SWTOR 7.0 Crafting and Crew Skills: A Beginners Guide (2024)

A SWTOR 7.0 Beginners Guide focusing on Crafting. Here you will learn everything about Crew Skills and all possible combinations!

The guide is up-to-date for Patch 7.4b

This Guide is a complementary addition to the Ultimate SWTOR Beginners Guide!

Crafting in Star Wars: The Old Republic is a great resource for both self-sufficiency and for making a profit. In fact, it is one of the recommended ways to make money in SWTOR.

This guide will help you better understand the types of crew skills as well as how crafting works, what role your companions have, and which skills best go together.

How to pick up Crew Skills

When you first land on the Fleet, you are able to pick up Crew Skills from the Strongholds and Crew Skills Section on your Fleet. Below are the locations on the maps for both Republic and Empire.

Empire Fleet Crew Skills vendors location

Republic Fleet Crew Skills vendors location

Crew Skills UI Panel explained

The Crafting In-Game is done via two main panels. Here is an overview of both of them. Please, note, the Onslaught 6.0 expansion expanded the crafting cap to 700 for all crafting professions.

Crew Skills Panel overview

The image below is from 5.0. Everything is the same, with the exception of the 600’s becoming 700’s now when you max your crew skills.

This is the Crew Skills UI. You can access it from the main menu by choosing the bottom line of the “Content” drop-down sub-menu. From here you will get access to all the Gathering Skills and Mission Skills you have.

1. At the top of the panel are your Crew Skills and the current level of the Crew Skill. Leve cap is 700 at the moment. Each level allows you to craft different items of different tier quality and with different player level requirements.
2. Below the Crew Skills list is the Companions panel. Here, on the left, you will find each companion’s busy status.
3. On the right you will see the companion’s influence level. the higher the level, the better performance you will see from this companion both on the battlefield and on the crafting table. Mousing over the number will tell you the “Time Efficiency for Crew Skill Tasks” and the “Critical rate for Crew Skill Tasks”.

Grade 11 was added with the Update 6.0 and Onslaught expansion. It also added 100 new points to the crew skills cap, as I explained above. Now the new cap is 700. To continue your progress with each crew skill after you reach a cap, you need to stop by the crew skill vendor and purchase a new token to unlock the next 100 points – up to 700.

Crafting Window overview

The next image shows the Crafting window.

When it comes to Crafting Skills, the Crafting Window is where the action happens.

1. The left panel lists all available items for crafting. Each item is displayed with a unique color, representing its rarity.
2. On the right side you will find the specific requirements for the selected item you are about to craft and how long it will take for your companion to produce it. If your companion has a critical success while crafting, you will receive an extra item of the same quality.
3. In the bottom right corner are the stats of the selected companion performing the task for you. The higher their influence is, the better chance you will have for a critical success and the faster they will complete the task.

Missions Window overview

The Gathering Skills and Missions Skills are split into Grades (Tiers). Each Grade corresponds to a certain moment of your character’s level progression. Currently there are 11 Grades available with 1 being the lowest level for gathering crafting materials and Grade 11 is the highest one, used to craft maximum level entry-level EndGame gear, consumables and more.

Mission Skills are also a good way to get Dark Side or Light Side points.

What types of Crew Skills are available

In Star Wars: The Old Republic professions are called Crew Skills. They are split into two major categories based on what purpose they serve: Collecting Skills Materials and Crafting Skills. The “collecting crafting materials” is further split into two additional sub-categories– Gathering Skills and Mission Skills.

Crafting is an essential part of the game. Through it you can get a nice set of gear for your character, boost it with a good stim or stock up on all kinds of bombs, grenades and other consumables.

Gathering Skills

As you explore planets in the galaxy, you’ll discover a variety of exotic resources and valuable pieces of information. With the right training, you and your crew will be able to scavenge for raw materials, slice computer systems, and track down valuable artifacts.

The resources and information you gather can be sold on the open market for a profit, or your crew can use them to craft useful and valuable items. If you like, you can select Gathering skills for all three of the Crew Skill slots available to your team.

Gathering Skills include the following:

Archaeology	The ability to seek out imbued items like Lightsaber crystals and ancient artifacts and is best combined with Artifice or Synthweaving.
Bioanalysis	The practice of collecting genetic material from creatures and plants and is best combined with Biochem.
Scavenging	The art of recovering useful materials and parts from old or damaged technology, and the items get from Scavenging are very useful for Armormech , Cybertech and Armstech.
Slicing	A skill in accessing secured computer systems and lockboxes to acquire valuable data and rare schematics. It’s a good money-making skill (although, it will not make you filthy rich!) and can be used with Cybertech or any other crew skill, really.

Mission Skills

Mission skills are a unique addition to the Crew Skills system. With these skills, you send companions from your crew across the galaxy on various missions to recover information, hunt down loot, or complete other goals to bring you rewards. When you use a mission skill, you’ll select a companion, choose a mission from an ever-changing pool, and send that companion out after the prize.

You can choose from a variety of mission skills – is your crew into conducting research? Participating in diplomatic missions? Trading in illicit goods?

