How do I make profit crafting armor?

[tylersavesworld]

I am maxed at 400.

 

Does this sound like a good idea?

 

1. Train one of each piece of armor that is in the level 15 range, for heavy and medium armor.
   
2. Train one of each piece of armor that is in the level 25 range, for heavy and medium armor.
   
3. Train one of each piece of armor that is in the level 35 range, for heavy and medium armor.
   
4. Train one of each piece of armor that is in the level 45 range, for heavy and medium armor.
   
5. Craft them all over and over until I have a wide selection of purples in different level ranges.
   
6. Sell
   

[DiLune]

Why would people buy your purple armor when they can wear oranges and use armor mods?

 

How much would it cost you to get all of those purples (in terms of missions to get mats) vs how much you can reasonably expect to sell a few purples to people who don't understand the orange armor system?

[Dorlomin]

If you're the one buying all my high priced mats off the GTN to do it, it's a fantastic idea.

 

 

 

Ok back to reality....No this really isn't because of all the orange drops from FP's and quest rewards. It's easier to keep them up to date and people won't want to part with them if the look cool.

 

A few months from today that may be different as a lot of folks are leveling alts and will have the credits to spare. Today however, I wouldn't.

Edited January 11, 2012 by Dorlomin

[Pherdnut]

Why would people buy your purple armor when they can wear oranges and use armor mods?

 

How much would it cost you to get all of those purples (in terms of missions to get mats) vs how much you can reasonably expect to sell a few purples to people who don't understand the orange armor system?

 

People who only wear orange don't understand how the game's stats work. REing the right purples from the right blues and then augmenting appropriately can result in some really tightly stat-focused gear. If boosting crit, for instance is a priority, I don't believe it's possible to match a crit-stacked and augmented purple pistol with an orange pistol with the perfect mods.

[Quraswren]

Sadly the likelyhhod of you making any money of armor is very very slim.

 

It's a well known fact that most crafting skills are relatively worthless.

 

You get a little use out of them 1 - 50 but thats very little especially when you start getting orange modifiable gear.

 

You end up finding orange gear you like and then just changing out the mods as you level. Buying upgrades with planet commendations.

 

The blue gear you make is rarely an upgrade and the purple gear you spent so much money on for mats for no more than a slight upgrade, it all becomes worthless in a couple levels at most. It ends up not being worth the cost to make them.

 

Selling them for credits gets even tougher.

 

I'm syntheweaving on my main and it's been a mistake and worthless baring a few items I used for even fewer levels. Nothing sells these days as word of mouth gets around about orange gear and how quest rewards are just better.

 

This is also why you see so many posts on everyone going Biochem.

 

It's the only profession that offers any real benefit for it's entire lifespan other then the grenades from cybertech.

 

All others are relatively worthless and nearly completely worthless at 50. Made items don't sell and at level 50, thousands of credits spent and you will have nothing to show for it.

 

It's not a pretty pictures for crafting right now.

[Liegence]

One key is to be extremely careful about how much you pay for materials. Always look for deals at all levels.

 

Seek to craft purps ppl want, especially versions from schematics because 1-49 they are the most potent gear. I would start whatever level the materials are easy for you to get - start low and build a catalogue of items then work your way up as revenue comes in and materials are easier to buy. Eventually you will ditch the lowbie gear because GTN maxes sales at 50 at a time and income from the lows isn't high enough.

 

Hope that helps.

 

Edit: BTW, ppl are going to say crafting isn't profitable. They are wrong. I cleared over half a mil last week in profit (after expenses) on my lvl 30.

Edited January 11, 2012 by Liegence

[tylersavesworld]

Thank you all for the advice. Hopefully in the future crafting armor will have better benefits!

[Celebrus]

Thank you all for the advice. Hopefully in the future the crafting system wont be a total sham!

 

Fixed.

[djdee]

People who only wear orange don't understand how the game's stats work. REing the right purples from the right blues and then augmenting appropriately can result in some really tightly stat-focused gear. If boosting crit, for instance is a priority, I don't believe it's possible to match a crit-stacked and augmented purple pistol with an orange pistol with the perfect mods.

 

This.

 

I am a synthweaver and I do wear oranges. However, whenever I accomplish RE-ing a purple that is appropriate for my level it is way better than oranges with blue mods in them, or even oranges with one or two purple mods in some cases.

 

Also dont forget, mods are not as easy to come by as some make it out to be. The commendation vendors sell some, yes, but not all and if you focus on some particular primary or secondary stat (I for example wanted to test high crit gear) it becomes difficult to find the right mods at the time you need it.

