Catwho wrote:
I make a killing primarily on endgame jewelry, as people buy the HQ items since spiritbond on those goes faster and there is an enormous appetite for high level materia. I also make a point only to sell things that have 0 competition on the boards.... but I make multiples of them. High demand items ftw. I joke that I make four HQ Spinel Rings in five minutes and sneeze out 60K.
That is no joke. I regularly see normal armors going for 18k. Low level stuff. Not as many low level crafters anymore. Everyone is competing at the mid level. Not too many elite elite crafters either. For that you need fully melded craft specific gear (not patricians) and you must have the new glasses and crafter tool (specific class) that requires you craft a crapton of really hard hq 2 star items.
But even gathering hq items is profitable. Anything hq sells well in the gathering market. Since they put in a high score list on lodestone for seal gathering, everyone is doing daily turnins.
I am sitting on about 5 million now, made mostly off of retainer ventures very early on. My retainers got to 50 first on the server, and got the flayer minion and taffeta cloth first on the server. Sold the first taffeta at 1.9 mil and the second at 1.8. The pet for 800k. Now the pet goes for 8k and the cloth for 30k. Supply far exceeded demand once everyone had 50 retainers. Farming glazenuts has made our FC nearly a 3 million profit as well.
I play the materia lotto occasionally, buying materia and transmutating 5 of them into a singe random one. I play III and IV high stakes, and have gotten fairly lucky.
Making glamour crystals can be profitable as well. Simply selling the stuff your retainers bring back from quick ventures can make you a tidy profit.
Boar Leather HQ sells REALLY well. Just a hint. So does toad leather. Also hq jewelry, like Kat says. With the atma hunt, people need to feel like they aren't totally wasting their time.