What to do, what to do...

[Occam]

Hi all...I use your site almost every EQ session, just never post.

I do almost all my tradeskilling on my 46 Wood Elf Druid. Here's what he has so far:

189 Baking
139 Tailoring
107 Blacksmithing
135 Brewing
023 Pottery

I just sold some stuff on my main, though, so I have about 14k in the bank. Rather than use it for some small upgrade in gear, I've decided to use most of it to kind of punch out of this mid-level stuff. The problem is, I'm not sure which way to go.

My goals are as follows: (not necessarily in order)
1- To GM any tradeskill. (Was going to do this with Baking just to say I did, but Ohabah Truffles haven't been kind to me yet)
2- To be able to make my own Tunarean Soldier armor while it's STILL AN UPGRADE.
3- To make money, either to put back in to tradeskilling, or just roll around in.

I've been doing a lot more Wu's (Tailoring was just barely over 100 until last night) to try to boost that, but I know it will run out not too long from now. Looking at the "EQ Tradeskill Companion" UI mod, it looks like Studded Acrylia is next...and Superb hides are expensive! Plus I doubt my druid could farm them, and my Paladin, though higher level, would probably not be very efficient at it.

To make a long post short (too late), what would you suggest I do? Just spend loads of money and get tailoring done? Spend less money on a different skill? It would still be cool to GM baking too...once I hit 51, all my AAs are going into NTCM. I've heard of people (non-enchanters) getting near 200 in JC for about 4k, and that's without enchanting metals. Smithing can be lucrative, I've heard, but I don't think there's a huge market for Wood Elf cultural smithing.

So...any tips? Experiences? Thanks for your help. :mrgreen:

[Tinile]

Well, if you decide to get 250 in a skill, just to have a 250 skill under your belt, choose brewing and not baking. Brewing is the easiest AND cheapest skill to 250 there is. You can get it done in one long session if you chose, and it wouldn't cost more then a couple hundred plat.

The other simple to 250 skill is jewel craft, but you will spend a good portion of your 14k on it. Some people will say it isn't so expensive if you enchant the metals, but IMO it isn't worth all the time to enchant every single gold and platinum bar. It makes the skill much slower and prevents you from doing things like exping. Also, unless you have a pocket enchanter over 44, you will be pestering other people and IMO it's too much of a bother to ask another person to help do your tradeskills. I didn't even bother enchanting my bars when my enchanter skilled JC to 250.

14k is no where close enough to the amount you will need to get tailoring to the 250 area. Tailoring is one of the skills that you take a long time doing, unless you are immensely wealthy (in the millionaire range).

Baking is fun, and much easier then smithing or tailoring, but it is much harder then brewing. You are dealing with huge amounts of subcombines which are rather annoying. I find myself purchasing PoP meats for skill ups as the recipes are easier then MTPs, but it is more costly and I can only get a few at a time, so it goes slower. I was mistakenly optimistic when I took baking over 200, thinking I could get it to 250 in a weekend. That was a few weeks ago. LOL

Smithing is probably the hardest and most annoying skill over 200. Options are very small. Tailoring second unless you are immensely wealthy due to very slow and long farming. Pottery and archery are very expensive over 200. Options are again small and imbuing everything for pottery gets old fast. Baking would come next in line, followed by the 2 easy skills brewing and jewelry.

Regarding the AAs, yes NTCM is fun, but get run3 first, even as a druid!