 

I play on The Rogue Moon EU server (avg load of 1.8 according to TORStatus.net) and I have been selling my made blue stuff well enough and my purple usually just as well.

It helps if you craft stuff for slots that are usually hard to acquire via other means (ie quests etc.) such as bracers and belts.

 

This economy especially in its current state is not one where you can make fixed assumptions just going from item rarity color. You need to take into account more things than that.

[GnatB]

to be fair, I'm only 270 synthweaving, and seem to make a fairly decent profit selling blues and purples. (redoubt heavy, critical or overkill light, whichever purple I happen to make for chest pieces)

 

Sell the stuff for roughly 2x the cost of the items, and have a hard time keeping "in stock".

 

My own experience (admittedly, only lvl 27) is crafted gear tends to be better than orange gear, even when kept up to date with commendation mods, which also requires you've done enough farming/etc. to be able to fully mod your full armor... That's quite a bit of mods. Also far cheaper than if you're buying up to date stuff from other players. (assuming you can even find appropriate mods for sale) Instead of buying 3 mods that seem to sell for the same price as a full piece of armor each.

 

And at least at my level, mods don't seem to do much in the way of +defense, etc.

 

But admittedly, the profit is pretty much just barely able to cover my own RE'ing to get the purple/blue gear to equip myself.

[HanzBlix]

I pretty much sell everything I put on the GTN in about 5 minutes or less. Blues with augment slot and purples are better than orange while leveling and you don't need to get 3 mods per piece (way more if counting companions).

 

People will also buy the blue and purple for their companions. I can sell one blue augment piece or a purple for around 5 to 8k credits consistently. Scavenging most of the materials off droids or planets really only leaves you to have to get the underworld trading stuff.

 

I don't know if you are going to be a millionaire from it, but you can definitely sell your goods. I focused on gearing my companions and certain slots for myself. I used orange for head chest and legs and crafted purples for the other slots.

[Lokai]

make level 50 epic stuff reason is, that from 1-49 you can wear all pretty modable stuff you like at 50 mods pretty much stop, and forced to either wear epics are crafted or wear teir gear is crafted do to mods in epics being locked in to the set.

[-Fatboy-]

Why would people buy your purple armor when they can wear oranges and use armor mods?

 

How much would it cost you to get all of those purples (in terms of missions to get mats) vs how much you can reasonably expect to sell a few purples to people who don't understand the orange armor system?

 

Well i can tell you from what i did / had , lv 50 i used mod gear lv 48-50 mods in it, and could not pass my final battle in my story line. i took a week and farmed the mats to get T6 to crit blues and crafted a full set and went back in a kick the crap out of the end boss in my story line ..

 

switching over the 2 dif suits i was able to compare the stats and i think crafting gear is better then mod gear, but that's just me ..

 

and another thing you can think about when using crafting gear over mod , u can pick all the other items like comms or loot when finishing off a quest and then sell all the items to make $$

 

this way i find my self walking away with 40-50 comms per planet and i use them and buy the purple box that cost 24 comms and sell the item, most of the time i can get 2 boxs to open for a random purple item ..

 

just my 2cents

[Liegence]

to be fair, I'm only 270 synthweaving, and seem to make a fairly decent profit selling blues and purples. (redoubt heavy, critical or overkill light, whichever purple I happen to make for chest pieces)

 

Sell the stuff for roughly 2x the cost of the items, and have a hard time keeping "in stock".

 

My own experience (admittedly, only lvl 27) is crafted gear tends to be better than orange gear, even when kept up to date with commendation mods, which also requires you've done enough farming/etc. to be able to fully mod your full armor... That's quite a bit of mods. Also far cheaper than if you're buying up to date stuff from other players. (assuming you can even find appropriate mods for sale) Instead of buying 3 mods that seem to sell for the same price as a full piece of armor each.

 

And at least at my level, mods don't seem to do much in the way of +defense, etc.

 

But admittedly, the profit is pretty much just barely able to cover my own RE'ing to get the purple/blue gear to equip myself.

 

Similar to my experience. I am an avid crafter. My gear is always either augmented blues or purples, mostly mats from schematics. I haven't used quest gear or comm gear since I bought the lv 20 PvP items, they're all weak. Profit from sales ensures I have gear two to three levels in advance. I gave up on oranges for all slots after being unable to find the armoring, enhancements etc when I need them. Crafting is so much better.

