Archived from groups: alt.games.everquest,alt.games.everquest2 (More info?)
I've been helping my guildies learn crafting so much recently I decided to
write everything down in one place. Hope you all enjoy
Maus' General Tradeskill Guide
The first thing you need to do is starting out on the Isle of Refuge do the
tradeskill quest Cellar Cleanup*- talk to Dreak in the tower- that will
make you ding level 3 and give you a handydandy bag. Making iron bars for
that quest is the easiest combine you'll ever make, you are practically
guaranteed a pristine. Don't get used to it being that easy.*Don't worry
if you already went to your new hometown, it's not mandatory
Before you start crafting, take a look at your knowledge book. By default,
it's a royal mess. You'll need to play matchemup and figure out what skill
is what. Example: For skill alchemy there's Experiment, Theory and
Reaction, put them together to make it easier to set up hotkeys when you
need them.
A good way to organize is to take each skill and put them on a separate
page, leaving page 1 empty so that will be where all the new skills go and
you won't get confused about what is new.*Thanks to Storme of Najena for
this suggestion*
Once you've organized your book, you'll need to get as much materials as
possible. If you are staying on the island, don't do too much fishing,
you'll need pepper to make spice to use them and they are rather rare. I
also recommend getting all your gathering skills over 20 before leaving,
sometimes it's a pain finding nodes in the newbie zones in your chosen
town. You'll also want a drink. Crafting takes power, lots of it. Some
people say it helps to have less power because it regens quicker that way.
I don't really agree with that but I haven't totally checked that claim.
Take all your stuff down to the basement and you'll see all the new
crafting stations that weren't there when you first went down there. (If
you chose to start out crafting in your home town, pick a fairly high level
crafting society, you can find the levels of the societies by pressing the
societies button under the EQII button). For this example I'll stick with
alchemy. Take the 3 icons that relate to alchemy: Experiment, Reaction and
Theory; and put them on a hotkey bar in that order. Take a look at the
icons. Experiment increases your progress and only costs a little power.
Reaction increases your progress but it decreases your success chance.
Theory is the "worst" of the 3, it increases progress but it decreases your
durability. NEVER hit that button unless you get an event that matches it.
Every skill should be set up the same way--at least thru level 10--there's
a (+prog/-power), a (+prog/-success) and a (+prog/-durability).
To start off, make a fossil temper. <yeah, yeah, you can buy them on the
isle but it's still good practice> You'll have to buy artisan essentials
volume 3 to get that recipe. Buy vol 4 also if you have the room for it.
Scribe the book by right clicking and choosing scribe. Click on the
chemistry table and find the recipe you want. Make sure you have the
ingredients you need and that it hasn't chosen something you want to keep
as any of the components. For fossil temper you need: Raw inorganic
material, a liquid, and a candle. There are lots of things that qualify as
each component. If i have to buy liquid, I usually use aerated mineral
water, it's cheap. Even cheaper is the drops that qualify as liquid,
salivas, essences.
Click begin and it'll start making the item. Right away, click your
+prog/-power ability, for alchemy that's Experiment. Keep hitting that as
it refreshes. Also keep an eye on the top indicator line. There is a
green line for durability that decreases most of the time and a blue line
that should increase as you craft. Look closely at the green line, there
are little tick marks. Your goal is to not let the green bar go down
farther than the first tick. If you lose more than half the durability
between where it starts and the first tick mark, start hitting your second
hotkey, the +prog/-success called Reaction for alchemy. You should be
spending the whole time clicking Experiment and then Reaction if it's
needed. Only hit Theory if you get an event that matches it. The events
are random and are just a matching game, match the icon and it'll counter
it.
If you do it right and get pristine fossil temper, you'll get 4 of them,
yay. Much better yield than if you just make them shaped or crude. The
first time you make any item pristine you get extra crafting xp. This is
very important. If you change to a different recipe every time you make a
pristine, you'll be level 10 in no time. I guarantee you can't make every
thing in all the level 3 to 9 books before you hit level 10 if you make a
different pristine every time.
