Need help with crafting

christian21594 · September 2017

I'm so bad at it and do not understand the concept essentially. I'm level 46 with 7 blacksmithing, 5 woodworking, and 3 clothing. It seems like I can never find an effective amount of materials I need to advance my level e.g. iron ore or maple logs. Any advice on getting started would be so appreciated. From what I gather crafting can be incredibly effective when you get to high levels with it.
Thanks!

Nestor · September 2017

Leveling Wood, Cloth and Metal Crafting is done with Decon, not crafting. If you just craft, we will be in the next decade before you finish. At L46, just go find a nice public dungeon or grind spot and harvest mob loot. Bring it back and decon it. Rinse repeat. You will also be quite flush with gold after too.

See the following for leveling crafting efficiently.

Nestor · September 2017

General Crating Leveling

Equipment Crafting

Decon all mob loot other than what you are using to research traits. Research traits, learn two on all items you would use, then learn 3, etc. Focus on Divines, Infused and Training for your first three for Armor, Sharpened, Precise and Training for your Weapons. Then go for the other ones. Nirn is expensive, and a lot of people suggest putting a priority on that, I can't see why. The Trait is all but useless for Armor or Weapons. Best place to find Mob Loot is Public Dungeons, then over land grind spots. Grind on mobs until your bags are full, then go on a decon fest. Remembering to save the ones you need or want to research. Use the Lock Function and or an Inventory Mule to hang on to those. Only invest Skill points while leveling it into the Research and Extraction Passive, the last really only needing one point.

Enchanting

Ignore all the "advice" on the web about using an enchanting partner. First, use Mob Loot decon to raise this up to a point. Later on as you approach end game have some some gold, then start making Green, Blue or Purple Glyphs on one character and decon them on an Alt. You will level Enchanting faster than trading the glyphs with another player, which is tedious by the way. (like pull out your hair and make a doily tedious). Use Green up to about L15 in the Enchanting Skill, Blue up to about L30/35 and Purple up to about L46/47. Then learn the runes you don't know, you should be at or near 50, if not, make/decon some more Purples.

Provisioning and Alchemy

Don't worry about these, you can level these professions in about an 20 minutes, for both. Just collect the Various Solvents and Reagents and Provisioning Ingredients/Recipes as you go along. Once end game, then you can level it. Use Mushrooms to level Alchemy, or Flowers that make potions you won't use. Make sure you grab solvents (waters) as your leveling as they can be rare to find in the guild stores. For Provisioning, make the highest level Green Recipes you can make. Blue or Purples do not give any more inspiration than Greens, so save those for character use.

Nestor · September 2017

Trait Research (This is why you craft to make special sets and that requires knowing traits)

Traits are why you craft as they allow you to make Special Crafted Sets. There are two sets in the game that your going to want to make, Julianos for your Magic Characters, and Hundings Rage for your Stamina Characters. There are no better sets in the game to have 5 pieces of. Period. Well, Twice Born Star is great to, but your a year out from making that. Nice thing you just a 2 or 3 weeks from making Julianos or Hundings on what you need to. But you need to start learning your traits now.

Leveling Equipment Crafting is easy, just decon the mob loot you are not either selling to cover repairs or using to research traits. No skill points needed while leveling it, other than maybe a point or two into the Extraction Passives.

Back to the Crafted Sets, it takes 6 traits known to be able to make Hundings or Julianos, 9 Traits for Twice Born Star. You don't need to know these traits on everything, but you do need to know them on the items you will use. So, start learning those traits. Focus on the gear you will use first, then fill in the rest later. This means:

Casters
Heavy Chest/Legs
Light Feet/Hands/Waist
Shoulders and Heads are good to, but there are 2 Piece Monster sets that can take up those slots. So learn the traits on these pieces, but prioritize the ones above.
Staves (all 4 of them)

Stamina
All Medium Armors
Daggers, Swords, Bow and Shield

Learn Training, Divines and Infused on the Armors first, Sharpened, Precise and Training on the Weapons. Powered is good for the Healing Staff, Defending is good for Sword or other one handed Melee. Then fill in the rest until you have 6 or eventually 9 traits. Some people recommend Nirn as an early trait to learn. Unless they change it, don't listen to them. You might use it on a Shield or a Weapon but that is about it. You need it someday, but it's expensive and you need your gold for other things.

Invest the skill points into the Research Passives. I can't stress enough how much of a time sink Trait Research is. Be able to learn more than one at a time, and reduce the time needed. Get an addon for Trait Research Tracking, I recommend Craft Store. If your on the Consoles, find one of the spreadsheets out there or make one to track this. Have I mentioned you need to learn your traits?

Doing this you will be ready to invest skill points into Crafting when it matters and not have to spend months getting ready. Did I mention Trait Research and how much a time sink it is? The last two traits will take you a month each to learn, on each item you learn them on. Get started now, yesterday would have been better.

christian21594 · September 2017

Thankkkk youuuu. This has been seriously killing me. I always tried constructing items instead of destructing them. This is really helpful. Much appreciated!

ASkullParty · September 2017

There's a perk you can take call keen eye under the skill lines for crafting. It illuminates nearby material nodes and is very helpful in finding enough raw ore and fibres, especially if you are running around at night. Try the starting zones for each alliance for good concentrations of nodes.

MizaRadioaktiv · September 2017

As everyone has said, crafting is great when trying to level up, but deconstructing items you don't need help level you up as well.

Juju_beans · September 2017

I use the addon Trait Buddy to help me keep track of traits learned for each piece. It also has a tooltip that tells you if you've learned that trait when you mouse over a piece of gear.

I'm level 25 and my alts are not far behind and i can already make a few pieces of gear/weapons for them..Night's Silence and Hundings. Soon will be able to make Juliano's. At this low level I just make white gear for them which still proves better than looted gear at that level for a while.

I love the crafting in this game and even more so that I can gear up my toons with some good gear as they level.