Just wanted to throw in some ideas on how to make money at the lower levels. Because everything costs so much so suddenly, it is hard to keep up with gear. So feel free to post things you can do to earn gil at lower levels, by that I mean level 1-10.
Can be quests, item drops, stolen items, etc.
I know there are quest guides and item guides that show what can be used for what, but it's hard to remember everything that's worth keeping. For example, I saw that the "Making Headlines" quest rewards 560 gil, so I decieded to do it. It seemed simple, talk to 4 people and inspect a door in the Ruins.
Finding the 4 taru's were easy, but much to my dismay, the Horutoto Ruins part was incredibly tough and I could not do it. The area you need to go has tons of high level critters (Tough-Extremely Tough checks to my level 7 thief). I could not get past them even timing their movement, etc.
So I know that it can't be done alone until around level 10-12. Varies per class, of course, because I don't know anything about other classes.
Without further ado, here is my list of stuff:
Item Dr[/u]
A slice of land crab meat (rare) River Crabs 200+ gil to vendor
Silk Thread (rare) Crawlers 800+ gil fast sell to AH
Quest It[/u]
Angelica's Signature:
This can be done at level 7, and really cuts the price on level 7 armor. Once you get to level 7, find a quest about Angelica (I forget the name). She will ask you to buy a level 7 decent armor, for Thieves it is Leather Vest (I wear this now). When you equip it, she will make a painting, and give it to you. And a signature I don't know what it's for.
Furnish the painting in your mog house if you want, but personally I sold it for 195 gil to vendor.
Hat-In-Hand quest:
Find it on your own, once again, it is in Waters. Reward is 200 gil and a 2 def +1 wind hat. Can be done at level 1.
If you have any other ideas for lowbie quests, let me know, and help each other get through the lower levels! Kerayu, Mithra Thief of Phoenix.
I have no idea how it is on your server, but on Sylph stacks of earth crystals sold for 1500+, wind for about the same, fire for 2k or so.
however, on backwards ass Cerberus, earth crystal stacks sell for 500 if you're lucky :P I did sell some wind for 1200 but that was luck cause most of the prices are way less. getting dark from 1-10 is pretty hard, but they sell well. fire sells the best, but you have to kill orcs to do that, and they don't drop nearly as much as earths.
anyhow, damn you Cerberus for not having an earth crystal market! that seriously cuts down on my money - with my thief, in seven levels, I had 4 stacks of earths. that would've been around 5k on Sylph :P
Right now, as a lvl 11 monk, I've been farming my way through the Ruins of Esaru w/o ever having to heal.
3 things drop consistently (Fairy prices): Fire crystals (~2k/12), bat wings (~2.5k/12) and wild onions (~3k/12).
It works out to about 5k an hour and, especially if you can solo the balloons w/o too much downtime, it's solid solo exp from 10-12.
My main concern is where to go next. I've checked out the canyon w/o too much luck, but maybe that'll change once I'm closer to lvl 15. I think that the Cardian-area/Beetle-and-Bat area of the Ruins could be great for a solid group, but I've found that getting a bunch of inexperienced lvl 10ish people together tends to be more trouble than it's worth.
