Bleeding Credits?

[Garradorn]

So I'm pretty new to MMO's in general and I've just got into the 20's with my first character on SWTOR. The problem is that I am literally hemorrhaging credits right now. I am repairing my stuff on a regular basis and I am spending credits on leveling up my crafting, but I am not buying any extra gear or anything like that. It just seems like I am spending way more than I'm bringing in. Is this normal? Am I doing something wrong here? Any help would be appreciated.

[sayklen]

Well first of all we need more info:jawa_confused: what's your class and what are your crew skills. Also why are you repairing armor, there is no point early on because you get new armor very quickly so its always changing.

[Garradorn]

Sorry I am a Jedi Shadow, my skills are Synthweaving Archaeology and Underworld Trading. I am repairing my armor cause it seems like I keep needing to. I always get the symbol that indicates it needs to be repaired.

[countersource]

Normal. About crafting, it is going to cost a lot to level it and you won't see much money returning for a while. I was also spending tons on repairs between lvl30-50, and now probably much more that I hit 55.

 

Also, just adding this, I would recommend only training skills you are actually using or going to use, because at lvl50ish they cost around 10-50k each I think(not exact prices because I haven't trained my skills since hitting lvl50).

[sayklen]

Sorry I am a Jedi Shadow, my skills are Synthweaving Archaeology and Underworld Trading. I am repairing my armor cause it seems like I keep needing to. I always get the symbol that indicates it needs to be repaired.

Welp first that is a good crew skill selection. Second you don't "need" to pay for archaeology you can find crystals and what not on coruscant ,taris and what not and finally you lose durability by dying usually if you are dying try going more on the tank side of shadow or think carefull

[Garradorn]

Thanks for the advice. I'll try to stop repairing my stuff as much and explore Taris some more for Archaeology spots.

[TheUnNamedHero]

Well first off, stop crafting. Yes crafting will allow you to get the best gear while leveling, but the trade-off is less credits, as you've noticed, which results in eventually not being able to keep up with your training which will actually gimp you even more. It's really best, for your first toon at least, to forgo crafting and just get 3 gathering skills. Sell the mats that you're not going to use, or save them for another toon, and when you start getting steady income, then start leveling your crafting.

 

As for repairs, that only becomes an issue if you're dying too much. You either need to start doing more quests before moving on, do some space missions, pvp, gsf, or flashpoints to level up more or tighten up your rotations. You also need to keep up with not only your gear but your companions gear as well. The planet comms you get from missions should cover that.

Edited March 17, 2014 by TheUnNamedHero

[Sinapus]

For UT and Archaeology you can make a lot on the GTN by selling grade 1 and 2 items. At least on servers like Harbinger. Try checking how much they're selling for and/or just try selling items for more than the mission it takes to acquire them. (...and archaeology items can be acquired by wandering from node to node so the costs are even lower for that one.)

 

Synthweaving, except for augments and augmentation slot kits, can be a bit hard to sell things on the GTN, alas.

[Fidelicatessen]

Also, just adding this, I would recommend only training skills you are actually using or going to use, because at lvl50ish they cost around 10-50k each I think(not exact prices because I haven't trained my skills since hitting lvl50).

 

Bad advice. Don't skip buying any of your skills unless they are Speeder Piloting ranks II and III.

 

This is how you get level 50+s who don't have an interrupt.

[ImmortalLowlife]

Well first off, stop crafting. Yes crafting will allow you to get the best gear while leveling, but the trade-off is less credits, as you've noticed, which results in eventually not being able to keep up with your training which will actually gimp you even more. It's really best, for your first toon at least, to forgo crafting and just get 3 gathering skills. Sell the mats that you're not going to use, or save them for another toon, and when you start getting steady income, then start leveling your crafting.

 

As for repairs, that only becomes an issue if you're dying too much. You either need to start doing more quests before moving on, do some space missions, pvp, gsf, or flashpoints to level up more or tighten up your rotations. You also need to keep up with not only your gear but your companions gear as well. The planet comms you get from missions should cover that.

 

This type of strategy helped me immensely. I'd say drop synthweaving and pick up either scavenging or slicing. The metals from scavenging sell really well on the GTN, & the lockboxes & nodes from slicing provide instant cash. And orange/purple mod'able armor shells will save you tons in the long run as you can use coms to keep the mods updated.

