{"id":1481,"date":"2017-10-20T22:00:10","date_gmt":"2017-10-21T05:00:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/swtorista.com\/articles\/?p=1481"},"modified":"2025-06-05T16:41:03","modified_gmt":"2025-06-05T23:41:03","slug":"which-crafting-skill-should-i-choose-in-swtor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/swtorista.com\/articles\/which-crafting-skill-should-i-choose-in-swtor\/","title":{"rendered":"Which crafting skill should I choose in SWTOR?"},"content":{"rendered":"

One of the most common questions I see asked by new Star Wars: The Old Republic players is \u201cwhich crafting skill or crew skill should I choose?\u201d Much like the age-old question of \u201cwhich class should I choose?\u201d this is a question that doesn\u2019t have a solid answer – it really depends on what you want to make, and what you want to do.<\/p>\n

Which Crafting Skill Video<\/h2>\n

Trying to decide which crafting skills you should pick in SWTOR? This video covers what types of items each crafting skill can craft, the pros and cons of each, and some tips and suggestions.<\/p>\n

<\/i><\/a>Watch Video<\/a><\/div>\n

How many crew skills can free-to-play, preferred and subscribed players have?<\/h2>\n

Let\u2019s start off with what\u2019s available. Free-to-play players who have never subscribed are only allowed to have one crew skill. Preferred players who have subscribed or purchased cartel coins in the past but don\u2019t currently have a subscription get 2, and subscribers unlock all three crew skills. The good news is that if you\u2019re a preferred player, you can use a friend\u2019s referral link to get a free crew skill slot, which will bring your total up to 3, just like a subscriber. Free-to-play players are stuck at one until they subscribe though.<\/p>\n

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Crafting & Gathering Crew Skills<\/h2>\n

There are three types of crew skills. Crafting skills, which allow you to actually craft things, gathering skills that allow you to gather materials by sending your companions on missions or by scavenging fallen enemies, and Mission skills that only allow you to send your companions on missions to gather resources.<\/p>\n

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If you are subscribed, it\u2019s generally recommend to get one crafting skill, and the two gathering skills that correspond to it, so you can gather all the materials you need to craft without having to buy them. If you have 6 characters, you can spread the 6 crafting skills among – so don\u2019t stress out too much about only having to pick one.<\/p>\n

If you don\u2019t have six characters or are just starting to play the game, you\u2019re obviously going to want to be a bit more picky about which crafting skills you choose. There is no objectively best crafting skill though – so just pick one that sounds fun!<\/p>\n

Free-to-Play Crafting Skills<\/h2>\n

As a free to play player, you can only have one crew skill per character, and 2 characters per server. This makes your choices a bit tricky. As I mentioned, if you have a crafting skill, you\u2019d normally want to pick the two complementary gathering skills to go with it. However, as a free to play player, you can only have 1.. So what should you do? You have two options.<\/p>\n

The first is just to pick a gathering skill and ignore crafting all together. If you pick Bioanalysis, Archaeology, Scavenging or Slicing, you can loot crafting materials from nodes across the galaxy. This is my personal recommendation if you are levelling – it\u2019s a neat little minigame to grab these crafting nodes while you are running around exploring, and it\u2019s a crew skill that costs no credits, which makes it an especially nice choice for Free to Play players who are capped at 200k credits.<\/p>\n

Archaeology will let you pick up pretty crystals, bioanalysis will let you pick plants and dead beasts, scavenging will let you get scrap metal from droids and trash heaps, and slicing will let you get credits from discarded terminals. Scavenging and Bioanalysis can be especially neat to have, because not only can you pick up the crafting nodes scattered across the galaxy, but you can also pick up the bodies of your fallen enemies.<\/p>\n

You can then decide what to do with the materials you gather – if you need money, you can sell them to vendors or on the GTN for a nice profit, or you can hold on to them in your legacy bank and use them for crafting if you decide to subscribe and unlock the other crew skill slots.<\/p>\n

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If you want to craft as a free-to-play player, you\u2019re going to encounter a lot of restrictions. The biggest one is that companions can only craft one item at a time on a non-subscribed account\u2026 while subscribers can queue up multiple items at a time. Some of the crew skills also can produce items you can\u2019t equip if you\u2019re on a non-subscribed account – for example, if you wanted to choose Artifice to craft yourself pretty lightsaber crystals, a lot of the crafted lightsaber crystals require artifact authorization\u2026 which means you could craft them, but not equip them. Luckily, the basic craftable armor and weapons from Armormech, Synthweaving, Armstech and Artifice can be worn by free-to-play and preferred players, even without artifact authorization.<\/p>\n

Subscriber & Preferred Crafting Skills<\/h2>\n

Subscribers will have a huge range of crafting options available to them though. The first option is just to pick 3 gathering skills from the Archaeology, Scavenging, Bioanalysis and Slicing list. If you\u2019re not interested in the actual act of crafting, this is the option I\u2019d recommend, because you can pick up free materials off the ground and turn them into credits. If you do want to craft, you\u2019ll pick one of the crafting skills and the two complementary gathering and missions skills to go with it.<\/p>\n

If you make the wrong choice or want to switch your crafting skills later don\u2019t worry – you can easily drop a crew skill by pressing the small X beside it in your crew skills panel. Then you\u2019ll have an empty crew skill slot and you can go pick up a new skill at crafting level 0. Just be aware this does erase any progress in the last skill – if you decide to go back to it later, you\u2019ll be starting from scratch.<\/p>\n

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Endgame Crafting<\/h2>\n

If you\u2019re crafting on a high level character, you may choose to craft for endgame rather than for fun. Endgame crafting is crafting purely for statistics – to raise your character\u2019s stats, like your power or endurance, so you can perform better in combat. This includes crafting armorings, mods, enhancements, hilts, barrels, relics, earpieces, implants and augments. Knowing which crafting skills to take for endgame requires you to be familiar with what pieces of endgame gear each crew skill can craft, and which types of stats your specific type of character needs. For example, a healer needs an entirely different set of gear than a tank. If you\u2019re interested in crafting for endgame, I\u2019ve included some links to resources in the description of this video, including how to find out what stats you need and which crew skills can craft what pieces.<\/p>\n