Tailoring -- The Smart Way

Convention tells you: Make leather gloves. Make leather boots. Make leather sleeves. Rinse. Repeat. Again, and again, and again.

But-- Is this the best way to level your tailor up? The answer is a resounding NO!

OK then, smarty pants, what do I do?

Until you reach level 500, you are stuck with the pain of making leather gloves, boots, and sleeves. Once you hit 500, though, your worries are over-- it's time to put it into overdrive!

The secret? Double-stitched cloth. Midgardians will know it as Thick Padded cloth, and you Hibbies out there call it Thick Woven cloth. It's the high level cloth-- the stuff that at the highest material tier has an AF of 51.

Start with double-stitched gloves, at level 535. I start working the gloves when my skill hits 525. Do gloves until you hit 555, at which point the boots are 10 points from turning yellow. Do boots until 590, and then switch to sleeves to take you to the next crafting title, all the way to 625. Repeat this pattern until you are done!

It really is that simple. The rate at which you will earn Tailoring points are significantly better than with traditional leather skilling up. It's amazing, really. Throw in the smarter crafting tool, and you approach a 50% skill-up rate on a consistent basis! I think it has something to do with the fact you are working on a material tier that is one tier below what your tailoring skill is. For example, at 635, you are making Sylvan items, but your tailoring level is Seamist. /shrug... all I know for sure is it works, and works well.

Did you want a chart? OK fine:

There is one drawback to this scheme, and that is your leatherworking skill is going to lag behind the curve while you work the sleeves. Gloves and boots use leather, so no problems there, but the sleeves use no leather, so you'll find yourself short a few points when you're ready to start in on gloves. I've found the easiest way to catch leatherworking up is to make a few swords or a bunch of studded armor for a while. They both give metalworking points as well, so if you are also raising your metalworking skill (with plans to be able to salvage), then this will help in that regard. (See the trinket guide here for details.)

What about cost?

Double-stitched is a lot more expensive than leather, right? I mean, this method is going to cost me a lot more, right? WRONG AGAIN!

Because you are working with the material tier below your current level, the cost is very comparable. Let's look at the chart!

Not only are the sellback losses comparable, about half the time you actually save money working double-stitched. Now factor in the more frequent skill-ups. Let's be conservative and give it a number-- let's say 20% more skill ups on double-stitched. No contest-- Double-stitched wins- in fact it's a TKO!

It Gets Even Better

This also works for Armorcrafters and Reinforced Lamellar (heavy Starkaskodd, heavy Cailiocht Reinforced). I am nearly done with field-testing this. I have leveled an Armorcrafter solely on Reinforced Lamellar gloves, boots, and sleeves, with identical resuilts as Tailoring-- fast and furious skill gains all the way from 525 to 1125. I've used the smarter tool the entire time as well-- contributing to the bounty-- and have approached, again, a 50% skill-up rate. Do I have logs? Unfortunately, no... I didn't think that far ahead. But... I love this strategy of leveling up, and highly recommend it to everyone.

Armorcrafting Cost Comparison

Because I was curious, I put this chart together as well:

This chart demonstrates a more controversial decision to use Reinforced Lamellar, because all the costs favor using studded. And, unfortunately, I did not field test my Armorcrafter in a vacuum; I took orders and otherwise tainted my gold supply, so I don't have an exact idea of how much it cost me to level on Reinforced Lamellar.

However! I remain entirely convinced I saved a lot of money overall. Really, all I had to do is double my skill-up rate, and I save money. I remember under the old-school method, I would make 15, even 20 pairs of studded boots without any skill gain. That virtually NEVER happened using RL. Streaks of 10 point gains in a row were common.

Therefore, RL also wins-- not a TKO, but studded got wtfpwned!

Would it work for Weaponcrafting and Fletching?

That is a good question. WC and Fletching are at a disadvantage off the bat, in that the high-level items (exceptional, fortified, and other DPS 16.5 weapons) are all grouped in the same cluster of points-- from x15 to x40, around there, so you would not be able to take advantage of this system throughout a tier's cycle. Also compounding the situation are shields, at a skill of x95, overlap slightly with DPS 16.5 items.

My limited field testing has demonstrated exceptional and fortified weapons do increase skill gain significantly, but I hesitate to give a definitive statement, since my experience is so limited.

UPDATE!

Since writing this guide, I have heard from several people who have verified that working on exceptional and fortified weapons does in fact return a much better skill-up rate. And, even better, you can almost make it all the way around the tier cycle as well! As one person said:

Plow through the x20 - x55 points quickly. Here you will have to trudge through regular weapons from x55 to x75, but at x75 you can start doing exc. round shields, all the way to x20.

So the bottom line is there are 20 points from x55 to x75 that will be hard to get. Good news for weaponcrafters!