Edited March 17, 2014 by ImmortalLowlife

[altaboy]

For your first character I'd suggest skipping an actual crafting skill and taking all gathering skills + slicing. And selling the stuffs you gathered. Don't send companions on missions, just gather stuff in the world as you quest/explore. Once you have a high(er) level character and can start spending extra or supplementing an alt, then pick up crafting if you like to craft.

 

If you need better gear check the GTN. And don't spend a lot on leveling gear since you'll be replacing it soon anyway. You might not find the best looking or best stats for cheap, but the cheap stuff with your primary stat will be sufficient for leveling. Then once you get to 50+, then start worrying about gear you like the looks of and best stats.

[tharbison]

The others are right - crafing is expensive. But the good news is 'gathering' is free. If you want to make some credits, just gather a bunch of stuff while on missions then sell it on the GTN. It sells quick and for a pretty penny.

 

Also what others have failed to mention is once you get a character to level 50 you can start doing 'daiies' (repeatable daily missions) that will have you swimming in credits instead of bleeding them. Then that character becomes the sugar daddy to your alts

[Kerensk]

No!

Don't drop crafting. You've already built something, it would be a waste to just flush it all away.

 

But definitely stop leveling it until you have more money. Start selling items. Blue gear in the 20s and 30s usually sells for more than it costs you in mats and there will always be somebody leveling that needs some gear on an alt. Others are in your same situation where they die more often and they'll want to get keep upto date with their gear, be the guy who sells it to them.

 

Spend 30mins one night checking the GTN for gaps in the market you can fill with the crafts you have now.

 

Or if you can just craft 2 of every blue and purple item you can make, and sell it all at once. Watch what sells and what doesn't and make more of the ones that sold in 24 hours.

 

Sell for slightly less than the price others are selling at. And never go below the price it costs in materials it took to make it.

[Orono]

Grind flashpoints/heroics that you're too high lvl for too. The gear you get from them is still worth $ to any vendor.

[nightsproull]

Synthweaving, and most of the "crafting" skills are pretty worthless at max level, unless you really plan to max out and spend lots of time and money reverse engineering and praying for recipe results.

 

I've found it easier to just buy the few things I actually need from crafters.

[JacksonMo]

No!

Don't drop crafting. You've already built something, it would be a waste to just flush it all away.

 

But definitely stop leveling it until you have more money. Start selling items. Blue gear in the 20s and 30s usually sells for more than it costs you in mats and there will always be somebody leveling that needs some gear on an alt. Others are in your same situation where they die more often and they'll want to get keep upto date with their gear, be the guy who sells it to them.

 

Spend 30mins one night checking the GTN for gaps in the market you can fill with the crafts you have now.

 

Or if you can just craft 2 of every blue and purple item you can make, and sell it all at once. Watch what sells and what doesn't and make more of the ones that sold in 24 hours.

 

Sell for slightly less than the price others are selling at. And never go below the price it costs in materials it took to make it.

 

Worst MMO advice ever.

Crafting is a money pit, pure and simple.

The market for leveling gear is hit or miss on a GOOD day, and this guy is asking you to invest MORE credits into materials to learn and make items that may or may not sell.

You could just as easily do that with the random gear you get from drops and then list the materials you gather along the way.

I 100% guarantee you will make more money by NOT spending a single credit more on crafting.

You having "built something", you've spent time and energy and credits on something you could easily power-level once you 50+ and can buy the mats you need by doing dailies.

[Kerensk]

Worst MMO advice ever.

Crafting is a money pit, pure and simple.

The market for leveling gear is hit or miss on a GOOD day, and this guy is asking you to invest MORE credits into materials to learn and make items that may or may not sell.

Like all MMO things it depends on your skill and knowledge. Crafting is a money pit for people who don't know what they're doing. If you know how to play it's easy money.

 

Surely all you gatherers have to wonder why people buy your mats. You thought you were playing us crafters for fools, let me give you a glimpse into our crafter world.

