Leveling Alchemy: From Beginner to Master

Heya,

this is a quick guide on getting started with alchemy and leveling to master. I'll explain everything from the ground up, so no prior knowledge of alchemy is required.

Why Level Alchemy: Milestones

Leveling up alchemy unlocks new recipes. Notably:

• At master 1 you'll have all elixirs and their rare procs unlocked and get maximum yield on them *.
• At guru 1 you'll be able to craft purified lightstones.

The higher your level the more mastery you get, which means

• Getting more items per craft
• A higher chance at getting the big lottery drops like
  
  Gold Bar 1,000G or
  
  Sturdy Alchemy Stone of Life.

*T3 elixirs like

Elixir of Frenzy start to yield rare procs (i.e.

Elixir of Endless Frenzy) at Artisan 1. At Master 1 (10 Levels above that) you'll get the maximum number of rare procs.

Step 1: Rent a Residence and a Container

You need a residence to do alchemy, which can be rented for CP (Open the map → click on a city → select a house → 'Residence' → 'Purchase: Residence').

Ideally, you want to get a cheap residence in a convenient location, for example close to the market or the imperial crafting NPC (for example Heidel 1-1 or Calpheon North Gate 4, 1F). By the way, to rent a residence that is part of a house chain, you don't need to have invested in the previous houses.

You also want to rent a

Container, which lets you access the storage from your residence. Storage containers can be rented for 10 CP by interacting with the storage keeper ('Chat' → 'Rent Container').

Step 2: Get an Alchemy Tool

The basic

Alchemy Tool is great for when you're first getting into alchemy. It's sold at vendors for 5,000 silver. However, as you progress, you'll find that higher durability tools are much more convenient because they allow for longer crafting sessions without interruptions.

The

Intermediate Alchemy Tool has 500 durability and has to be crafted at a T3 workshop or higher.

The

Advanced Alchemy Tool has 900 durability and gives 1 second alchemy time reduction and is the most commonly used alchemy tool. When doing alchemy on a larger scale you will likely need to craft your own advanced utensils. You can produce them in a T4 tool workshop, for example Duvencrune 11-1, which likely requires gathering

Log and

Rough Stone (for rotation guides see the gathering page).

Supreme Alchemy Tool has a whopping 5000 durability and also give 1 second alchemy time reduction. Their high durability makes them incredibly useful for longer afk sessions but you can only get them from exchanging these items: 15

Dark Spirit's Greed / 40

Resplendent Medal of Honor / 100

Golden Seal - [Imperial Alchemy] / 25

Oxiterr Crystal.

Step 3: Reduce your Alchemy Time

An alchemy craft takes 10 seconds to complete, which can be reduced to a minimum of 1 second. Reducing your alchemy time is essential for leveling your alchemy fast.

The table below lists items that reduce alchemy time.

Category	Item	Reduction
Utensils	Advanced Alchemy Tool / Supreme Alchemy Tool	1 second
Clothes	Silver Embroidered Alchemist's Clothes	1-7 seconds
	Loggia Alchemist's Clothes / Gorgath Alchemist's Clothes / Manos Alchemist's Clothes	1-7 seconds
Alch Stone	Sturdy Alchemy Stone of Life	0.5-2 seconds
	Life Spirit Stone	1.1 seconds
Food	Seafood Cron Meal	0.6 seconds
Elixir	Verdure Draught	1 second
Lightstone Set	[A Fragment of a Star, a Spoonful of the Moon] Alchemy Time -2 sec Alchemy EXP +10% Alchemy Mastery +20 Weight Limit +30LT	2 seconds
Pearl Shop Costume	[Nova] Pavilla Clothes	2 seconds
Event	Event buffs	usually 1 sec

Here is a cheap setup to reach 1 second alchemy time. No pearl shop costume required.

• 
  Advanced Alchemy Tool /
  
  Supreme Alchemy Tool (1 sec)
• 
  Silver Embroidered Alchemist's Clothes (4 secs)
• 
  Life Spirit Stone (1.1 secs)
• 
  Seafood Cron Meal (0.6 secs)
• 
  Verdure Draught (1 sec)
• 
  [A Fragment of a Star, a Spoonful of the Moon] Alchemy Time -2 sec Alchemy EXP +10% Alchemy Mastery +20 Weight Limit +30LT

It can make sense to invest into mastery clothes if you plan to do alchemy long-term. They're generally more expensive but give mastery on top of alchemy time reduction, which increases your income.

