If you’re asking yourself “What can I do to prepare my character for Heavensward?” you’ve come to the right place. Here, we discuss what you can to BEFORE 3.0 hits so you can gain a slight, but meaningful advantage.
Feel free to comment/suggest more ideas for Heavensward preparation!
General Preparation (All character types~)
Finish your STORY QUEST: I’ll mention this again near the end of the guide – but this is pretty damn important! Make sure you’ve completed the VERY LAST STORY QUEST in 2.x questline.
Rested EXP: MAX OUT your rested EXP, as this will help you out immensely. AFAIK 72 hours in a sanctuary is the maximum (Anyone else know the exact amount?)
Prepare Food: We’re not really after the stats, so don’t worry about not having a stack of Flint Caviar, haha. The 3% EXP Bonus is what you’re after.
- Gathering food for gatherers (perception isn’t important when leveling up)
- CP/Craftsmanship food for crafters (Basic stuff, control is so-so leveling up)
Heat of Battle I / II: I’m talking about the Free Company Actions – A flat bonus to EXP gained from killing enemies. This USED TO STACK, although I/we haven’t done this in a while. Remind your FC leader/officers to buy a few of these.
99 Gyashl Greens: Take your chocobo out of the stable and stock up on Gyashl Greens, self-explanatory. Leveling up with a choco sure beats leveling up without one.
Find a group to play with: Goes without saying. Doing dungeons and other things without a group sucks compared to with.
Stocking up on Currency: We cannot know truly how useful they will be come 3.0, but might as well if you have nothing else to do…
- Gil: of course, never a bad thing. Used for crafted gear, materia and other things.
- Allied Seals: from hunting – you never know if it will be relevent!
- GC Seals: surely will be relevant… cap it out before 3.0 comes!
- Ventures: never a bad thing to stock up on. Remember, these guys will level up, too!
Disciple of War / Magic
For the love of god, AGAIN, please check that you’ve completed your story quest, first and foremost. Under your Quest Log > Complete > Main Scenario Quest > TBA should be the last entry.
10 Maximum Completed Levequests: You can get a chunky boost of EXP by completing a total of 10 relevant Levequests for DoW/DoM classes.
- 4 Levequests from St. Coinachs Find (Battlecraft)
- 6 GC Levequests from St. Coinachs Find
- 2 From each GC (Maelstrom, Adder, Flames): You can do them even if you’re not part of that GC.
Note that level 40 Leves incur a penalty (Bluefog/Whitebrim), so I don’t recommend these. You also have a max of 16 active leves between all types. If you have no plans of leveling a crafter or gatherer, by all means repeat the same process in Whitebrim.
6 Maximum Beastman Quests: Complete any (preferably max reputation) Beastman Quest from any NON-IXAL Beast Tribe to get another 6 quests of bonus EXP. You can also do the highest 3 and second-highest 3 from the same tribe so you dont have to travel around. Note that you can only have a maximum of 6 Beast Tribe quests active.
Any random quest you have unfinished: Impractical, but if you have some high level quests lying around submit them before 3.0
Disciple of Hand
6 Maximum Completed Levequests: There are a total of 6 total relevant leves you can pre-complete to gain EXP in 3.0 – 3 from your crafter Hometown, 3 from local levemete (Mor Dhona).
- From your crafters hometown: 1 Single-submits, 1 Courier, 1 Triple.
- From St. Coinachs find: 2 Single-submits, 1 Triple.
Items needed for these leves: 4 from single/courier and 18 from repeatables,
What’s my crafters ‘hometown’? ALC, GSM, WVR: Ul’dah. CRP,LTW: Gridania. ARM, BSM, CUL: Limsa.
6 Maximum Beastman (IXAL ONLY) Quests: Complete any (preferably max reputation) IXAL quest to get another 3-6 quests of bonus EXP. Naturally, take the 3 highest rep quest first, then go downwards. Note that you can only have a maximum of 6 Beast Tribe quests active.
GC Supply Missions: The moment you login, craft/buy the required items for the GC submission. This is a free leve, and if its a star-item, submitting HQ will chunk your EXP up a huge amount.
Disciple of Land
4 Maximum Completed Levequests: A decent chunk of EXP can be gained by doing this, make sure you have at least 1 of each “evaluation” levequest (since they give the highest exp).
- 4 Levequests from St. Coinachs Find (Fieldcraft)
A decent gear set: While BiS is something most hard-core gatherers have, newer players might not have the time or gil to build this up. Remember, when leveling Gathering is far more important that Perception. So just buying i55 greens and capping Gathering is a good idea if you’re short on gil.
GC Provisioning Missions: The very second you login, farm/buy the required materials for the GC submission. This is a free leve, and if its a star-item, submitting HQ will chunk your EXP up a huge amount.
Spreading it between all classes?
So all these preparations have a combined limitation: 16 total active levequests & 6 total active beastmen quests. Here’s what I’ll be doing:
- 4 Battlecraft Leves & 6 GC Leves completed on Main Character.
- 6 Leves for Goldsmith
- 6 Beastmen Quests for Goldsmith
There’s a bunch of ways to squeeze value here… for example:
- 2x Triples & Courier for CRAFTER 1.
- 2x Triples & Courier for CRAFTER 2.
- 2x Evaluation for Miner.
- 2x Evaluation for Botanist.
- 2x Triples for Fisher.
- 6x Leves (GC?) for Main Combat Class.
