Farmable Trade Skills

[Nephyr Silverhand]

Ok, I want to work on my tradeskills, I am getting tired of the normal leveling grind. What I wanted to ask, is in your opinions, what tradeskills are all/mostly all farmable to skill up? I would much prefer to farm things then to buy from vendors...

[crystilla]

Hands down, Tailoring is farmable from start to finish (everything from spider silks to various hides to the metals used-velium/acrylia, etc.). Some smithing and fletchery as well depending what routes you take for skilling up (as they both use metals).

- Brewers can hit 248 from vendor bought items.
- Bakers can hit around 200 from the vendor; after that it requires farming/foraging.
- Jewelrycraft can hit 250 from vendor bought items.
- Pottery is mostly vendor bought (with very minimal farming needed and basically on the higher end).

[Androsulach]

For pottery, you can farm clay in the Gorge, since most types drop from the Muddites. I know, I've farmed up there, but most clay is easy enough to get from vendors.

Most of your top end skill ingredients for smithing will require drops, the same with fletching with a mix of vendor bought supplies. Tailoring, by far, is the most farmed, since aside from threads and ribbons, it's mostly mob drops, unless you go vendor mining. JC can be farmed, which will cut down on the cost since you'll mostly just be buying bars. The higher end gems, though, will have you hunting in 50+ zones. You'll find that you will have to buy some components, but you can find recipes that use drops at most skill levels. Most of the 200+ recipes will use a drop of some sort.

Crystilla's right about brewing. It's almost entirely vendor bought. But you'll want to make the investment and it's not that expensive to get to 200 skill. You'll want it that high for temper and tanning creation, depending on which of smithing or tailoring you get skilled enough at to need tempers and tanning solutions. Oh, I almost forgot that combination of fishing and baking. Sure, you'll have to buy ingredients, but you can increase both fishing and baking with the modest investment in bait and a couple poles. I know that if you have GoD, fishing in Abysmal can take you to 200 skill easy enough just on fishing tuna and crabs, processing the meat, and then baking it all.

[Footsore]

It's been pretty much covered here, but just to say it a different way.

If you are implying you WANT to farm and you WANT to exclusively tradeskill for a while:

Tailoring MUST be farmed. Either by you or someone you buy from. That is to say tailoring REQUIRES dropped items to skill up at every stage.

You can get to 202 fletching rather cheaply from vendor purchased supplies, but then you will probably WANT to use mob drops if you are cost conscious. Farming is fairly simple – condensed substance in Shadeweavers and Acrylia ore in Grimling. (Note: fairly simple = mind numbing.) Acrylia arrows will get you all the way to 250.

Smithing to 188 is cheaply done from vendor purchases. Then farming velium will get you to 222 making enchanted velium bits. Then farm your heart out for windstones, essence of wind and acrylia, for example, to get to 250.

If you are new to tradeskilling, I would highly recommend you start with one that can be vendor purchased to a fairly high level (i.e., fletching or smithing). If you get that far and still haven't burned out, then you are a candidate for farming ingredients for the rest of the way.

You may find however, that you will find more enjoyment mixing xp with collecting tradeskill materials, rather than one or the other exclusively. This is my chosen path and I can say that though I haven't mastered either I'm still happily trudging along.

[Silverfish]

A Few Corrections

Footsore wrote:

"Tailoring MUST be farmed. Either by you or someone you buy from. That is to say tailoring REQUIRES dropped items to skill up at every stage."

True only after a certain level. One can go to 54 doing the tailoring quest on board the Queen of Thorns, and then woven mandrake to 66, and then picnic baskets to 76. After that, it's wise to go for drops, but if you're truly trying to get tailoring up without farming, and you don't consider foraging to be farming, you can get to 187 (you'd be truly insane, but it can be done with foraged robe ribbon combines).

Footsore further wrote:

"Smithing to 188 is cheaply done from vendor purchases. Then farming velium will get you to 222 making enchanted velium bits. Then farm your heart out for windstones, essence of wind and acrylia, for example, to get to 250."

I'm glad this isn't true, since I've made decent profit from leather padding, which is not vendor-buyable and so must be farmed. I believe 158 (162 for Halflings and possibly for other cultures) is the top for vendor-only smithing. After that, fine steel, and then LDoN armor. After 209 or so, enchanted velium bits are my choice too, but then if you're going to farm, why not just farm for shadowscream components, especially if you're on a budget? Acrylia armor is expensive to make, and takes almost as much farming as shadowscream.

Beyond these two things, I'm with you all the way. Try something that can be raised quite a bit in front of a vendor, and if it doesn't drive you away from tradeskills, then you can dive in on others.

SIlverfish

[mewkus]

Karana Worshipers can buy their way to 188 via steel arrowheads. It is also possible to buy your way to 250 (with a uberload of plat albeit) via the Mistletoe Cutting Sickle The blades for which can also be a viable method of skilling up to 183 (at 26ish pp per attempt). Only non pp thing you'd need is a Tunarian druid/cleric to imbue emeralds for ya.

[escotor]

Actually, the blades for the cutting sickle require 2 emeralds that cost 13.5 pp each (one unimbued and an imbued one for the Blessed Dust of Tunare) as well as a mold costing 4 pp and a couple of Celestial Essence costing 2 pp each with vendored components and 1 pp for the sheet metal (also vendor bought) which brings the total to at least 36 pp per combine. Unless there's a decent sellback to players for the blades, you're looking at worse losses than simply buying padding for fine steel in the baz at 20 pp a pop (even less if you farm your own padding) since you get a good deal back on the sellback of successful plate combines.

Zeralenn's Guide is your friend!