There are many options, each with their own set of benefits and rewards. Some can even earn you light or dark side points. If you select Light Side from the Dark vs Light alignment toggle panel you will only earn Light Side points from the respective Missions you send your companions to. Same goes for Dark – all your missions will then bring you Dark Side points.

As with the other skills, your companions complete these missions on their own time and bring the rewards back when they’re done. Any number of your Crew Skills can be a Mission skill, so get ready to put your team to work!

Mission Skills include the following:

Diplomacy	The art of conducting and managing negotiations. Ideally should be combined with Bioanalysis and Biochem.
Investigation	The skill of examining evidence and following clues to discover valuable secrets.Ideally should be combined with Scavenging and Armstech.
Treasure Hunting	The ability to track down and recover valuable items by investigating clues.Ideally should be combined with Archaeology and Artifice.
Underworld Trading	Expertise in the trading of illegal goods and services.Ideally should be combined with Armormech or Cybertech and Scavenging.

Crafting Skills

Whether your team gathers resources or you acquire them through other means, they’ll be the cornerstone of crafting. Depending on how you choose to specialize, your crew will be able to construct armor, weapons, implants, or other types of useful items and gear. You can use these items yourself or put them up on the open market for profit.

You’ll receive Crew Skill reports even while you’re away from the ship, and if one of your companions returns with the schematics for a valuable item, you can assign someone else to start crafting the item right away on the ship’s workstation without having to return to the ship!

Crafting skills are very specialized disciplines; for your three Crew Skills slots, you’ll be able to select one Crafting skill for your crew to master.

Crafting Skills include the following:

Armormech	The ability to work with metals and electronic shielding to construct personal armor.Ideally should be combined with Scavenging and Underworld Trading.
Armstech	The skill of constructing blasters, blaster rifles and upgrades.Ideally should be combined with Investigation and Scavenging.
Artifice	The delicate work of constructing Jedi and Sith artifacts.Ideally should be combined withArchaeology and Treasure Hunting.
Biochem	The engineering of performance-enhancing chemical serums and biological implants.Ideally should be combined with Bioanalysis and Diplomacy.
Cybertech	The technical expertise to construct gadgets and high-tech armors.Ideally should be combined with Scavenging and Underworld Trading.
Synthweaving	The art of creating lighter outfits and armors that are imbued with Force qualities.Ideally should be combined with Archaeology and Underworld Trading.

Being able to craft your own Augments, will save you a lot of resources and money. Especially if you are aiming to be a progression player (or already are).

Which Crew Skills should you pick together

The simple rules state that you are allowed to have up to three crew skills in total if you are a Subscriber. If you are Preferred Status Player, you have access to two Crew Skills. An easy way to unlock the third one for free is if you use a Referral Link.

Also you can have more than one Gathering or Mission Skills, but only one Crafting Skill. Crafting Skills should be combined with certain Gathering and Mission Skills that compliment them.

In the diagram below you can see which skills go together nicely and can make a decision which to pick up. Keep in mind that you can have three Gathering Skills if you wish to, for example, but on your first character I recommend you get a Crafting Skill too.

Companions and Crew Skills

Your companions have a major role when it comes to Crafting. In fact, they are the ones doing the hard work for you. You can send them to gather the materials from the nearby node as you journey through various planets, send them to complete missions or ask them to craft for you certain items such as gear upgrades and stims, for example.

Keep in mind that while your companions are crafting or on a mission, they are unavailable and you cannot use them to help you with your current mission or task. You can send up to 8 of your companions to perform Crew Skills at any given time. This number is based on your character’s level with 8 being the limit for level 70.

Here is what a busy Crew Skills Panel looks like.

And on the image below you can see how your companion can perform a Gathering Skill for you.

How to level up your Crew Skills

The Gathering Skill level rises as you gather materials or send your companions to complete missions. The Mission Skills can only be leveled up by sending your companions to complete missions. Be aware that some times your companions will return with empty hands, meaning both time wasted and money spent for nothing.

When you open the Missions panel, you will always see the Rich and Bountiful missions at the top. These are the most time-consuming missions, but they always yield the best results.

Unfortunately, the only way to at least partially overcome this is to increase the companions’ Influence level. Quickest way to do this is by “feeding” them Companion Gifts.

To level up your Crafting Profession, you need to, that’s right, craft items. The higher the level and tier of the item, the longer it will take for your companion(s) to craft them, but the quicker you will reach the next Grade.

My advice is to always craft the items with an “orange” icon and always send your companions to missions marked with “abundant yield”.

Planet Maps with Material Resources locations

SWTOR Player SoupPotato shared with me these custom-made full Planetary maps. They contain the exact locations all gathering nodes for Bioanalysis, Scavenging and Archaeology resources on several planets.

Dromund Kaas

Balmorra

Tatooine

Nar Shaddaa

Alderaan

Voss

If you have any questions or want to share feedback, leave a comment below. I hope you have found this guide useful! Don’t forget to share it with your friends on your Social Network!