 

I do, however, anticipate this will change by lvl 50, but profit will continue if not increase. I foresee in a few months as crafters become more popular the orange gear will be the gear considered too cumbersome to maintain... why buy a bunch of mods every other level when you can buy one or two pieces and be done with it? Time will tell.

[HanzBlix]

 

Well i can tell you from what i did / had , lv 50 i used mod gear lv 48-50 mods in it, and could not pass my final battle in my story line. i took a week and farmed the mats to get T6 to crit blues and crafted a full set and went back in a kick the crap out of the end boss in my story line ..

 

switching over the 2 dif suits i was able to compare the stats and i think crafting gear is better then mod gear, but that's just me ..

 

and another thing you can think about when using crafting gear over mod , u can pick all the other items like comms or loot when finishing off a quest and then sell all the items to make $$

 

this way i find my self walking away with 40-50 comms per planet and i use them and buy the purple box that cost 24 comms and sell the item, most of the time i can get 2 boxs to open for a random purple item ..

 

just my 2cents

 

Great point, I did the same exact thing

[DiLune]

 

Well i can tell you from what i did / had , lv 50 i used mod gear lv 48-50 mods in it, and could not pass my final battle in my story line. i took a week and farmed the mats to get T6 to crit blues and crafted a full set and went back in a kick the crap out of the end boss in my story line ..

 

switching over the 2 dif suits i was able to compare the stats and i think crafting gear is better then mod gear, but that's just me ..

 

and another thing you can think about when using crafting gear over mod , u can pick all the other items like comms or loot when finishing off a quest and then sell all the items to make $$

 

this way i find my self walking away with 40-50 comms per planet and i use them and buy the purple box that cost 24 comms and sell the item, most of the time i can get 2 boxs to open for a random purple item ..

 

just my 2cents

 

This is somewhat the exception on Orange gear. When you get to level 50 you are at the end of what can be crafted. Orange gear is supposed to be on par with equal level purples. You're at the end of the purple line, so yes, a full purple will be better than an orange with blue mods in it.

 

And before someone mentioned getting a nice purple gun that was crit focused and better than anything they could do with orange at that level...

 

So lets say you're level 35, your purple pistol is better than my orange pistol. But at level 37 I improve my pistol. And again at level 39. And again at level 41. And again at level 43...

 

Meanwhile you are stuck with that purple until you make a better purple, which can be a very painful process. My pistol is passing the effectiveness of yours via mods. (Until level 50 and until I can get the high end purple mods and then we're back on par, unless you have an augment slot and I don't.)

[-Fatboy-]

This is somewhat the exception on Orange gear. When you get to level 50 you are at the end of what can be crafted. Orange gear is supposed to be on par with equal level purples. You're at the end of the purple line, so yes, a full purple will be better than an orange with blue mods in it.

 

And before someone mentioned getting a nice purple gun that was crit focused and better than anything they could do with orange at that level...

 

So lets say you're level 35, your purple pistol is better than my orange pistol. But at level 37 I improve my pistol. And again at level 39. And again at level 41. And again at level 43...

 

Meanwhile you are stuck with that purple until you make a better purple, which can be a very painful process. My pistol is passing the effectiveness of yours via mods. (Until level 50 and until I can get the high end purple mods and then we're back on par, unless you have an augment slot and I don't.)

 

 

well first it was all blue not purple crafted gear , i just finally got the chest yesterday to crit purple after RE 46 blue chests .. that's a lot of mats man lol

 

and to keep up with mod gear being abler to change out so much, I'm a farmer and when it come to crafting, i have np spending 5-8h in a day getting all the mats i need to craft, on corellia iv got a spot that i call the gauntlet run lol, i pull 5 nods every 4mins /repeat, and will spend 5-8h doing that for a day .. even at lower lv i did this , the only thing i ever spent $$ on is crew skills and only on UT.

 

And even more now that I'm 50 and all my alt (lv 32 and lv 13 ) have there lv gear crit to purple waiting for them to get the lv to put on .. (guild help a lot with this)

 

its all in how u play i guess , I'm not a pvper and instead really enjoy working on all 3 of my crafters,

 

ps. when making alts and grinding up lv and not have to even thing about gear , you be amassed on how much $$ u have , think it was little over 300k fully trained at lv 22 .. /shrug

[GnatB]

Orange gear is supposed to be on par with equal level purples.

 

No, it isn't. Orange gear is on par with whatever is slotted into it. if you've slotted green mods into it it's on par with greens. if you've slotted blues into it it's on par with blues. It's only if you've slotted purples into it that it's on par with purples.

