This is a guide for the FFXIV Island Sanctuary. In this installment, we will be talking about animals, aka the Pasture System. You need animals as they produce materials to be used in the workshop and that is their main purpose, aside from looking cute, of course.

The care of the animals can be automated by the mammoths. And while it may be fun for some people to take care of them themselves, I find that it ultimately becomes a bother. So, I have all of mine automated.

Which Animals To Get?

Which animals should you be getting?

There are options here. If you’re lazy and don’t feel like capturing any of the rare animals, you can stock your zoo with just normal animals that can be found anywhere on the island and still get all of the materials you will need for your Workshop.

Once again, we will be making use of the Overseas Casuals recommendations to determine which animals we should get. For the minimum effort pasture, follow the chart below. If your pasture is not yet able to accommodate 20 animals, try to get at least one of each listed here and then work on grabbing duplicates.

If you like collecting rares, then Overseas Casuals recommends you get the following:

• Alkynost
• Alligator
• Apkaulu of Paradise
• Beachcomb
• Black Chocobo
• Boar of Paradise
• Funguar
• Glyptodon Pup
• Gold Back
• Goobbue
• Grand Buffalo
• Griffin
• Island Doe
• Morbol Seedling
• Ornery Karakul
• Paissa
• Tiger of Paradise
• Twinklefleece
• Weird Spriggan
• Yellow Coblin

Be aware that the Funguar, Griffin, and Paissa require you to have unlocked flying on the island. I would recommend using the previous non-rare pasture recommendations as you work on collecting the rares. Whenever you do get a rare, try to replace one of the animals that drops the same leavings so that you’re not left with a gap.

You can find which leavings each animal drops by checking the charts in the Overseas Casuals discord. You can also check the Lalachievements website. Overseas Casuals also has more pasture recommendations. So, if none of these work for you, then check their discord.

Honestly, my own pasture is just full of rares and nothing else. I did not follow any recommendations and I easily have all the leavings I’ve needed for my Workshop. So, just know that the recommendations are helpful, but don’t sweat it too much.

Also Read: What Should You Do While Waiting For Queue To Pop In FFXIV? - 10 Tips

How To Get Rares?

Now, let’s talk about how to get rares for those that are interested in stocking their pasture with them.

Many of them have different conditions for when they will spawn. This may include certain times they’ll spawn within Eorzea or certain weather patterns or both. The Lalachievements website shares what these are and where to find each rare.

You can also sign up for roles in the Overseas Casuals discord. That will ping you when a specific rare is going to be spawning. This will ping before the spawn, so you have time to log in and it will, of course, tell you the coordinates of the rare spawn.

What To Feed Your Animals?

Finally, let’s talk about what to feed your animals. The optimal choice is to feed the animals, Island Greenfeed. Now, this will result in fewer leavings. But Overseas Casuals has found that it doesn’t really matter. Because you will still have enough of what you need for your Workshop.

So, what makes this optimal is that you have to use a fewer of your crops to create food for your animals and then you can export any excess crops for calories.

However, if it brings you more joy to see that sunny icon next to your animals’ names, then go ahead and feed premium Island Greenfeed. Of course, premium Island Greenfeed will definitely cost you a lot of FFXIV Gil. So, you'd better stock up some in advance. This is what I have been doing the entire time up until making this guide. Most people will find that they have crops in excess regardless of what they feed their animals, so it’s really up to you which route you’d prefer.

I’m going to teach you how to level up in Island Sanctuary, including some mistakes to avoid.

If you’re just starting Island Sanctuary, it’s probably because you’ve heard or even seen of some of the really cool rewards. You can get like mounts, minions, Glamours, Furnishing, dyes and Materia. Or maybe you heard about the fact that you can actually decorate your Island Sanctuary with outdoor furnishings. It’s pretty cool, right?

Don’t Use Your Cowries

At lower levels, you’ll receive a few thousand Cowries by completing the quest given to you by the Felicitous Furball. You must not use these Cowries.

These are given to you purposefully, as you will need them to pay the Mammoths to clear other areas of the island so that you can build Workshops and Granaries. Using these Cowries will absolutely stall your progress and make things a lot harder for you.

Quests

With this quests warning aside, let’s talk about how you can actually gain exp and rank up.

