So, you want to be a Leather Crafter? - Leathercraft 101

[iglak]

how often would you say dhalmel leathers fail at lvl 11 crafting?
what if i craft them on the field at that level? (no image support)

[Brennon]

without image support, you'll fail most of the time. it won't be worth it to craft without support out in the field until at least, i'd guess lvl 16 or so. To be honest though, i havn't done much crafting without support, so i don't really know how much of a difference it would make.

[Foxion]

omg .. i lost about 40-70k and i'm only lvl 10

[imstimpy]

Told ya

I attempted dhalmel leathers at 13 without image support. I succeeded on one and failed on two. This was done on darksday. From then on I used adv synth support up until lv18. I still failed a decent amount even with the synth support, but losses were minimal. Post 18 I synthed the leathers without support just fine.

[X Launcher]

I'd like to offer an alternative for 11-17 skill range. Lizard Cesti. The formula is 1 Earth Crystal + 1 Cesti + 1 Lizard Skin. It's really nice as you can buy Cesti for something like 153 from the NPCs at weapon shops. That, and they sell for a nice profit at 1k apiece. So, it's like 7k spent for a stack of skins and 12k earned for a profit of about 4k once you factor in the Cestis.

Plus, they usually sell in bulk. Probably the people skilling off of Himantes. Only real problem is that selling them takes up space on the AH. Not too big a problem if you have a mule in Sandy.

I love the guide!

[Klash]

i havnet messed around with leatherworking to much, im only level 1.5. should i stick to making rabbit mantles or sheep wool? i cant buy from the guild yet i dunno why. which gives the most experience(if theres a difference) and which is the most useful?

[imstimpy]

I've now made lv24 leathercrafting. My progression from lv21-24 is as follows:

Leather Ring 21-22
12x Dhalmel leathers = 11000 gil
12x Wind crystals = 2000 gil
Cost = 13000 gil per 12 synths
= 1100 gil per synth
Return:
NPC = ???
AH = 150-200 gil

This recipe may seem horrid, but it isn't. You can either make your dhalmel leathers, or buy a cheap stack at the AH. You then craft all your leather rings until lv22 where they cap. Now buy a stack of lightning crystals and desynth them all back to dhalmel leathers. I probably had a 60-70% success of this desynth and I was only at cap. This was more of an excercise in desynth than anything. I then sold my dhalmel leathers back as singles for 1700 gil each. Minimal failures without synth support.

Chocobo Gloves 22-23
12x Cotton Cloth = 7000 gil
12x Dhalmel leathers = 11000 gil
12x Lizard Skins = 7000 gil
12x Earth crystals = 500 gil
Cost = 25500 per 12 synths
= 2100 gil per synth
Return:
NPC = 600 gil
AH = 2500-3000 gil

This requires a bit of capital to level on, but if you have the patience you can break even or even turn a profit on them. They sell slowly at the AH, so be forewarned. Minimal failures without synth support.

[EDIT] Chocobo gloves are a VERY slow seller to the tune of 5 or so per month. They are probably not the best recipe.

Sandals 23-24
12x Sheep leathers = 7000 gil
12x Dhalmel leathers = 11000 gil
12x Wind crystals = 2000 gil
Cost = 1200 gil per synth
Return:
NPC = 841
AH = 900 gil

People have said these are horrible, but they were a better synth than the dhalmel mantles. I leveled these at a loss of 200-300 gil per synth whereas the dhalmel mantles were a loss of 700 gil per synth. I crafted 13 of these on earthsday, lost one, had one .2, eight .1 skill ups, and the rest were successes. If you +1 the desynth, you will get your dhalmel leather back; I don't know how easy the desynth is to succeed.

My next step will be Parchment from 24-27 and then cap out the ram leathers.

[imstimpy]

Parchment 24-27
12x Sheep leathers = 7000 gil
12x Rolanberry = 1900 gil
12x Wind crystals = 1900 gil
Cost = 10800 per 12 synths
= 900 gil per synth
Return:
NPC = ~100 gil
AH = 900-1000 gil

This allowed good skillups and a full return on synthesis. They can be sold back in Jeuno for the BRD quest, or sold back in any of the three nations for wood workers. I ended up with 4 stacks of Parchment after I was done skilling.

Ram leather 28-35
12x Ram hide = 7200 gil
12x Distilled water = 110 gil
12x Windurstean tea leaves = 230 gil
12x Dark crystals = 2300 gil
Cost = 10,000 gil per 12 synths
= 900 gil per synth
Return:
NPC = ???
AH = 1200-2000 gil

It is a leather recipe, it is good . It is also plagued by a lack of supply at a good price, just like other leathers thus far. Farming for this one is definitely viable since the rams are on a 10 minute timer (I think) and turn in around 4 hides per kill.