 

I used to make millions on blue mid level earpieces. I'd sell for an average of 16000 a piece, 8000 on a bad day, 30000 on a good day. It cost me 6 green mats and 2 blue. The blues were usually the most expensive at 1000 a piece, greens were usually about 200 (you can check your prices to see if it's still the same). End result was that I made about 10000 per sale on average, I'd only sell about 2 per skill per level but that's still about 10 earpieces a day (100000 credits a day). I did all this from fleet in between PvP queues.

 

A lot of market knowledge is needed. Know where to focus and only develop those schematics (don't "get all the schematics!" like mat gatherers assume we do). You don't lose anything if the items don't sell, just be patient and re-list later when the market isn't dry.

 

Generally purple items had less ROI since purple mats are so expensive EXCEPT on synthweaving. UT crafters always have too much fabrics and often let it go for cheap on the GTN. But item buyers on the market expect purple items to be expensive so you can markup like crazy. I sold purple synthweavings for 30-60k and was buying the purple mats for 1000 a piece. But that was pre-55 days, not sure if that market is still there.

 

I've crafted every skill in the game and ALL of them have items that sell for more than their material costs. Always sell for more than your cost in mats, be patient and re-list if they don't sell, and you'll never lose money; it's that simple. The only variable is how quickly you make money.

Edited April 10, 2014 by Kerensk

[Loc_n_lol]

Bad advice. Don't skip buying any of your skills unless they are Speeder Piloting ranks II and III.

 

This is how you get level 50+s who don't have an interrupt.

 

Well, when the trainer asks you for 20k+ credits for a 5% increase on the damage done by your stun, you know it's just a credit sink.

[chillshock]

I don't think, unless you really LOVE crafting, you'll ever get the credits back it took you to learn it. By now I am totally confident, that even buying artifact quality items for the mods from the GTN is a more effective and cheaper way to get 'really good' leveling gear. Financed by other peoples longing for a crafting skill but not the patience to level it up "the classic way": by gathering.

 

One thing you absolutely MUST skip: The items you don't ever want to craft - dont get the schematics! Way too expensive to "just have". So unless you want to use it to level your skill or even better: Use it to RE and craft advanced versions.

 

I repeat: Do NOT buy schematics for items you are never ever going to craft. That's something you can do if bored. With you first million creds or something.

[nightsproull]

If you enjoy the gameplay, but aren't serious about crafting, don't waste your time with it. The gear you can make on the best of days is mostly only useful for companions. I can assure you that gearing up companions is not a good reason to level crafting skills.

 

If you really truly want to have the highest level recipes, be prepared for a frustrating grind and spending a lot of effort and money to get the recipes that people will buy. If you just want to play the game and occasionally buy something nice for yourself, like the 34 hilt, it's much easier just to farm dailies. Use the creds to buy cool stuff, and the comms to gear out comps.

 

Also understand that some of the people who make serious money crafting have been doing it for a long time, and have 4 or more alts with gathering skills like slicing whose only real purpose in life is to have five companions that can be sent off on the max level gathering missions.

 

If you just want to have fun, ignore crafting, or go biochem, as it's definitely useful for the ability to use reusable stims/medpacs/adrenals.

[dr_mike]

Well, when the trainer asks you for 20k+ credits for a 5% increase on the damage done by your stun, you know it's just a credit sink.

 

I don't know about others but most increases I see and for a small number of percentage points.

[JacksonMo]

Like all MMO things it depends on your skill and knowledge. Crafting is a money pit for people who don't know what they're doing. If you know how to play it's easy money.

 

Surely all you gatherers have to wonder why people buy your mats. You thought you were playing us crafters for fools, let me give you a glimpse into our crafter world.

 

 

Well this IS "New Player Help" so go ahead and encourage them to jump into crafting with both feet.

You forgot to mention that your competition in the crafting market will routinely take notice of the healthy profit margins you are making and under-cut you.

I make money crafting too, but as you admit, it takes a lot of time and research. And even when you find something, the bottom-feeders insist on undercutting everyone else until your profit margin literally depends on crafting crits doubling your outcome.

And that's in a market niche that will happily pay 20 - 30k profits per augment kit ALL.DAY.LONG.

Do they do that? Oh HELL no! 80k+ for MK9 kits was standard for months. Then it slipped to 70k. Now it's slipped to 60k.

I did the math. I tracked what it costs sending companions out for materials. Even factored in the materials you get back REing the ear pieces. Long story short, the break-even point was approximately 60k.