In order to ding 10, you have to leave the island, acquire your citizenship
and then go visit Althea Augustine in West Freeport or Alfred Ironforge in
Qeynos to set your specialty. If you already have xp over level 9, you
have to do one combine that gives you xp in order to get that xp added and
ding level 10. You can go to Althea or Alfred as soon as you come to town
even if you aren't artisan level 9 yet, I've done that with most of my
characters. Be sure before you set your specialty, you can't change your
mind. Do some digging around on eqtraders or eq2.computersims.com and see
what you want to make the most. Don't pick a trade thinking you'll get
rich. Most people don't. Most of the time, whatever you pick will end up
being a tremendous time and money sink only. With tradeskilling, it's
either love it or hate it.
Now that you are level 10, you'll have new abilities. But only for the
profession you picked and for the 4 ones they added to keep those people
happy who complained about not being able to make thier own components. To
keep it simple, I'll use an example from one of those, since everyone has
those. I'll use apothecary for the examples. For apothecary, at first you
get Stir(+prog/-power), Coalesce (+prog/-success) and Test(+prog/-
durability). After level 10, the only one you really want to keep around
is Stir. At level 10, you get Agitate(+dur/-power), Consolidate(+dur/-
success), and Examine(+dur/-prog). The technique changes slightly because
of the +dur abilities. It IS possible to regain a pristine if you've lost
the durability by pushing the +dur buffs. I usually start out hitting Stir
a few times, then if I'm losing durability, I hit agitate exclusively till
I regain enough that I think it'll make it to the end without losing the
pristine. Using the Consolidate buff also helps with durability if you are
desparate to keep the pristine. Don't beat yourself up, if you lose ALOT
of durability right away, it's sometimes better to just stop before you are
locked into a crude and lose the fuel instead of wasting your materials on
something lower than you want.
If you adapt these instructions to the crafting you are doing, you should
be able to get a pristine 90% of the time. Good Luck and Happy crafting.
Maus Rache <Legion> Oggok server
I've been helping my guildies learn crafting so much recently I decided to
write everything down in one place. Hope you all enjoy
Maus' General Tradeskill Guide
The first thing you need to do is starting out on the Isle of Refuge do the
tradeskill quest Cellar Cleanup*- talk to Dreak in the tower- that will
make you ding level 3 and give you a handydandy bag. Making iron bars for
that quest is the easiest combine you'll ever make, you are practically
guaranteed a pristine. Don't get used to it being that easy.*Don't worry
if you already went to your new hometown, it's not mandatory
Before you start crafting, take a look at your knowledge book. By default,
it's a royal mess. You'll need to play matchemup and figure out what skill
is what. Example: For skill alchemy there's Experiment, Theory and
Reaction, put them together to make it easier to set up hotkeys when you
need them.
A good way to organize is to take each skill and put them on a separate
page, leaving page 1 empty so that will be where all the new skills go and
you won't get confused about what is new.*Thanks to Storme of Najena for
this suggestion*
Once you've organized your book, you'll need to get as much materials as
possible. If you are staying on the island, don't do too much fishing,
you'll need pepper to make spice to use them and they are rather rare. I
also recommend getting all your gathering skills over 20 before leaving,
sometimes it's a pain finding nodes in the newbie zones in your chosen
town. You'll also want a drink. Crafting takes power, lots of it. Some
people say it helps to have less power because it regens quicker that way.
I don't really agree with that but I haven't totally checked that claim.
Take all your stuff down to the basement and you'll see all the new
crafting stations that weren't there when you first went down there. (If
you chose to start out crafting in your home town, pick a fairly high level
crafting society, you can find the levels of the societies by pressing the
societies button under the EQII button). For this example I'll stick with
alchemy. Take the 3 icons that relate to alchemy: Experiment, Reaction and
Theory; and put them on a hotkey bar in that order. Take a look at the
icons. Experiment increases your progress and only costs a little power.
Reaction increases your progress but it decreases your success chance.