Step 4: Get EXP Buffs

You should run these buffs at all times:

• 
  Verdure Draught
• 
  Seafood Cron Meal

A few buffs to consider:

• 
  Perfume of Swiftness
• 
  [Event] Secret Book of Old Moon (1 Day) (can be bought in the pearl shop for 2k loyalties)
• Life EXP pets
  
  Gray Moon Cat
• Tent Buff:
  
  [Villa] Turning Gates (180 min)
• 
  Treant's Tear - an alchemy stone that gives +30% life EXP. To obtain it, you need a lvl. 60 season character and complete a small quest chain (video guide).
• 
  Sethra's Artifact - Alchemy EXP (obtained from imperial alchemy delivery)
• 
  Mercenary's Life (60 min) (from Rewards tab)
• 
  Caphras - Journal of Nature (from Caphras Journal) A full list of buffs can be found here

Step 5: Recipe and Ingredients

Clear Liquid Reagent and

Pure Powder Reagent are fantastic recipes for leveling up alchemy early on. They are easy to craft and used in many other alchemy recipes. If you're only going to craft one, it's recommended to choose

Clear Liquid Reagent.

Recipe	EXP	Ingredients
Clear Liquid Reagent	400	1 Salt, 1 Sunrise Herb, 1 Wild Grass / Weeds, 1 Purified Water
Pure Powder Reagent	400	1 Sugar, 1 Silver Azalea, 1 Wild Grass / Weeds, 1 Purified Water

Ingredient	How to obtain
Salt / Sugar	Purchase from cooking NPCs.
Sunrise Herb / Silver Azalea	- Gather wild herbs with a hoe, for example at Behr. - Buy at herb vendors like Nieves in Calpheon for 500 and 575 silver.
Wild Grass	Gathered from wild herbs. Can be substituted with Weeds.
Purified Water	- Use Empty Bottle (bought from material vendors) to gather Bottle of River Water and filter it through processing. -Collect Bag of Muddy Water from worker nodes at Leical Falls or Kunid's Vacation Spot and filter it through processing. -Buy from Waida in Sangrain Bazaar for 5,000 silver.

Step 6: Start Crafting

First, you'll need to place the alchemy utensil inside your residence. Simply activate 'Place Mode' inside the residence and place down the utensil. Then, walk up to the utensil, put in the ingredients for exactly 1 craft and press Batch production.

Craft Results

A craft always yields the main product (like

Elixir of Fury) and some recipes can yield a rare product (like

Elixir of Endless Fury).

Recipes can also yield up to 3 kinds of byproducts:

Mysterious Catalyst,

Shining Powder and lottery drops.

Product	Yield per craft	Affected by mastery	Note
Regular proc	1-4	yes	Perfumes always proc 1. Processing items like Metal Solvent proc 1-3.
Rare proc	0.3	no	Not all recipes have a rare proc.
Mysterious Catalyst (byprodct)	0.024	no
Shining Powder	0.04	no	Does not proc on reagents and T1 elixirs.
Lottery drops	low chance	yes

The chance to get lottery drops will increase based on your mastery:

• Regular: up to 3.57% per craft
• Special: up to 1.92% per craft
• Rare: up to 0.23% per craft

Regular	Special	Rare
Life Spirit Stone	Life Spirit Stone	Caphras Stone Bundle
Guardian Spirit Stone	Guardian Spirit Stone	Sturdy Alchemy Stone of Protection
Destruction Spirit Stone	Destruction Spirit Stone	Sturdy Alchemy Stone of Life
Oil of Corruption	Cron Stone	Sturdy Alchemy Stone of Destruction
Oil of Fortitude	Hard Black Crystal Shard	Gold Bar 1,000G
Oil of Regeneration	Memory Fragment	Golden Backpack
Oil of Storms	Tenacious Origin of Life	Caphras Stone
Oil of Tranquility	Rough Opulent Crystal	Yona's Fragment
Metal Solvent	Gold Bar 10G	Reagent of Harmonious Spirits
Black Stone (Weapon)	Gold Ingot	Sharp Black Crystal Shard
Black Stone (Armor)
Ancient Spirit Dust
Gold Bar 1G
Melted Gold Shard
Broken Alchemy Stone Shard
Pure Powder Reagent
Clear Liquid Reagent
Wheat Flour
Deep Frying Oil

You can read more about the drop rates and expected income of lottery drops in Thell's alchemy byproduct sheet.

How long will it take to level up?

Goal Level	EXP	Crafts*	Hours**
Apprentice 1	42,600	53	0.02
Skilled 1	324,600	406	0.1
Professional 1	1,190,400	1,488	0.5
Artisan 1	5,240,400	6,551	2.2
Master 1	36,889,300	46,112	15.4
Guru 1	735,553,800	919,442	306.5

*Assuming 400 EXP per craft and +100% EXP buffs.

** Assuming 1.2 second alchemy time.

You can calculate for yourself how long reaching a level takes using the bdolytics EXP calculator.

What else can I craft to level up?

If you find yourself bored from crafting reagents all day here are some more advanced recipes that give more EXP.

• 
  Clown's Blood (800 EXP)
• 
  Sinner's Blood (800 EXP)
• 
  Elixir of Demihuman Hunt (920 EXP)
• 
  Elixir of Shock (920 EXP)
• 
  Elixir of Spells (920 EXP)

Closing Thoughts

I hope this guide helped you on your journey to getting to know basics of alchemy. If you have any questions or suggestions for this guide feel free to leave a comment below. To learn more about leveling to guru, check out my Alchemy Guru Leveling Guide!