I'm at 28.1 right now, and I have not synthed Ram Leathers yet. I'm waiting on a good supply of Ram Hides before I get going on it. They are stuck at 600-700 gil with minimal supply right now. I was also busy doing M6-1 and M6-2 ^^.

[Brennon]

I was frustrated by the lack of ram leathers at this point too. I went and hunted rams, since i needed the horns, for the purple belt quest, but also found the other people hunting rams and bought all the hides i could carry off them, and also they aggreed to bring them back to town with them and sell to me directly.

[imstimpy]

Waistbelt 35-43
12x Grass Thread = 1,100 gil
12x Ram leathers = 15,000 gil
12x Ram leathers = 15,000 gil
12x Wind crystals = 1,900 gil
Cost = 33,000 per 12 synths
= 2,800 gil per synth
Return:
NPC = 1,863 gil
AH = 3,000 gil

If you buy everything outright, then you are losing 1,000 gil per synth.

Alternatively, synth all your Ram leathers for this recipe. If you kept the Ram leathers you synthed up to lv35, then you should have 5-6 stacks all ready to go:

Waistbelt 35-43
12x Grass Thread = 1,100 gil
12x Ram leathers = 11,000 gil
12x Ram leathers = 11,000 gil
12x Wind crystals = 1,900 gil
Cost = 25,000 per 12 synths
= 2,100 gil per synth
NPC = 1,863 gil
AH = 3,000 gil.

I started with 5+ stacks of Ram leathers and after 1.8 levels (lv36.9), I am down to around 2 stacks left. The synths that require 2x of anything really eat up materials quickly. At lv35, I failed almost every synth and skillups didn't come as often as I would have liked. At lv36, failures have been reduced but are still prominent; I received more skillups at this level with some .2. I hear that lv37 marks the end of most failures. These do sell at the AH, however they only appear to sell to other crafters; possibly very high levels trying to HQ2 the belts but more likely those synthing Corsettes. As such, they are not sold very often.

Hard to get started on, but you are nearly synthing at a loss of just the crystal.

[imstimpy]

Ram Mantle 43-49
12x Ice Crystals = 1,000 gil
12x Ram Hides = 6,000 gil
12x Wool Thread = 18,000 gil
Cost = 25,000 per 12 synths
= 2,100 gil per synth
Return:
NPC = 1,012 gil
AH = 900 gil

This is a painful recipe to synth. Sadly, this is the best option on my server. It sells back to the NPC for more than the AH, however. If you decide to desynth the mantle, a normal desynth will get you back the Ram Hide (net loss of 1,600 gil) and an HQ desynth will get you back the Wool Thread (net loss of 700 gil). I haven't tried desynthing, but chances are you will lose more money desynthing that if you just took the 1,000 gil loss by selling to the NPC.

I synthed these on Windsday and got one .1, five .2, and two successes with no skillups. This has put me up to 44.1.

[Sirch]

Can I get to the point where I can make Ram Leather with 250k?

[Truce]

Well, I started Leatherworking a couple of weeks ago with this guide and have achieved level 68 so far. I'd say I probably started with around 1.1 million gil and I had about 220K left. However with all the items I still have to sell some of which I'm holding for later synths, such as coeurl jerkins, I have about 550K. However, since I was holding some of the items I camped VE twice and sold two pins . So now my net gil is back up around 1.1 mil. Anyways, it cost a good bit to get here and finding enough coeurl hides to craft with from 65-71 is hard and expensive. Especially since, on my server, Coeurl leathers do not sell well at all. I was just going to suggest, I don't know what options are out there, that you may want to craft something other than coeurl leathers for skill up at this point. Unless you have the gil and the plan to craft Coeurl jerkins in the relatively near future you may want to choose anothe route. I got from 0-62 in about a week and after that things have slowed down quite a bit for me. I do hope to hit 70+ by the of the weekend though.

And to the original poster~ Great post, it has helped me a lot in crafting for minimal loss.

Also Dhalmel mantles were a pain to level off of as well, but the guild wanted them for guild points and my mule sold many in Bastok so they didn't last too long.

Anyways goodluck to all you future leather crafters. I hope to be around lvl 90 by the end of next week.

[Truce]

Hey me again. To the person who wanted to know if they could get to the point of Ram Leathers with 250K... I'm not exactly sure. I think it might take you pretty close but not quite that far. It's hard for me to say because I don't remember when I started spending all my gil.

P.S. I got lvl 74 by the end of Sunday.... I hope I can get 85-90 this week.

[Eabe]

nice guide, helped me get from 0-4 in 1 night made a few thousand k too, not bad