During your time playing Aion you will need to collect a few things. This can be for missions, crafting or sometimes even both. There are a few things to know about the process and ways of collecting the items you will need.

Collection Node (Node)

A Collection Node can be many things in the environment; including plants, animals, and minerals. You can tell a lot about a Node by moving your cursor over it. Names that appear in grey mean that you have enough skill to collect the item, but you will not gain any skill from successfully collecting its material. Names in yellow will provide you with both skill and material when successfully collected. Red means that you do not have the skill to collect this item. Besides the names alone, your cursor will change if you can or can not collect from this Node.

Skill

Just because the item can be collected does not mean that you will gain skill doing so. Every time you collect materials from a Node, you will gain small amounts of Collecting Skill if you’re at the appropriate level (if the Node is grey, you will not gain any skill at all). This will build up until your Collecting Skill increases by a point. You can check your Collection Skill from the Skills Window (K).

Gathering Meter

With either Collecting or Extracting, there is some risk that you the gathering will fail. Once you begin gathering, a meter will open. It shows what you are attempting to extract form the Node, your current extraction level, and two bars. The two bars are marked Pass and Fail. If your Pass Bar fills before the Fail Bar, then you have successfully gathered the material. If you Fail then you have not collected anything and must try again. You may notice radical spikes in the progress of the Pass or Fail as each bar slowly moves toward being full.

Collecting

As a Human, before you Ascend and become a Daeva, you will scrounge in the dirt to dig up the things you need. This is called Collecting. To Collect, approach the item you wish to collect, and Right-click on it. Once you begin collecting the Gathering Meter will begin. At this point you will only be able to have a collection skill up to 49. This means you can continue to gain Collection Skill Points up to but not over 49.

Extracting

Once you have Ascended to the rank of Daeva, there is no longer a need to root around in the ground like an animal (so maximize before ascending). You will now Extract the very essence of material. You will gain two new Extract Skill types for you to work on: Lesser Extract Vitality and Lesser Extract Aether. You will Extract Vitality from Nodes, very similar to Collecting. You can use Extract Aether to gather Aether from the skies and use it to Morph substances that you may need later. Just like collecting, these skills have a cap. Once you make it to 99, you will need to learn how to extract higher level items by visiting a Master Craftsman.

Basic Knowledge you Should know

All material are static spawn, that means they will always spawn in the same spot.
Material difficulties are increased by 5, and you can only gather materials equal or lesser than your skill level.Most materials spawns allows up to 3 chances to extract material from it, some special materials might only allow one chance. Only two things can happen upon extracting materials, fail, or succeed. As your gathering skill increases, it is easier and faster to extract lower level materials.

Where and what to gather?

In the beginning it’s really straight forward as you can only gather Angelica they are all over the place from where you start both faction the same, I like to gather Angelica up till 15 skill points, you can do it up to 10 and Fruit Tree till 20. Once you have reached 15 or 20 skill points, you should gather Iron ore/ore because it is needed for a quest. As for higher level materials they usually spawn within the area of your level range, so you probably won’t reach 100 gathering skill until your character is at least level 18.

Gatherable table from 1 – 100 skill points.

Asmodian

Angelica – 1
Clam – 1
Pujery – 5
Fruit Tree – 10
Raydam – 10
Iron – 15
Okra – 20
Watered Silk – 25
Tecoma Log – 30
Silver – 35
Rose Quartz – 40
Calendula – 45
Otombliss – 50
Zucchini – 55
Crystal – 60
Sturgeon – 65
Horto – 75
Amethyst – 80
Blicora – 85
Baily – 90
Kisaki – 95

Gathering Tips,

Tip #1 – Gather while your leveling, between skill cool down, and healing time, that way you won’t feel bored.

Tip #2 – I personally like to gather 1 type of material for 10-15 skill point gain, reason being as your skill increases it gets easier and faster to gather that type of material, and you still gain skill at the same rate between 1-10 skill points of that material.

Tip #3 – You must purchase level 2 gather after 99 skill points, level 3 after 199 skill points, etc… To acquire level 2, 3 and beyond, go to Sanctum or Pandaemonium for Asmodian and learn it from Vitality Master which are located in the crafting area.

Tip #4 – How to stop instant fail. One of 3 thing will happen when your extracting materials, succeed, fail, and instant fail. The first two you will gain skill points from, but the third one you gain nothing. To stop instant fail while gathering either take 1 step at any dirction or take a 1–2 second break in between attempts.

Tip #5 – Use Novice Gatherer Hat & Novice Aether Gatherer Hat. They are really cheap and you cand use it from Lvl 10.