i can find, still not enough for the blood etc. cloth and ore i have enough

You’re right. It is basically impossible to level an armor profession and a weapon profession at the same time without going bankrupt. (The only exception is artifacing but that’s because you can level it by making potions instead of making weapons.)

Unless cooking or jewelcrafting is your second, you can expect to wait until 80 (or an alt) to level a second craft.

It’s definitely doable. It’s not meant to be ridiculously easy though either. My main is currently level 56 and I have both Weaponsmith and Armorsmith past the 225 mark, somewhere around 230-235. In all I’ve spent about 15 silver on a few blood mats on the trading post, I’m currently sitting at about 12 gold.

Did I have to go out and specifically farm for some Fine crafting materials? Sure did.

My recommendation – go out and find a spot to farm. If you’re after Vials of Blood, I usually find a high density area of skale mobs to kill. Farm for about 30 minutes or so. If you find your drop rate decrease significantly, take a break. Do something else, farm in a different place, hop on an alt, etc. Then go back and do it again later.

It’s very doable, just takes some time. While leveling I did Weaponsmithing and Jeweler at the same time. Now I wont say it wasn’t frustrating at times with all the additional farming I had to do but then again this was before they got the TP up and running.

My suggestion would be to go into multiple area’s where the material you are looking for it located. This way you dont feel like you are running the endless hamster wheel and get additional exp for exploration.

Also if push comes to shove, buy some mats off the TP. Most material isnt that expensive atm so a few S here and there shouldnt be too bad.

I can’t even finish ONE… spent two weeks farming level 25-35 areas and still haven’t gotten enough fine materials to complete all the discoveries for the second tier of artificer (which only has FOUR different items – scepter, focus, staff and trident – far less than weapon, huntsman or any of the armoring crafts)… although I DID finally gain enough xp to skip this and start working on tier 3 finally.

All of my coin was going into new gear or the Mystic Forge requirements for my other profession (cook) so I really couldn’t justify spending 10-15s on the TP for materials needed for one item I’d sell at a loss.

@Barghaest for artificing you only need about 30 of ~3 different fine mats to get up to the next tier, since you can do all discoveries for scepter/focus and only masterwork for staff, after which you mix a bunch of potions in your discovery panel.

Yeah, it’s tricky to get all the materials you need but crafting takes a little bit of dedication, farming or downright cash in any game. I find that in this game the costs are actually pretty low to get to 375 (near-max).

1. Gather what you need.
2. Gather what you do not need.
3. Sell what you do not need.
4. Buy what you do need.

Crafting the Rare recipes are worth a T O N of xp. And a T O N more if you use a crafting boost.

If you try to farm all the mats required for discovering every recipe for each craft, yes, it will take you a very, very long time. If instead, you chase events and follow Echo’s advice, you can level up with relative ease. There are a number of effective guides available, but the strategy is the same, for each 75 ranks:

• Create a set or two of upgrade items (insignia/inscriptions).
• Discover the recipe for the set (e.g. one of each armor or weapon type or one of each upgrade applied to same piece, e.g. a few types of gloves).
• Refine a stack of the appropriate mat(s) as soon as you can.
• Repeat.

There are variations and you can do more discovery or craft tons of one item that grants experience instead of discovering. This also allows you to avoid need to gather 100s of the same fine material.

Also: keep an eye out on the TP for which items for the next rank are cheap and invest in those before you need them, i.e. put in a WTS custom order — that saves you a lot of coin.

You also get a (small) free crafting boost from Power of the Mists, which will be best on Fridays before the WvW match up change.

In other words, it’s possible to manage eight crafts (especially spread across four toons).

I think the problem of not being able to keep up with mats mostly affects players who are casual crafters who are just trying to make stuff at their own current level while mostly focusing on other aspects of the game. Hardcore crafters who make it their focus and spend hours upon hours analyzing the system to determine the quickest most efficient methods of leveling each crafting branch wont have problems. But if you just aporadically drop by a crafting station and blindly follow the most obvious path of making components, dropping em in the discovery panel and seeing what you get, you end up wasting so many mats that you are never gonna keep up with 2 craft branches that both use the same basic components. Personally, i just salvage everything i find and never sell a single drop I get unless it cant be salvaged or I actually intend to use it. My gold doesnt rise very fast, but if I pair either a weapon OR armor craft with Cooking/Jewling/ artifacing i can usually maintain a basically equivalent level crafting as my characters level. It really just depends on your style of play. But you cant make drop rates to high or those players who focus on crafting will use their uberstrategized crafting plans to mass produce stuff making crafting irrelevant for casual crafters since everything would end up being uber cheap in the trade post. Drop rates prolly need a lil bit of tweaking, but on the whole they are probably about where they need to be.

Its viable in the sense that if you are willing to take a lot of extra time just to kill stuff for compents and in turn level slower you can do it.

Its faster to complete one craft while leveling up then do the other at 80.

Artificing, cooking and jewelery are exceptions they are much cheaper to level..