I've tried other segments of the crafting market as well, as you suggested. Same results each time. And I've been in this game long enough I maxed out my legacy level long ago. Been playing MMO's for over a decade and making money crafting is ALWAYS a hit or miss proposition. You CAN make plenty of money, but quite often you find your bank vault filled to capacity with rubbish gear no one wants.

 

That's why, for NEW players, I always recommend gathering. When they reach 50+ and want to begin getting into crafting, their income from dailies will dull the pain of any mistakes they make learning the markets.

Crafting before then, you either get it right every single time, or you're flat broke.

[Kerensk]

Well this IS "New Player Help" so go ahead and encourage them to jump into crafting with both feet.

Yup.

This is new player HELP, the fact that people are even here reading means they're more educated than 90% of the players online. I explained how a new player can start to make money on the market with little work. Everybody needs to start somewhere, the sooner you start learning the more you'll know later; especially crafting, it's like getting a ball rolling it starts out slow but the bigger it gets the faster it moves. Start the ball rolling early, but time to hit 55 it will be a profitable side job while you grind dailies.

The OP already had work put into developing crafting and people were telling him to wipe it all and start over. Never throw away experience you already gained. Especially when it cost money to gain it.

You forgot to mention that your competition in the crafting market will routinely take notice of the healthy profit margins you are making and under-cut you.

Let 'em.

This is where your anti-crafting stance falls apart and what you don't understand. If somebody under cuts you (it happens often) to the point sales are not profitable...

DONT GO LOWER!

Keep selling at the price you make money. If it doesn't sell you lose NOTHING, just re-list till sells. If you know how much it cost to make something and sell above that you'll never lose money. Worst case scenario you break even.

 

I have had things not sell for 3 weeks, I had a cargo Bay full of crafted gear. The guy undercutting so low lost money and dropped out of the market, while he was undercutting he scared all the other sellers away. Then I sold off all my gear and literally owned the market. My patience meant that when I sold I could mark up to huge profits so that it was better than if I had competed with the undercutter for the last 3 weeks.

I make money crafting too, but as you admit, it takes a lot of time and research. And even when you find something, the bottom-feeders insist on undercutting everyone else until your profit margin literally depends on crafting crits doubling your outcome.

Yes it take time and research, I'd add patience too. But no, crits don't matter unless you're in incredibly narrow margins. That's why I advise selling high quantity of 30k leveling gear instead of ultra rare high quality endgame gear where you only get one sale a week and only make back 10% of the price in mats.

 

The whole trick with crafting isn't selling the most expensive items, it all about selling the items that cost significantly less in mats than they sell for and letting high turnover make the money. That way you cut your risk down to nothing and can weather market instability.

I did the math. I tracked what it costs sending companions out for materials. Even factored in the materials you get back REing the ear pieces. Long story short, the break-even point was approximately 60k.

It's either crap gear or bad math (or the mistake of getting ALL earpiece schematics).

I did the same, I looked at what the cost in mats was to craft an item then checked the GTN to see if it sold higher than that. Most did, some by the tens of thousands. So I bought only those schematics, crafted 4 greens to get the blue schematic and I was rolling. In most cases the schematic and 4 greens cost me less than 10k and I made more profit than that on my first sale. Selling roughly 2 a day for 2 years the startup cost spread across my returns would be a couple credits.

Which is another reason to get on board early, the more sales you make the better your ROI. As long as you keep your selling price above cost, simple turnover will make money.

 

And don't forget every negative scenario you mentioned above applies to selling materials too, usually with worse results:

 

-People undercut your price for mats. Since I don't farm I shop alot and wait for those deals. I usually purchase green mats for less than 200 a piece (and I only need 4-6 to make an item that will sell for +10k).

-For non scavengable mats (or if you let you companions do the work) you have to pay money to do the mission, and sometimes they fail completely. That money is lost, if my items don't sell I get my listing fee back and can try again.

-And your don't factor in the time spent to wander a planet farming nodes.

Spend the extra hour or two you spent gathering on space, pvp, and flashpoints and you'll already have more money. While you're playing your items are still selling. Even offline you gear is still for sale 24 hours a day.