Theory is the "worst" of the 3, it increases progress but it decreases your
durability. NEVER hit that button unless you get an event that matches it.
Every skill should be set up the same way--at least thru level 10--there's
a (+prog/-power), a (+prog/-success) and a (+prog/-durability).
To start off, make a fossil temper. <yeah, yeah, you can buy them on the
isle but it's still good practice> You'll have to buy artisan essentials
volume 3 to get that recipe. Buy vol 4 also if you have the room for it.
Scribe the book by right clicking and choosing scribe. Click on the
chemistry table and find the recipe you want. Make sure you have the
ingredients you need and that it hasn't chosen something you want to keep
as any of the components. For fossil temper you need: Raw inorganic
material, a liquid, and a candle. There are lots of things that qualify as
each component. If i have to buy liquid, I usually use aerated mineral
water, it's cheap. Even cheaper is the drops that qualify as liquid,
salivas, essences.
Click begin and it'll start making the item. Right away, click your
+prog/-power ability, for alchemy that's Experiment. Keep hitting that as
it refreshes. Also keep an eye on the top indicator line. There is a
green line for durability that decreases most of the time and a blue line
that should increase as you craft. Look closely at the green line, there
are little tick marks. Your goal is to not let the green bar go down
farther than the first tick. If you lose more than half the durability
between where it starts and the first tick mark, start hitting your second
hotkey, the +prog/-success called Reaction for alchemy. You should be
spending the whole time clicking Experiment and then Reaction if it's
needed. Only hit Theory if you get an event that matches it. The events
are random and are just a matching game, match the icon and it'll counter
it.
If you do it right and get pristine fossil temper, you'll get 4 of them,
yay. Much better yield than if you just make them shaped or crude. The
first time you make any item pristine you get extra crafting xp. This is
very important. If you change to a different recipe every time you make a
pristine, you'll be level 10 in no time. I guarantee you can't make every
thing in all the level 3 to 9 books before you hit level 10 if you make a
different pristine every time.
In order to ding 10, you have to leave the island, acquire your citizenship
and then go visit Althea Augustine in West Freeport or Alfred Ironforge in
Qeynos to set your specialty. If you already have xp over level 9, you
have to do one combine that gives you xp in order to get that xp added and
ding level 10. You can go to Althea or Alfred as soon as you come to town
even if you aren't artisan level 9 yet, I've done that with most of my
characters. Be sure before you set your specialty, you can't change your
mind. Do some digging around on eqtraders or eq2.computersims.com and see
what you want to make the most. Don't pick a trade thinking you'll get
rich. Most people don't. Most of the time, whatever you pick will end up
being a tremendous time and money sink only. With tradeskilling, it's
either love it or hate it.
Now that you are level 10, you'll have new abilities. But only for the
profession you picked and for the 4 ones they added to keep those people
happy who complained about not being able to make thier own components. To
keep it simple, I'll use an example from one of those, since everyone has
those. I'll use apothecary for the examples. For apothecary, at first you
get Stir(+prog/-power), Coalesce (+prog/-success) and Test(+prog/-
durability). After level 10, the only one you really want to keep around
is Stir. At level 10, you get Agitate(+dur/-power), Consolidate(+dur/-
success), and Examine(+dur/-prog). The technique changes slightly because
of the +dur abilities. It IS possible to regain a pristine if you've lost
the durability by pushing the +dur buffs. I usually start out hitting Stir
a few times, then if I'm losing durability, I hit agitate exclusively till
I regain enough that I think it'll make it to the end without losing the
pristine. Using the Consolidate buff also helps with durability if you are
desparate to keep the pristine. Don't beat yourself up, if you lose ALOT
of durability right away, it's sometimes better to just stop before you are
locked into a crude and lose the fuel instead of wasting your materials on
something lower than you want.
If you adapt these instructions to the crafting you are doing, you should
be able to get a pristine 90% of the time. Good Luck and Happy crafting.
Maus Rache <Legion> Oggok server
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