Platinum is the main type of currency players use in Rift: Planes of Telara. In most MMORPG games it’s called gold so this would in fact be a gold making guide, but since it’s called Platinum in Rift, it’s a platinum guide. There, that’s settled.
This page will try to give you some basic tips and tricks on how you can earn more platinum. Since Rift is still a relatively new game some of these strategies may not work after some time, and many strategies don’t even exist yet. The game economy is still not developed as many players are just now leveling up their characters and not working on leveling professions. However I’ll attempt to provide as many tips as I can from my experiences playing the game, and if you have any be sure to add them in the comments section below!
Do expect this page to be frequently updated though with as much info I can possibly gather so be sure to bookmark it, like it on facebook and other good things.
Making Platinum With Quests
For the first few levels you’ll be making platinum (or rather silver, and an occasional gold piece) by completing quests almost exclusively. You’ll also be gaining some money by killing monsters.
Fortunately you won’t need to purchase anything, except perhaps food and some potions. I do in fact recommend you purchase some, as it will help you kill monsters faster, and the prices are pretty cheap. Potions are a great way to keep yourself alive when you happen to pull an extra monster on yourself.
The only investment I can recommend with your extra gold is buying bags. However, you will also gain bags from quests and monster drops, so be sure not to waste too much money on them. You should however upgrade them as soon as possible, because all those gray quality items you will be looting can all be sold to vendors for extra income.
For more info on quests see this leveling guide from Leveling-guides.com. It will show you how to most effectively and quickly finish them in order to maximize your platinum gain.
Making Platinum With Gathering Professions
Gathering professions are currently, and I suppose will for quite some time the easiest platinum-making opportunity. There are always players looking to level up their crafting skills, and you should be the one to capitalize on it.
I recommend you learn at least two different gathering professions since you will very frequently come across lootable materials like ore and herbs. All the time while you’re leveling up you should pay attention to your minimap (don’t forget to turn the tracking on!) and if the materials are easily gathered be sure to collect them. It’s frequently not worth going for a herb or wood if you have to fight your way to it through 3-4 monsters, but remember that those monsters also give out experience and drops.
Mining is from my experiences the most profitable gathering profession. There’s tons of weaponsmiths and armorsmiths looking for materials and there’s almost always a shortage. You can sell your ore at decent prices on the auction house, and quite frequently make tons of extra platinum when there’s a high demand.
By gathering plants and wood with foraging you’ll be selling the materials mostly to apothecaries and artificers, but also weaponsmiths. There’s plenty of mages and clerics looking for those materials, enough to make foraging lucrative.
Butchery is quite possibly the most convenient gathering tradeskill to have because you will constantly be killing tons and tons of beasts which can be skinned for leather and hides. That gives you the largest pool of resources, but plenty of players are aware of it and selling leather isn’t as profitable as selling other materials.
If you really want to bank it and reach the level cap with tons of platinum, you could always take all three gathering professions. You will have an incredible amount of materials to resell on the auction house, but also be sure to put some away in your bank when the time comes for you to level up your own crafting skills.
Making Platinum With Crafting Professions
Crafting items is currently not nearly as profitable as it should be. Many players are just beginning with the game and haven’t reached the level cap yet, and those who did most likely can craft much of the items on their own. In short, crafting is profitable if you’re level 50 with a maxed profession, but otherwise it’s just a drain on your platinum.
Why? Because most players can’t afford to constantly buy new items, and the quests provide so many of them that it’s even not necessary. The only items worth buying while you’re leveling up are weapons (especially two-hand weapons and bows) since there’s a shortage of them from quests, and they boost player’s damage output significantly, unlike most other gear. That alone makes weaponsmithing a lucrative crafting profession, and armorsmithing nearly useless.
If you do pick any of these crafting professions I recommend having Runecrafting as well, because it will allow you to Runebreak items you don’t need or can’t sell for other materials. Runebreaking is very expensive to level up since you won’t be selling items to vendors or players but rather destroy them, but once you reach level 50 it will be extremely profitable. This is in part due to the fact that players of lower levels are constantly upgrading their gear and it’s not worth upgrading it with runes.
Basically it’s currently hard to make significant amounts of platinum with crafting professions. Most items are hard to sell to players who are just leveling up.
Bind On Equip Items
Bind on Equip (BoE) items are hard to find, but they can be extremely profitable if you come across one. They are typically of blue quality (rare) and sometimes even purple (epic), and have noticeably higher stats than green items obtained from quests for the same level.
The value of these items is not so much in providing higher stats and therefore improving your character, but in the fact that most players believe these items are of higher value than they actually are. It’s true that these items are better than any greens you will come across, but on the other hand in 4-5 levels you’ll start getting green gear which is of the same quality.
If you loot a BoE item, I don’t recommend equipping it. It’ll be nice to have one short-term, but you will potentially miss out on a lot of platinum: just hop to the nearest auctioneer and sell it to someone with too much platinum on their hands. I guarantee you will find someone who wants to buy your overpriced item; just be careful and make sure you set the right price.
Auction House Flipping
Flipping items on the auction house (AH) is a well-known strategy from other games, most notably WoW. I used to make thousands of gold every week just by spending 10-20 minutes browsing the AH every day, and that was years ago when a thousand gold used to be a lot.
In Rift, it’s just the same, or perhaps even easier. I constantly see under priced items on the auction house which I frequently purchase myself and resell later on for almost twice as much. It’s also amazing if you have Runecrafting profession because very often you will come across a really cheap item that is worth a lot more if you runebreak it and use or sell shards. Even though it’s rare, you can also find items which are actually worth more if you sell it to a vendor than the price the seller is asking for on the AH. It’s insane, but there’s always someone being impatient or careless, and you’re the one who should be profiting from it.
The biggest downside to flipping items on the AH is that it takes time to get to know the market and the items. You need to be extra careful in the first two weeks when buying items if you don’t know for how much they typically sell because you could quite easily lose platinum. The easiest way to get started with flipping is by focusing on a narrow niche: for example if you’re selling certain raw materials yourself you most likely know the prices and if you see someone listing it for low price, buy it and re-list it with a higher one. It’s a very basic tip that might or might not make you a few gold coins, but you’ll soon learn when you should buy/sell yourself.
Your Tip?
I only know so much about Rift. There are tons and tons of gold and platinum making strategies for Rift, and I’m sure you have a tip or two. Please share it with everyone else so we can earn a few coins as well.
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