-The market for crafted items is wide, for materials it's very narrow leading to massive competition. There are four level 3 scavengable materials for all material sellers to compete in. In the comparable level 30-40 Cybertech item range there are 3 main items (mod, armor, ear), multiplied by 3 item levels (usually 4 levels between mods), multiplied by the 4 mainstats coverd, multiplied by about 3or4 secondary stats at Blue level (power, crit, tank, etc.). That's 108 to 144 variations. Even if you don't count the secondary stat variations there are 36 markets I can compete in with the 4 mats a scavenger can make.

 

Crafting takes knowledge and patience. If you have both crafting is much easier, less time consuming, and more profitable than being a farming Mule. The sooner you start the sooner you can become a millionaire that knows the market and you can graduate to simply buying under priced gear and reselling it for a higher price (which is the only reason I'm letting my old crafting tricks go).

Edited April 13, 2014 by Kerensk

[JacksonMo]

Yup.

This is new player HELP, the fact that people are even here reading means they're more educated than 90% of the players online. I explained how a new player can start to make money on the market with little work. Everybody needs to start somewhere, the sooner you start learning the more you'll know later; especially crafting, it's like getting a ball rolling it starts out slow but the bigger it gets the faster it moves. Start the ball rolling early, but time to hit 55 it will be a profitable side job while you grind dailies.

 

Well, the point of the original post was MAKING money, not building a "side job" for after he hits 55.

 

The OP already had work put into developing crafting and people were telling him to wipe it all and start over. Never throw away experience you already gained. Especially when it cost money to gain it.

 

Dropping the crafting skill, or not, is of small consequence. Sinking more and more money into it while it has yet to turn a profit is just foolish.

 

Let 'em.

This is where your anti-crafting stance falls apart and what you don't understand. If somebody under cuts you (it happens often) to the point sales are not profitable...

DONT GO LOWER!

Keep selling at the price you make money. If it doesn't sell you lose NOTHING, just re-list till sells. If you know how much it cost to make something and sell above that you'll never lose money. Worst case scenario you break even.

 

I'm not "anti-crafting". Don't put words in my mouth. I stated quite plainly that I've made money crafting.

If your crafted items don't sell you are not out NOTHING:

1. You are out what it cost to learn the schematic.

2. You are out the potential profits from selling the mats consumed not only making the items you put up for sale, but the green items you reverse engineered to learn the blue versions.

 

There are three possible versions of Blue to learn from each green schematic. Critical (+crit), Overkill (+power) and Redoubt (+defense). Each of these will appeal to different players. Some are all but worthless (ie Redoubt scoundrel gear)

 

I have had things not sell for 3 weeks, I had a cargo Bay full of crafted gear. The guy undercutting so low lost money and dropped out of the market, while he was undercutting he scared all the other sellers away. Then I sold off all my gear and literally owned the market. My patience meant that when I sold I could mark up to huge profits so that it was better than if I had competed with the undercutter for the last 3 weeks.

 

And here you go! It leveling to 50 doesn't take very long. Three weeks after Alderaan you can easily be standing on Illum still waiting for your level 30 gear to sell. What you don't seem to be getting is that the NAMES of the bottom feeders is always changing. When one person goes out of business, another has already taken his place. With luck you can catch a window in between to unload your items.

 

Yes it take time and research, I'd add patience too. But no, crits don't matter unless you're in incredibly narrow margins. That's why I advise selling high quantity of 30k leveling gear instead of ultra rare high quality endgame gear where you only get one sale a week and only make back 10% of the price in mats.

 

We aren't talking about end-game gear, obviously.

 

The whole trick with crafting isn't selling the most expensive items, it all about selling the items that cost significantly less in mats than they sell for and letting high turnover make the money. That way you cut your risk down to nothing and can weather market instability.

It's either crap gear or bad math (or the mistake of getting ALL earpiece schematics).

I did the same, I looked at what the cost in mats was to craft an item then checked the GTN to see if it sold higher than that. Most did, some by the tens of thousands. So I bought only those schematics, crafted 4 greens to get the blue schematic and I was rolling. In most cases the schematic and 4 greens cost me less than 10k and I made more profit than that on my first sale. Selling roughly 2 a day for 2 years the startup cost spread across my returns would be a couple credits.

