Economy SpeculationFollow

This is a hard question to answer. If you look at the gear you get for quests and lv15+ dungeons, crafting(equipment and consumables) really isn't that big of a deal. Some people will point how you can use spiritbonds from gear into materia slots. While I see that argument, it appears that gear obtained from doing 4 man, 8 man, and higher groups will have superior gear that doesn't have a cost attached to it. Some will say that you need people to fix gear and even that's not true as npc's can do that already for a nominal fee. Duty Finder makes it easier than ever for FFXIV players to get gear without using gil. Crafting is quite enjoyable and painless to do. I don't see much reason for people not to craft this time around.

So if I can honestly answer your question; I'd have to say that the economy is less important than other games people might of played in the past. The focus is on having fun with friends and raiding for uber loot. The few money sinks the game has is barely worth mentioning. Chocobo rentals, dye supplies, crafting supplies, and teleporting to crags hardly calls for an economy where you need to work a second job like Eve Online just to keep enough gold on hand to pay for those things.

I don't think the economy will be an issue nor do I feel RMT will be a threat.

Thanks for the heads-up. And yeah, I like the implementation as well. It may invalidate the "BiS" concept, or at least render it much less vital, as you won't be able to mindlessly push 1/2 stats in any/all augmentation of your gear. Balancing main stat, crit rating, accuracy, determination, skill/cast speed etc. will make many combinations worthwhile. Plus, while the vertical progression for gear is technically there, as you say the stat boost from moving from an ilvl60 to an ilvl65 item won't turn the game into ezymode.

And for the above other comments comparing dungeon to crafted gear - while crafted HQ gear may not have the raw power stat-wise of dungeon gear (and, let's face it - we are speculating about gear strength for 50 crafted vs. 8man vs. 24man content anyway), it is far more customisable via the materia system. If the DoW DD gear (MNK/DRG stuff) from 50 dungeons is crit-heavy, working some crafted pieces with accuracy & determination stats + materia boosts may well be useful.

In summary - the game won't revolve around the economy - clearly. But with the constant destruction of gear to feed the materia system (and overclocking newly acquired gear will chew though materia), and utilised gear being unsellable between players, every profession is effectively creating consumables - just "to be consumed" over varying lengths of time. And previous MMO experience tells us that consumable professions tend to have the greatest longevity.

They are pretty much your city-slaves.

Anybody who spends a decent amount of time crafting will be able to make more money than they need selling in the market even at sub-standard pricing. High quality items are not hard to make, and materia sells well and pretty much falls in your lap as you spiritbond anyway.

All a retainer is for is so you can sell items in the market and to hold your overflow items, but you can only sell in one city at a time which seems unnecessarily restrictive. Although I can see it would be advantageous to focus your items on the city where the jobs that use those items reside.

Sure the high level high quality items should fetch good money as there are less and less people crafting that high, but with all the easy ways to make money, all the nice drops you can't sell anyway, and the fact that selling a good item you may not need for 100 gil is still a lot better than selling it for 1 gil - the question is why is the economy even relevant? It seems they've done so much to stifle RMT that they've essentially made money into the proverbial 'no object'.

That was my assessment as well. It's so strange for me since I'm switching from FFXI to FFXIV. I remember the high ticket craftable items like the Scorpion Harness and the Hauby that used to cost millions simply because SE limited the materials required to make them. Although despite the gear that binds on your character, it's like the game keeps throwing gear at you without even trying so it doesn't matter. Consumables of arrows/bullets/ninja tools were costly in FFXI, but I don't see any consumables in FFXIV that break the bank. I have this feeling that craftable gear will primarily be sold to players that don't wish to do the hardcore endgame content like the Crystal Tower or the Bahamut fights. People say we'll still have RMT, but that begs the question, who is buying gil and why would they. Unless SE follows the same game-plan from FFXI's relic weapons, I don't see any use at all for buying gil no matter how casual you are.

This is an awesome thread. I've been out of the loop for a while so there is lots of good info in here. I don't really understand how creating materia works... Maybe someone can clear this up for me. As I understand it, you have to wear gear, do stuff with it on, then eventually it's spiritbond will reach 100%. Once this happens you can create a piece of random materia by destroying this gear? So... to create high level materia you have to wear high level gear then destroy it... How long does it take to get spiritbond to 100%? Does this mean that people will be wearing gear they don't actually like just to "farm" materia? I don't like the sound of that.

Edited, Jul 31st 2013 12:08am by ScrapTower

So my initial interpretation was correct. They've created a system that requires grinding in sub-optimal gear to farm materia. I'm not sure I like that.

I like that spiritbonding made armor essentially a consumable which keeps crafting profitable, however I didn't know what spiritbonding actually did until today.

Edited, Jul 31st 2013 12:51am by ScrapTower

Then don't worry about making your own materia if it upsets you that much. Just buy the materia and move along if it doesn't interest you; not all aspects of the game will (and that's just a fact towards everyone).

The fodder out in the world is easily killed relatively brainlessly with quested items and crafted ones are usually a slight step up above that. It isn't like you're taking off all of your God gear from sky and trying to go solo weapons in the palace with vendor gear.

Gotta remember that doing instances is not hte only way to spiritbind gear. Fates and leves and even gathering/crafting help this. Do you really need to farm fates in your best of the best gear? I wouldent even if the process was changed due to repair costs. I like to keep my good gear rdy for instances.

Plus once you spiritbind and break the gear to materia there is no reason to repair it heh. so its a win win.

GC Leves for marks and GC Hunting Log. FATEs for marks if they still give em out on release and possibly gear for "endgame-style" FATEs. Also good for messing with your battle rotations to try and improve your own performance.

Edited, Jul 31st 2013 10:31am by BartelX

This has turned into a fascinating thread. I've been wondering myself if I should level gathering classes (Botany and Miner first) to 50 before tackling crafting. I wouldn't have to break up what I'm doing for the sake of gathering mats. In the beta I noticed a lot of people /shouting for mats like elm/yew logs which are around level ~16-20 Botany. The HQ versions sold pretty well for me on the Market Wards. For those people who can't stand gathering, there is a profit to be made with selling leftover materials. The lesson to take away from here is to make a profit by putting in work that others can't be bothered to do. Selling crystals/shards/materia/catalysts/spiritbond gear/high level mats will be profitable enough.

I consider that a good thing. I crafted in FFXI but what a giant pain it was... it seemed like unless you were a high-level goldsmith you were not really making good money.

I was 100+6 on Woodworking and could barely break even on Demon Arrows unless I made my own arrowheads.

It will be refreshing to play a game where the economy is not so messed up and favors only a few players.

I'm actually considering doing Alchemy and Leatherworking so I can work on my own armor and make potions and materia for sale.

I agree. In XI my main source of income was gardening. I leveled Cooking to 75ish and it was a colossal pain. After that I was able to make decent gil but nowhere close to as much as I made gardening. My 1.0 character has all crafting/gathering jobs except Fisher, Culinarian and Alchemist in the 20s so I should be in a good place to support myself at launch.