Why is tailoring not profitable?

Kessra · April 2015

Hi there,

as my alts which store all my crafting materials due to lack of bank space (I'm slowly upgrading my bank though) filled up (although >110 bag space) I took all the crafting materials I had more than enough of and started crafting.

Comparing the price a stack of 200 raw materials will sell for at the vendors (800 gold) with the gold you get by selling crafted items, none of the tailored items does make a profit (up to VR4-6 items). One raw-material is equal to 4 gold, crafting f.e. a VR4 robe requires 13 ironsilk which adds up to 52 gold of raw materials if sold directly to the vendor, though the robe only sells for 46 gold which makes a loss of 6 gold. VR4 shoes require 11 raw materials (11x4 = 44 gold) but sell for 23 gold only - loss of 21 gold!

With smithing and woodworking especially 2h weapons do grant a profit (some items just a small one, but they do), but I'm currently considering just selling the raw-materials needed for tailoring directly to the vendor (at least this grants more gold than crafting any of the items). I know I can offer/sell these materials at the guild store but I was not able to sell raw materials their either (maybe need to change trading guilds I'm in). Besides that, crafting isn't really needed to push a profession to max-level as the deconstruction of white items you can pick up by running through the leveling zones is more than enough - maybe that's why I'm not able to sell these at the guild store.

Is this system really intended that way? I do not have problems making gold (at least of now while I'm still leveling), but crafting seems to be a bit out-of-place IMHO.

Vandril · April 2015

Crafting in this game is very different from other MMOs in that, rather than making a bunch of items and selling them, most of the profit from crafting comes from commissions. Equipment crafters make money by having someone hire them to make a piece with very specific criteria - a certain set, trait, and quality (rare, epic, etc.) - that the buyer just must have. Just making random crap really only makes a profit if someone happens to need the trait on the piece for research (which is also another good way to make money with equipment crafting in ESO - sell gear w/ popular traits for research).

Enchanting is much the same way, since there are a variety of popular enchants, so it's best if you find someone who wants to commission you.

Provisioning, Alchemy, and (very specifically, because there's only 3 types of it) Armor Enchanting are the types of crafts where you can just make stuff and sell it. But, even with these three, you need to know which potions tend to sell, which food and drink people tend to like to use for what type of content at what level, and the current popularity of each attribute to decide on which armor enchant(s) to try to sell.

Crafting in this game is...different. Due mainly to the lack of global AH.

newtinmpls · April 2015

Learn a lot of traits, then go to a set site (choose carefully, and pay attention to materials - seducer is a good value to light armor, much less popular in medium or heavy), make set peieces and then place them for sale in a decent trade guild. Take the auto-generated price and mutiply it by 3-4.

Vet 1 stuff (especially seducer/light or Tourgs pact/heavy) will sell for 1000+ if you are patient. They sell better if you can offer the entire set (all peices) for sale at a time in the same trader.

Others may see your name (in the "crafted by" or "for sale by") part of the item and may game-mail you.

You can also join a guild and put a note in your roster that you will craft such and so sets/traits on commission.

Tarukmockto · April 2015

@kessra: I agree with your message that it's difficult to profit from crafting, but I think you confused "Raw" for "Refined" materials.

When you refine raw mats you get more than a 1 to 1 ratio back, so the cost per raw is divided by the number of refined you get. IE: if you paid 4 gold for the Raw and got 4 Refined back from it, the cost per refined is only 1gold.

4 gold each is a pretty low value for "Raw" mats, which is why I think you meant "Refined" mats. Refining Raw Mats gives you a chance at valuable tempers which is why they sell for a lot more than refined mats.

Nestor · April 2015

About the only crafted items that sell on "Spec" are Researchables. Items that others can use to research the traits. I make these and sell them for 200 Gold, although some sell them for up to 500 Gold.

The other way I make money is to take orders and make stuff that way. This can be a pain sometimes as I have gotten some complicated orders from people, like wanting 3 or 4 different styles, items from 3 or 4 different crafted sets, just weird requests like this. Also, offer people discounts if they mail you the Materials Stacks (I always cover the Traits and Style Gems unless Daedric or Imperial). You can burn through a 100 stack making one set of armor, so keep that in mind.

However the way you make money by crafting is by not spending your money on gear you need. Essentially, anything you craft is free, if you either farm the mats or decon loot and collect the mats that way. Good gear can also make your battles more efficient (less resources used to kill mobs) which means after a while you can start pulling large groups of mobs and killing them all at once rather than two or three at a time. This gives you more loot to research, decon or vendor in less time.

