Farming Crystal's

There are many way's to obtain crystal's in FFXIV, the most cost effective method is also the most time consuming sadly but i will explain how you could go about it and also share how i replenish my crystal stock.

Tradecraft Leve's are a very good way to obtain crystal's as you should be doing them anyway i wont go in to much details about this method as it's capped by allowances you get every 12 hour's but every little bit helps.

Disciples of Land have access to various way's to get crystal's even at low level's but they may not be the exact shard your looking for allow me to explain. Mining at level 1 allows player's to mine Fire crystal shard's from a node. this changes with every location and it goes the same for each other Gathering Class like Botanist for example. Here are some other location's in which i know thus far.

Fire Shards: Western Thanalan (Hammerlea)
Wind Shards: Central (Spineless Basin), Northern Thanalan (Bluefog lvl50 area)
Earth Shards: Lower La Noscea (Cedarwood), North Shroud (Treespeak and Peacegarden)
Ice Shards:  Western La Noscea (Skull Valley), South Shroud (Upper Paths)
Lightning Shards: Central, Southern Thanalan
Water Shards: Eastern La Noscea, Western Thanalan
Please note that all this information is listed in your Gathering Log via your Personal Log in game. Make good use of this as it will help you through out your adventure.

There are a few other way's to farm crystal's Farming the actual sprites which are found all over Eorzea but i reckon if your high enough this method is way more productive time wise then farming the actual crystal's. ; 
There is a trick i use if your higher in level you can farm Banemites (lvl25) for the there silk and sell it through your retainer, with the Gil made replenish your crystal stock. this in term in way more expensive but it's alot less time consuming also less stressful as you can see from my snapshot Im all good in the crystal hood lol

I hope this is useful to player's

Moogle