Crafting worth while early?
 

Just started playing again and I'm leveling a monk (with my GF playing shaman) and a druid (when she doesn't want to play). Should I be crafting my own armor or just selling CB belts and buying from players? Wasn't sure if it's economical early on like this because I remember it feeling expensive when I last played.

For your druid you can tailor up some patchwork. I don't see that sold and it's cheap/easy to make at low skill (trivial is in the mid-20s). For your monk it's harder to make because the Cured Silk trivials go up to 80ish so you'd be better off finding a tailor to make it.

Would it make sense just to train tailoring on the monk too and make patch work stuff not worrying about the 14 weight and the AC loss for now?

I dont think so. I can make you some cured silk if you provide the spider silk.

To be honest, I would do tailoring on the druid. Don't need to worry about looting pelts off of animals since they will add so much weight.

Craft if you like crafting. I "like" fletching (for bows) and lower lvl tailoring (just bags mostly). Brewing is really nice too though not doing much of that here, myself. Typically you will be dumping a lot of plat into crafting and/or time, and then needing to find someone to sell stuff too, not to mention storing it. So, more starting out on the server, looking for a way to make plat, I'd suggest just looting stuff. CB belts sell fine here, easily buy basic armor very quickly at 3pp ea. which is even faster plat than hunting mammoths if you are not stepping over everyone hunting belts.

Oh yeah, and if tailoring, your drui will have tracking, which is a big factor in farming tailoring components... well as good as drui tracking is anyway.

Eh, I would not craft unless you genuinely like crafting.

It's not cost efficient at the low levels.

There are only a handful of professions that reap large dividends (and repeatable ones) in the end game - jewelcrafting, alchemy, and smithing.

JC / Alch are class specific, really.

It takes ~10,000pp to level JC to max. Average profit margin on a JC (platinum, or sapphire/ruby) is between 45pp - 100pp. Even taking an average of 75pp, it takes around 130 pieces of jewelry to just break even, and the market is barely there for it. I can sell maybe 10 pieces in a night if i try.

You're much better off leveling, and then farming items for your cash. If this was a brand-new server, it'd be way different (on Fippy I used to clear over 15k a day in profits)

The general rule of spending time in (Project 1999-era) EverQuest is that leveling is almost always the most efficient path. If you're choosing between:

1) level to 10, earn $ and do tradeskills, level to 30 with gear your made
2) level to 10, earn $ and buy gear, level to 30 with gear your bought
3) level to 30 with gear dropped by mobs, then earn $ and buy/make gear

choose #3. This is because a level 30 earns platinum MUCH faster than a level 10, but a level 10 with purchased/crafted gear won't level much faster (if at all) than a level 10 geared with drops. Gear just doesn't impact leveling that much (except for a few items like the Fungal Tunic, which are way out of a starting player's price range). And the same holds true if you can hold out for higher levels (eg. if you can wait until 40 you can kill hill giants and those drop more platinum than anything you could kill previously).

Now, all that being said, I personally did tradeskills early on because ... well they're fun and I like causing myself carpal tunnel syndrome ;). There's nothing wrong with that.

But if you want to be as efficient with your time as possible, don't earning plat, shop, or tradeskill; just level. When you finally come up for air after leveling you'll be able to accomplish way more than you could back when you were lower level.

The key in this is don't farm for plat at low level.

However, P99 presents some very nice opportunities to make plat as you XP 1-15. Choose XP spots that yeld belts/pads/chips/bear pelts/lightstones. You can sell these easily and often while you XP (GFay/EC/CB/NK). By 10-15 you can have a decent nest egg that will buy you cheap mid-level gear which will last you for a long time.

Going about it like that won't waste any time farming, and will boost your performance as you level a lot more than anything you can make/loot at low level. A weapon for melees or +hp items for anyone can impact your play a lot.

It's easier to earn money 1-15 on p99 than it is to earn money 15-30 in most circumstances.

-cb belts
-deathfist belts
-Orc scalps
-nybright sisters
-bone chips

I made my first small bankroll before 15 - enough to buy 6/19 and 9/19 weapons, a set of plate armor, and some cheap instruments that I wore well into my 40s.

Money was faster from 1-15 than it was up until low to mid 30s.

On a fresh server where everyone is a noob, the market for these items is a lot smaller. Under those circumstances, money comes faster with levels and tradeskill gear will hAve higher profit margins.