SHADOW2KK · April 2015

If you are a decent enough crafter and know enough traits in Clothing, up to vr14 and legendary, you can make a good bit of gold from crafting for people, and word spreads if your prices are good, it soon mounts up.

A while ago, I done a full set of pvp armour for a mate and he gave me 70K for a few mins work, and that was not even my asking price, he gave me it despite my objections.

A lot of people want nirnhoned on their clothing, so you are speaking mega gold for crafting commissions.

Then as others have said, you can sell unrefined or refined mats too and make not bad gold also.

I wish you luck:}

Kessra · April 2015

First of all, thanks for all the replies but I feel rather misunderstood. I'm aware that selling items to other players with certain traits can be profitable, but what I was going for is just that selling a stack of refined tailor materials to the vendor is more profitable than actually crafting something and then selling it to the vendor (as of to many low-level stacks at my storage alts) - for any item you actually craft in tailoring.

Maybe I'll try crafting sets with certain traits (also on low levels) and then sell them via trading guilds (have tried this once but didn't sell any of these although every item was prices at 250 gold each while comparable items were offered for 300 gold +) instead of selling all those materials directly to the vendor.

stefan.gustavsonb16_ESO · April 2015

At launch, you could accidentally make lots of money by cooking food from looted ingredients and selling it to vendors. They removed that, and I have not seen any example of a profitable craft since. Collecting ore, wood and fibrous plants is about the only thing you can do that is related to crafting that will earn you any money without involving other players.

On the other hand, if you craft stuff for real people, they are often prepared to pay rather a lot for a crafted set. Your best option for making gold in ESO is definitely not to sell crafted stuff to NPC vendors.

fromtesonlineb16_ESO · April 2015

The guild-based economy is a fail, in so many ways, crafting for profit is simply one of the many aspects that simply don't work in ESO because of it.

Nestor · April 2015

Kessra wrote: »

but what I was going for is just that selling a stack of refined tailor materials to the vendor is more profitable than actually crafting something and then selling it to the vendor

If by Vendor you mean the Kiosks, then your right in some cases you can make just as much selling mats as making something and selling it. Selling to in game vendors you will never make any money.

One thing I have discovered, and this requires a VR level Character, is to do the low level Equipment Crafting Writs. This is great for an Alt you have leveled and have not done any crafting on. Anyway, I have found that a 100 Stack will last me a week at L1 Material level writs (where one L9 writ will use up an entire stack of 100) and you can get 600 plus gold for each writ at VR Ranks.

There are many ways to make money in the game, just most of them won't make you a ton of money.

Sylveria_Relden · April 2015

This game lacks a true framework of economy when it comes to trade for crafting- the main issues being-

No centralized "clearinghouse" or market
Crafted items are really no more beneficial to players than drop gear or rewards from quests

The only thing you "get" for investing in crafting in this game is the "choice" to create what you wish with attributes you want (set items, particular attributes) but other than that if you're looking to profit from selling crafted items you've got a huge task ahead of you. If anyone else can list any other benefits you get other than this, I'd love to (hear) see it.

IMO they need to make crafted gear have unique bonuses so that it can improve the incentives for crafting for the entire game economy- if it was made competitive with rewards/drops then perhaps we'd see more influx.

Tarukmockto · April 2015

Kessra wrote: »

Maybe I'll try crafting sets with certain traits (also on low levels) and then sell them via trading guilds (have tried this once but didn't sell any of these although every item was prices at 250 gold each while comparable items were offered for 300 gold +) instead of selling all those materials directly to the vendor.

If you want to sell simple crafted goods in the Guild Stores, you should figure out which items are hard to come by for research and make a bunch of those. For the most part trait stones are easy to obtain, and some of the items don't drop often with certain traits. So making crafted items with hard to find traits can be profitable in on a small scale.

SantaOrc · April 2015

I don't see any use in making crafted items more interessting for non-highlevel characters.
As long as you can get to veteran levels without wearing any armor by pressing two buttons repetitively (speakig of solo leveling, way to easy), not many people will be interessted in spending gold in equip. Or potions. Or glyphs.

For veterean ranks, the items (sets) are good enough, imo.

Serenityx · May 2016

Unfortunately crafting isn't very profiteable unless your making end game items to sell in a guild store.

Vending your crafted items is sometimes more profiteable than just selling the raw mats at low levels. When I first started playing ESO a couple months ago I found that bows made the most profit per material needed to make each one.

llSRRll · May 2016

It is if you know what people want. I sell plenty of V1-V16 light and medium armor on my guild traders all the time making a really good profit doing it. I suggest go around and find out what sets and traits people are coveting and make them and put them up for sale.