A Knack for Nicking
Location
Required Items
Rewards
What the allowance actually buys
One allowance here buys 402,330 EXP, which places it 2nd of the 3 Lv 60 Blacksmith tradecraft leves that record EXP. The best of them, Have Blade, Will Travel, returns 703,720 EXP for the same allowance, 75% more.
Across that rung the return runs from 110,360 EXP to 703,720 EXP per allowance — 3 distinct figures spanning 538%, so the wrong pick leaves 593,360 EXP of the allowance unspent.
On whether to wait: the best Lv 62 Blacksmith tradecraft leve returns 705,130 EXP per allowance, 0% more than the best on this rung, while the Lv 58 rung behind tops out at 811,360 EXP.
At Lv 60 this data holds 27 leves paying EXP across 2 categories: the 24 Tradecraft ones average 415,953 EXP per allowance, the 3 Fieldcraft ones 1,098,783 EXP, which puts this leve 3% below its own category's average.
High Steel Head Knife ×1 is a Lv 61 Blacksmith recipe, 2 steps deep through 3 intermediates, costing 15 units of raw material and 14 crystals.
Handing that in returns 26,822 EXP and 125 gil for every unit of raw material the order swallows, and the tree needs Blacksmith, Carpenter and Goldsmith.