Eyes on a Hard Body
Location
Required Items
Rewards
What the allowance actually buys
One allowance here buys 52,220 EXP, which places it 3rd of the 6 Lv 30 Armorer tradecraft leves that record EXP. The best of them, Aurochs Star, returns 67,730 EXP for the same allowance, 30% more.
Across that rung the return runs from 26,530 EXP to 67,730 EXP per allowance — 5 distinct figures spanning 155%, so the wrong pick leaves 41,200 EXP of the allowance unspent.
On whether to wait: the best Lv 35 Armorer tradecraft leve returns 82,760 EXP per allowance, 22% more than the best on this rung, while the Lv 25 rung behind tops out at 69,150 EXP.
At Lv 30 this data holds 52 leves paying EXP across 2 categories: the 48 Tradecraft ones average 44,832 EXP per allowance, the 4 Fieldcraft ones 275,323 EXP, which puts this leve 16% above its own category's average.
Decorated Buckler ×1 is a Lv 33 Armorer recipe, 4 steps deep through 6 intermediates, costing 18 units of raw material and 19 crystals.
Handing that in returns 2,901 EXP and 26 gil for every unit of raw material the order swallows, and the tree needs Armorer, Blacksmith and Goldsmith.