Just started trade skilling, noticed there are 4 question marks at the bottom of my new recipies that fill up as I make more of that item. I only have ever filled up two of them (when my recipe fails the first time then i try a second time). Is there any advantage to filling all 4 up? Can you make the item better or something if you do that? Also I don't have any recipies to use the "rare" items from nodes yet, do I have to buy those or become higher level to get them? I'm only level 8 crafting so far and just got the begining recipes.
These are a hold-over from when the crafting process could result in varying qualities of goods. For the most part these have been removed from the combines so you get either a Pristine result, or just fuel/components back. They're effectively just placeholders now.
Basically it just means that you've never crafted that before. Mendou is right about it being a hold-over, but a little more in detail, the 4th one is your PRISTINE quality item. Thats usually your goal for what you want to make, and the one that will give you a Bonus Experience reward for the first time you craft it. Dont bother trying to finish the lower quality stuff, its a waste and there is no reward. So the first time you make that item, you should get the question mark replaced with an icon of the item you are making. So if you make a Pristine item (the 4th bar) you'll have an icon in place of the question mark the next time you make the item. But if you only succeed to the third bar, you'll get an icon there in the 3rd bar, and your 4th bar will still be a question mark. The next time you make the item after you've competed one Pristine, it will show ALL 4 tiers of items, usually the first two or three will show as fuel components, the last is the product you are aiming for, depending on what you are making.
welcome to crafting young noob Important thing to note about crafting. You will get 6 "reaction" arts that help you in making your items. The goal of making the item is to reach the 4th question mark (which simply denotes you are making a recipe you havent made before and you dont know what is going to get created when you succeed). The 4th level down is pristine, all subsequent levels of crafting have been removed now. Occassionally you might see when doing rare crafting the rare appear in the level 1-3. This means if you fail you will get your rare back but the other components are lost on failure. Ok, back to the reaction arts. You will notice at the top of the crafting window two lines, a green one and a blue one. The green is durability and the blue one is progress. These are important. The durability is the level you can make. If your green line drops level the 4th tier, that level will disappear until you get your durability back up into that tier. This is where the reaction arts come in so stay with me. There are 6 icons on the crafting window, you can hit them with your mouse or by using the keys 1-6 on your keyboard when the crafting window has focus. The buttons 1-3 increase durability and buttons 4-6 increase progress (how fast you are working to complete your craft). Some reactions increase durability but lower progress while others simply increase durability, the progress can lower durability or simply raise progress. put your mouse over them for a description of what each does. Notice the icons, even though there are 6 are effectively 2 sets of 3. From time to time an icon will appear which looks like 2 of the icons on your bottom bar (1 progress and 1 durability). You must click "react" to that icon by pressing one of the correpsonding reaction art icons you have (1 durability or the 1 for progress). Countering will give you a boost in either durability or progress. Here is the important part - you can use the reaction arts proactively and not just as a reaction to the problem icons that arise. Hitting the 1-2-3 buttons from time to time and/or as needed will keep your durability high, ensuring a high level of probable success while using 4-5-6 will help you finish faster. Hope that helps get you on your way, enjoy~
Thanks a bunch! A friend told me I probably need special recipies to have the items that would use rare components. As for the ? mark thing I definately won't bother filling them up then I got the jist of the durabilty/progress thing but appreciate greatly your explanation, I'm sure it will help a ton for any other noob crafters just starting to read what you wrote. The guides and info I had found made me think I was going to have to organize my own hotkey bars and do all kinds of crazy things, I figured it out but your explanation was even better. Basically gotta build the item before the bottom green bar runs out. Thanks all, I'm sure I'll be back here as I advance further hehe.
