I took forever, making Master crafted items just to transmute them, and spending huge amount to buy items. I worked my transmuting fingers to the bone and finally got to a transmuting level of 170.... now I figure I'll level up my adornments, I have a huge stack of materials to work with. Now I find I can't make a single adornment! EVERY beginning adornment requires 6 Lapis Lazuli and I've only got 4.... after all of that! I can't break down any higher level adornment material into a Lapis Lazuli I can't combine anything to make a Lapis Lazuli. The one combine I found used 6 Lapis Lazuli to make an infusion of earth which I can't use for anything at level 1. So where the heck does everyone get the Lapis Lazuli required to get your Adornments off and running? I'm assuming everyone else had just as much bad luck finding them as I did, how does anyone get anywhere making adornments?
Its a harvested material I think T1 or T2 (it's been a while) break out the pick-axe! May I make a suggestion? In both Qeynos and Freeport there is a once a day adornment trainer who will help you level your adorning and all you have to pay for is your fuel. He is located up the steps in the trade-skill society in North Qeynos, his twin in Freeport I'm sure is also pretty easy to find.
As Wurm mentioned lapis lazuli is a harvestable. Doing the daily is a great way to raise adorning. Also the adorner npc is in every city not just Qeynos and Freeport.
You can also buy recipes that turn powders into fragments (and vice versa). It only works between materials in the same tier, but it is still very useful. As Wurm mentioned, there is also the daily adorning quest. There is one in every starting city (not just Freeport and Qeynos) and you only need to supply fuel. Additionally the daily adorning quest seems to be more generous with skill-ups then the regular adorning recipes.
He also gives you a few extra mats to make the adorns he wants; so make sure to keep making them until the crafting UI shows no mats left before turning in the daily. Once you turn it in the extras will disappear and they are usually good for an extra point or two.
Ardrek meant lapis lazuli fragments, so no, it's not a harvestable. (Though he could harvest rough lapis lazuli, craft stuff from it, and transmute that to make lapis lazuli fragments.) There are transmuting recipes that convert 1 powder into 7 fragments or 10 fragments into 1 powder (transmuting distillations vol 1, and ... the other book named similarly, I'm not in game to check.) You can use those to balance out your supplies if you're powder-heavy (I assume all your mastercrafted transmuting was spells; equippables should have given you a ton of fragments). And if you only have higher-level bits (coral fragments +), then you need more level 1-9 stuff to transmute into tier 1 parts, or you have to grind the daily transmuting task that gives you the materials you need, as mentioned above.
As others have mentioned, you should run the daily adorning quest to get your skill ups on the cheap. I haven't run it in some time as I've been maxed for some time and haven't yet maxed for the current expansion, but back in the day it was important to note that while the quest requires 10 combines, you're given enough materials for 11 so always take that extra at bat (unless its changed). As for making adornments at tier 1, I wouldn't bother. People go through that tier so fast it's not really worth adorning their gear, which makes your sales outlook bleak. To get your transmuting up I've found the best way at is to keep a watch on the broker for cheap adept spells in the level range for your current skill (see http://eq2.wikia.com/wiki/Transmuting for a chart). Before you know it you'll have plenty of transmuted bits to play with.
thanks, I couldn't understand making all of the adorning material names to match names of other items. I could just shoot the developers for that. ( rough coral / coral fragment, rough lapis / lapis fragment, etc ) It makes the auction house very annoying to work with.
AS FOR THE DAILY suggestions! I just figured out they give the recipes with the daily, I thought I was going to have to level to learn what they wanted.
my suggestion? if you can't mass production yourself yet, find a guildmate or friend that can! Harvest or get your hands on t1 rares, batches of 25, 50 or 100 and have your mass production done of t1 rare gear or experts and transmute those for t1 supplies!
I think its a waste to MAKE mastercrafted items and THEN to transmute them. Just go out and kill mobs. You can transmute any treasured/ legendary/ fabled gears or adept/ master spell books - much easier that way. Camp for some easy named boss and you'll get something to transmute every time. Or, like previously said, you can buy them off brokers; although the reasonably priced ones are hard to find. For tier 1, I used to do "The Deadly Storm" in Frostfang, ~5 min. respawn time, and the mobs around it drop treasures about 1/10 of the time.
For low level gear, Terror, it's faster to harvest a bunch and make the MC gear. Actuallly, the best is to get a scholar, because they can make the experts at various levels... so you can ramp up the level of the item for more chances at transmuting skill ups.
Daily adorning quests is how i got out of "adorning 'ell" Lapis Lazuli fragments and Ulteran Powders are obtained by transmuting lvl 1-9 Treasured items (only found in starter zones).