At lower levels, you will get the most exp from doing any quests that pop up on the island. These will usually come from Felicitous Furball or mamas, asking if you want a clear part of the island.

Crafting Tools & Restraints

Usually, to clear a section of the island, you need to craft tools. You will also get exp for crafting the tools.

In fact, you get exp the first time you craft anything, so look through that log and see if there’s anything else you could craft.

You’ll also get a small amount of exp for repeatable crafts, like Restraints. So, if you happen to have any extra masks that you don’t need for the workshop, craft away.

Also Read: What Should You Do While Waiting For Queue To Pop In FFXIV? - 10 Tips

Building & Renovating Buildings

At any rank, you will gain exp by building new Granaries, Workshops, or Landmarks. Of course, the spots for these are limited, so you can only build so many.

You will also get exp for renovating the Workshops and Granaries. The max level you can renovate them to is four. Make sure to do this not just for the exp but also for the bonus in rewards. For example, each renovation of the Workshop will increase the Workshop Cowries output.

Setting The Workshop

Speaking of the Workshop, you can also get exp from making stuff in there. So, you should be setting your Workshop every week.

For those who are happy with leveling up casually or slowly, once you’ve done all the quests and renovated all your buildings, the Workshop is pretty much the only passive way to level.

Gathering

For those that want to level up a bit faster or who made the mistake, I mentioned earlier of using up all your Cowries. Unfortunately, all that’s really left for you to do is just gather things on the island.

Now, the most optimal way to do this would either be to gather in an area where you don’t have to run very far, such as on the top of the mountain if you’re past rank 10 and have unlocked flying. Or, if you’re below 10, this spot along the stream is also good.

Macro For Gathering

There is actually a macro you can use that will target and auto run you to the nearest Gathering mode.

Gathering Macro:

/merror off

/targetnpc

/lockon on

/automove on

Once it does that, you need to hit the confirm button, which on the keyboard is defaulted to the number pad to zero. I like to set the macro to 1 and the confirm button to two, so I can just hit one and two and watch something on my second monitor while I do this. This macro works best if you can gather on top of the mountain since it’ll keep you in your small circle.

But I don’t see why you couldn’t use it elsewhere if you really wanted to. Just make sure to look at your screen every now and then to prevent your character from getting stuck. And while this method of gathering will level you up, unfortunately, it’s not going to be able to get you the Cowries that you need to pay the Mammoths. You will have to just be working on your Workshop in order to get those. This is why it’s a really big deal and why you should not spend your Cowries until you have cleared some of those areas that need to be cleared and have Cowries in excess.

Gathering Heavily Used Items

But back to gathering, something else to consider would be to gather some of the items. Otherwise, you need to spend a lot of FFXIV Gil.

You will need a lot of for your Workshop, such as Island Laver, Island Sap, Island Cotton Bolls, Island Sugarcane and Island Tinsand. Those are the items I find myself running out of the most.

Even though gathering these is not the most optimal way to gain exp because they’re more spread out, doing so will still give you exp and it will be helpful to you later. It’s kind of like killing two birds with one stone.

Gathering Crops & Leavings

It’s also worth noting that you can get exp from gathering your crops and gathering the leavings from any animals you have. It’s 120 exp per crop and 50 exp per animal. When these are automated by the Mammoths, they don’t give any exp at all. So, just be aware of that.

Personally, I find this amount to be so negligible that it isn’t really worth the extra effort you have to put into the island. Because this means, of course, feeding the animals and watering the crops yourself. But it’s up to you whether you want to do this for a little extra exp or not.

Troubleshooting

Finally, I want to share a couple of troubleshooting items because I remember them happening to me.

First of all, you have to craft the tools in the crafting log before you’ll be able to take new quests. If they’re showing up red, that could be why.

Another reason they might be read, and this was the most confusing for me, is because you’re not actually a high enough rank to take them. I remember having quests I couldn’t do and I had no idea why because I crafted all my tools and did anything else the Felicitous Furball told me to do, but nothing unlocked the quest.

Once I ranked up to the appropriate level, the quest would unlock. I don’t know if they’ve patched this or not. But if you see a red quest and it doesn’t change color even after you’ve crafted the most recent set of available tools, you probably need to level up.