- 6x Ixal quests split between 2 Crafters
In the end, it all depends on what you want to get up first. Since I’ll be raiding ASAP when 3.0 hits, I will be spending a lot of these resourced on my White Mage.
What to do before Heavensward?
I guess this is part of Heavensward preparation as well.. here are some things you might think about
Cross-class skill classes to 50: If you’re really bored, I suggest leveling up your base-classes to 50 – Why? For example, you main a BLM (50), so you got your ACN to 34 for Eye for an Eye, and Archer to 34 for Quelling Strikes. What if Heavensward releases a level 50+ cross-class skill from Archer or Arcanist? This idea dawned on me quite some time ago, so I decided to level up my mains cross-class classes to 50 (WHM: ACN, THM). You better do the same – it’s better to be safe than sorry. (DONT LET THIS BE SOMETHING YOU REGRET)
Level up some gathering? A luxury for most content… I mean, as of right now you aren’t missing much. This is a brainless source of gil for anyone who bothers themselves with it. Gathering classes are insanely easy to level up with rested EXP. (Related resources: Mining leveling, Botany leveling, Fishing leveling) It’s always better to HAVE the option to gather, rather than rely on others.
Level up some crafting? Again, another luxury, but if you’re out of things to do, might as well start! Max DoH classes might seem troublesome, but the ability to repair your own gear in duty is cool. And for most people, you’ll be able to make a constant stream of gil from any crafting endeavor. I’ve never been sad to be a Builder of the Realm since 2.0, and I think everyone should work up to it. Crafting is fun!
Related Resources:
ALC Leveling, ARM Leveling, BSM Leveling, CRP Leveling, CUL Leveling, GSM Leveling, LTW Leveling, WVR Leveling
Well, good luck preparing for Heavensward! To be honest, these are the ones I thought up of on the top of my head. Again, the most important part of this whole document may just be the bit about cross-class skills. If you have suggestions PLEASE COMMENT!
St. Coinachs Find – 5 Battle Leves and 9 GC leves can be obtained here. Leaving 2 left for another location.
once you pick up the 4 Battle leves go and finish one and come back and another will be open. (Don’t turn in) Repeat this with GC leves as well.
My memory is a bit rusty regarding leves but I believe there was a trick to open up the last leves. I think if you accept all and complete and turn in 1, then the one you turned in plus the leve that was hidden before will be listed. So for the gc leves, accept the 2 for each gc, complete 1 for each gc and there should be 2 more listed for each gc. Plus the one you still have that’s 3 per gc.
As I mentioned my memory is very rusty. I remember doing this trick to guarantee my leve needed for animus books would appear. If it still works them that’s 9 gc leves plus however many normal leves there are
I think this is the perfect time to start saving up some gil, especially if you are NOT a Crafter. Doubly so if you have neither Crafting nor Gathering classes. If you have 3 or 4 star Crafters, watch the trends in the market but be careful: a lot of folk have stopped buying i110 gear and accessories because they are waiting for 3.0. However, a LOT of things still sell for good gil and there is money to be made!! Gatherers may want to stock up on clusters (on Gilgamesh – when new 4 star gear was introduced, the MB price of these skyrocketed.) Another thing to note: If you are serious with your Crafters/Gatherers/Main Warrior Class – get the best weapon for them! Get all Lucis (grindy but easily do-able!) and go for at least one Zeta weapon! I’ve heard rumors that there may be bonuses for those who already have Zeta weapons. I have extrapolated that that statement MAY even include those of us who have Lucis Weapons for our Crafters & Gatherers. Hope this helps!
As far as I’m concerned, Perception is really relevant to leveling thanks to the 300% xp bonus when hitting an HQ item. Hitting a Chain streak with HQ items is thousands of points of xp that you wouldn’t get with a low perception lvl. Not saying Gathering isn’t important – obviously you need to actually GET the items to get xp – but to say that Perception just flat out “isn’t important when leveling up,” I think is wrong. I started leveling a lot faster when I ate HQ Jack-o-lanterns (after reading something about boosting gathering hurting HQ chances) for the perception boost and was getting more consistent HQ hits.
Just my 2 cents.
Aye, perception is important when grinding out nodes. When doing leves, not so. While perception is a great BOOST, gathering is a much needed baseline. a missed strike breaks chains, and has 0% exp…
tldr: perception is a luxury, but welcome!
Does anyone know if they will be increasing the level / rank you can be with the GC’s?
You should add stocking up materias. We will probably have new materias with heavensward too sure but we might be able to use IV’s, III’s or II’s to meld those to new gears. Also being capped on Seals and what not is probably a good thing to do as well.
I will be adding to this very soon!
Don’t forget weekly challenges, they won’t be really “Preparing” per say, but its nice to remember to utilize them when it comes out, its best for the 50+, try no to waste them on the new classes unless you save them till your new class is about 40+ :)
Definitely! As 3.0 approaches, I will be expanding on this, and an ultimate Heavensward MEGAPOST from the depths of the Aetherhell.
Surprised no comments, this is literally some next-level strats. Thanks for making this. Was actually considering this, as well as stocking up on a decent supply on HQ btn/min materials awa precrafted (current) endgame mats(cloths/ingots/etc.). Probably something thy should be constantly done to prevent messed in the first place, but organizing your and your retainers’ inventories before 3.0 can be very helpful.
Thanks! feel free to share it with friends! I still have more ideas on this list… but my to-do pile is ever growing t-t