 

So sure, if you're RE'ing (or somehow buying... from what I remember, the commendation mods are typically blue ones, not purple) a full set of 4 purple mods for your gun every 2 levels it'll be better than the RE'd gun with crit.... But I imagine it'll be quicker to RE the one purple gun than RE the 4 purple mods. Now, I guess you can just slot one purple "barrel" (or hilt or armor) mod into an item to get the purple equivelent attack/defense, and not even bother upgradeing the rest of the mods (or just upgrade to green) if you aren't particularly concerned about all the ancilliary stats... but then you're probably severely gimping yourself. And, of course, no single character can actually MAKE a full set of purple mods for an item... whereas a single character CAN make a purple blaster.

 

(and from what I remember, weapons don't go that many levels between upgrades. It's only armor that does.)

[DiLune]

I wasn't 100% specific, but yes - Orange gear with purple mods is supposed to be equivalent to purple gear.

 

The two systems are supposed to turn out the same results (at 50.) But its the leveling process where we'll differ on what's better.

 

While leveling, you can upgrade your oranges at will. Find a mod on a commendation vendor, make it yourself or buy it from the GTN. Meanwhile, you may have equivalent stats with non-orange gear at one point, but the mods you want will most likely be more common on the GTN than the gear you want.

 

Which is why, in my original point, I felt (and still feel) that attempting to make money by crafting purples every 5 or 10 levels isn't going to make as much (or net a profit necessarily) as people would want.

 

I only used the gun as an example because someone else did. You're better off with Artifice or Cybertech (probably cybertech) because they make the base (Armor or Hilt) as well as either an enhancement or a Mod.

Edited January 11, 2012 by DiLune

[GnatB]

Meanwhile, you may have equivalent stats with non-orange gear at one point, but the mods you want will most likely be more common on the GTN than the gear you want.

 

Maybe on your server, but on mine the mod selection is extremely lacking. I saw some nice looking orange gear I was thinking about putting on my companion, so did a quick check of mods on the GTN, and while there was a bunch of greens, and a couple of (bad) blues, there were no purples even close to my level.

[Syas]

Why would people buy your purple armor when they can wear oranges and use armor mods?

Purples tend to be better than Oranges that people USE is one reason (if you are stacking full purple mods in your Orange then it is really just a 6 on one hand/half a dozen on the other). The other reason being management of Commendations. When you are pulling 15-20 commendations from a planet, 14 to drop on a new orange item or 16-18 for a full set of blue mods for one item.

 

I can tell you at 41 I don't wear every Orange Item I can because I simply don't make enough commendations to keep ALL of my Orange gear up to date. I happen to be an Armormech (400) myself, but if I wasn't I would still probably seek out blues/purps.

Edited January 11, 2012 by Syas

[Wurmkrank]

Don't listen to the sheep going on about orange items. They are good for leveling due to the commendaton system but it isn't practical to use more than 3. I re-d some of the lvl 49 maurader boots into an epic overkill pattern last night. I can easily turn the 40k worth of madalorian iron into 60+k pair of boots now not to mention the chance to potentially tripple the value of the item if I proc an augment slot

[bizznach]

my pvp lvl 40 gear is better than the lvl 45 gear you can make

[crazysam]

You can do a lot of credits if your carefull!

 

I'll give you an hint....

 

Everyone are using orange weapons and armor, so what you want to do is either craft purple upgrades(barrel,mods,enhancement,armoring,crystals), craft orange armor for low level and fill em with your mods from another toon. A lot of players are going to the GTM to buy some nice orange gear at low level.

 

Poeple are lazy and they dont mind spending for everythng they want.

 

You can also gather and sell mats.

 

Best you can do is max several profession on different toon to provide them all they need.

 

EX:

 

Toon 1: Cyber/scav/slicingwill give you tons of cash if you farm boxes and may provide nice schematics for other professions. Make purp mods and sell them.

 

Toon 2: Armorcraft/scav/UT will provide you in mats for cybertech and armorcraft wich will allow you to craft the oranges you may get by doing missions with UT and slicing.

 

Edit: Poeple are whining about how bad ad useless crafting is for 2 reasons:

 

1: They dont want you to do it to avoid competition.

2: They want to do it the easy way and are going in the GTM to buy mats at high price and make no profits selling their items.

Edited January 12, 2012 by crazysam

[Syas]

Honestly, I make my Armormech money just advertising in Fleet:

 

/1 Is your Trooper/Smuggler companion(s) undergeared? 400 Armormech here to solve your problems, PST with role and level for pricing!

 

It requires a bit more of a Merchant mindset, but so far it has been going well.