Which is another reason to get on board early, the more sales you make the better your ROI. As long as you keep your selling price above cost, simple turnover will make money.

 

 

And here is where you get it right. The only issue I have is that you ask him to invest those start-up costs when he can least afford them, while leveling his first toon.

 

And don't forget every negative scenario you mentioned above applies to selling materials too, usually with worse results:

 

-People undercut your price for mats. Since I don't farm I shop alot and wait for those deals. I usually purchase green mats for less than 200 a piece (and I only need 4-6 to make an item that will sell for +10k).

 

You fail to mention, or perhaps forgot, that every gathering skill, at each tier of ability, has at least one item that is harder to find and pushes it's price up. And by your own advise, don't list items for less than it costs to run the missions gathering them.

 

-For non scavengable mats (or if you let you companions do the work) you have to pay money to do the mission, and sometimes they fail completely. That money is lost, if my items don't sell I get my listing fee back and can try again.

 

And you have to factor that into your costs, like I did crafting MK-9 augment slots.

 

 

-And your don't factor in the time spent to wander a planet farming nodes.

Spend the extra hour or two you spent gathering on space, pvp, and flashpoints and you'll already have more money. While you're playing your items are still selling. Even offline you gear is still for sale 24 hours a day.

 

Who said anything about farming? Just keep your companions busy and pick up what you find along the way doing your quests, you can easily be a millionaire by level 30 with all available class training. I've done it several times. I did it that way with my first toon. I did it that with with multiple alts getting no help from my level 50/55's along the way.

 

-The market for crafted items is wide, for materials it's very narrow leading to massive competition. There are four level 3 scavengable materials for all material sellers to compete in. In the comparable level 30-40 Cybertech item range there are 3 main items (mod, armor, ear), multiplied by 3 item levels (usually 4 levels between mods), multiplied by the 4 mainstats coverd, multiplied by about 3or4 secondary stats at Blue level (power, crit, tank, etc.). That's 108 to 144 variations. Even if you don't count the secondary stat variations there are 36 markets I can compete in with the 4 mats a scavenger can make.

 

Crafting takes knowledge and patience. If you have both crafting is much easier, less time consuming, and more profitable than being a farming Mule. The sooner you start the sooner you can become a millionaire that knows the market and you can graduate to simply buying under priced gear and reselling it for a higher price (which is the only reason I'm letting my old crafting tricks go).

 

36 possible markets to compete in in Cybertech alone.

That's alot to learn for someone starting out from scratch.

Oh, and you're competing against not only other crafters, but also against the players listing random drops in the hope of picking up extra cash above what a vendor will give them. Which also often don't sell, even when listed at the default price because I'm feeling lazy and don't want to research the market for prices.

 

Know what it costs you to gather the materials via missions and use that as your base line. Don't sell below it, and don't run missions that drive up your costs. (moderate grade 9 scavenging missions cost too much for the mats returned at about 1k each, compared to 500-600 each for other missions)

Metals usually list around 800 each while compounds can fluctuate anywhere from 1k to 2k each

 

You can take up to three gathering skills, you can only take one crafting skill. If you MUST craft, choose wisely.

If you choose to gather, and you aren't happy with your profits, you can drop it and start over. The profits from selling the mats in the new skill will more than pay for the missions along the way.

 

Like I've said, you CAN make money crafting.

You will ALWAYS make money doing it my way.

 

Edit: Correction, the break even point for MK-9 augment kits is approximately 42k according to my crafting notes not 60k as I stated. The point that they continue to slide remains true. My estimate does not include crits which are unpredictable.

Edited April 14, 2014 by JacksonMo
Correction

[NicholasNI]

Best advice I was ever given was don't spend credits on things you don't need. Only spend them on these key things whilst leveling.

 

1) New skills from your trainer (This is obvious, better abilities mean stronger attacks, things die quicker etc)

 

2) Speeders - makes things that much quicker completing new planets.

 

3) If you're seriously running low on creds; complete all the missions on each planet + the optional bonus series alongside it (they have a lot of credits attached). Combine that with the odd flashpoint and perhaps daily space missions and you shouldn't be running low with cash at all.

 

4) Try not to die as often. I know, I know this seems obvious but seriously you will save a heck of a lot of credits when u don't have to keep repairing your gear.

 

Hope that helps!