In Lost Ark, characters can learn Trade Skills that work like professions in other MMORPGs. They unlock gathering skills for your character.
There are six different Trade Skills to learn in the game – Foraging, Logging, Mining, Hunting, Fishing, and Excavating.
Recommended Read: Lost Ark – Virtues Guide
Through the Trade Skills system, your character learns to gather materials and resources from natural sources around the world of Lost Ark.
Farming materials and resources by using Trade Skills will help you upgrade your Stronghold and equipment, and acquire food and battle items, all making your character stronger.
In this guide, we give you all the information you need on the Trade Skills system in Lost Ark, from how to unlock them to what rewards you get by doing each of them.
Table of contents
- What are Trade Skills in Lost Ark?
- How to unlock Trade Skills in Lost Ark
- How to perform Trade Skills
- How to get Trade Skill tools in Lost Ark
- How to get more Trade Skill work energy
- Rewards from Trade Skills
- Are Trade Skills account-wide?
- Trade Skills inventory
What are Trade Skills in Lost Ark?
Trade Skills in Lost Ark are skills that your character can learn to obtain materials and resources you need for crafting items and researching upgrades.
Trade Skills are like professions that you know from other MMORPGs, where you can learn additional non-combat skills.
With Trade Skills, you can gather resources and materials from natural sources like mineral veins, trees, and animals that appear all over the world of Lost Ark.
You can see what Trade Skills can be performed on a certain map by looking at the info bar in the top-right corner of any map in the World Map.
There are six different Trade Skills your character can learn in Lost Ark:
- Foraging
- Logging
- Mining
- Hunting
- Fishing
- Excavating
Upon learning Trade Skills, your character learns all of these skills at the same time. You don’t have to specifically learn each one.
Foraging is the ability to gather herbs from plants around the world, which can be used to craft potions and other battle items.
Logging is the ability to gather timber by chopping down trees with an axe, which you need to research upgrades and craft items in your Stronghold.
Mining is the ability to gather ores from mine mineral veins around the world, which you need to research upgrades and craft items in your Stronghold.
Hunting is the ability to gather meats from wild animals roaming the world, which you need to craft various food items.
Fishing is the ability to gather fish from the ocean and lakes, which you need to craft various food items.
Excavating is the ability to gather relics from the ground, which you need to craft Trade Skill tools.
Each Trade Skill has its own level that you can increase by performing that Trade Skill.
The maximum level of a Trade Skill is 30.
When you level up a Trade Skill, you level up both its normal skill level and mastery skill level.
Leveling up the normal skill level of a Trade Skill unlocks new gathering capabilities, like the ability to log lush trees with Logging or kick a tree to get guaranteed special rewards.
Leveling up the mastery skill level of a Trade Skill increases your efficiency in that Trade Skill, increasing your chance to acquire higher-rarity materials and resources, gathering speed, and more.
How to unlock Trade Skills in Lost Ark
You unlock Trade Skills in Lost Ark by completing the questline Crown of Lakebar from the NPC, Artisan Urr, in Lakebar.
The quest Crown of Lakebar is part of the main questline in Lost Ark, which means that you cannot start it before you’ve completed the previous quests in the main story.
In other words, to unlock Trade Skills in the game, you simply have to follow the main questline until you reach Lakebar, and then follow the main questline there.
We were level 24 at the time that we reached Lakebar and unlocked Trade Skills through the main questline.
Crown of Lakebar takes you through the process of making a new Crown for the new king, including gathering minerals from mining.
When you unlock Trade Skills from the main questline in Lakebar, you unlock all six Trade Skills at once.
You can access the Trade Skills window by pressing ‘L’ on your keyboard or through the Character tab in the bottom-right menu once you’ve unlocked them.
Even though the quests don’t require you to use most of the Trade Skills, you learn them all at the same time either way.
How to perform Trade Skills
To perform Trade Skills in Lost Ark, you either need to walk up to a natural resource and press ‘G’ on your keyboard or use the Trade Skill’s skills, depending on what Trade Skill you wish to use.
To access the Trade Skills window and see your current skills and progress, press ‘L’ on your keyboard or click Character in the bottom-right menu and select Trade Skills.
Before you can perform any Trade Skill in the game, you need to be wearing a Trade Skill tool for that Trade Skill.
Performing any Trade Skill costs Work Energy. You can see how much Work Energy you have in the small green bar above your skills when you’re in Trade Skills mode, which you can enable by pressing ‘B’.
Foraging, Logging, and Mining all work by you walking up to a natural resource – a loggable tree, a mineral vein, or a plant, and you pressing ‘G’ on your keyboard or left-clicking it with your mouse.
Hunting, Fishing, and Excavating all require you to use their skills, which you can use by pressing ‘B’ on your keyboard to switch to Trade Skill skills.
Hunting has two skills to start with, Throw and Search.
Throw is an active area skill that you can use on wild animals, after which you can carve them for meat by pressing ‘G’ on your keyboard next to them or left-click them with your mouse.
Search is a passive toggle skill that highlights wild animals that can be hunted.
Fishing has one skill to start with, Float Fishing.
Float Fishing is the skill you can use when next to a fishing spot to throw your line in the water to catch fish.
Excavating has two skills to start with, Sonar and Relic Search.
Sonar is a detecting skill that makes a beeps faster the closer you are to a relic. When it starts beeping really fast and displays a dark blue/purple color, use Relic Search.
Relic Search searches the area around your character for relics. If a relic is within a small radius of you, it will appear on the ground.
To get the relic, walk up to it and press ‘G’ on your keyboard or left-click it with your mouse to excavate it.
Later, when you unlock additional normal skills for each Trade Skill, you will have more active skills to use in the Trade Skills skill window.
How to get Trade Skill tools in Lost Ark
You need to be wearing Trade Skill tools before you can perform any Trade Skill.
Each Trade Skill has its own tool, so before you can log trees, you need to be wearing a Logging Tool, before you can hunt, you need to be wearing a Hunting Tool, and so on.
You can get Trade Skill tools for each Trade Skill by purchasing them from a Trade Skill Tool Merchant NPC, completing quests, or by crafting them.
The first Trade Skill Tool Merchant you encounter in the game is Nickel, who is located in Lakebar Village, where you learn Trade Skills.
From Nickel, you can purchase the Novice version of each Trade Skill Tool for 1,500 Silver each.
Trade Skill Tool Merchants are also present in each major town, including Luterra Castle.
To get Trade Skill Tools of higher rarity, you need to first acquire the recipe for crafting them and then craft them using the required materials.
You can get the recipes for higher-rarity Trade Skill tools from the NPC Jeniff in your Stronghold and then craft them in your Crafting Workshop in your Stronghold.
You need to repair your Trade Skill tools to keep their durability up and thereby the ability to use them.
Every time you repair a Trade Skill tool, there is a chance that it cannot be repaired to its maximum durability, thus losing a bit of its maximum durability.
This means that you need to acquire completely new tools at some point or restore them with Trade Skill Tool Restoration Kits. As it’s expensive material-wise to restore tools, only restore those that are of a high rarity with great stats.
Trade Skill Tools of higher rarities give various boosts and increased chances for better rewards when used.
Trade Skill Tools are not worn in your character equipment window, but the Trade Skills window, as Trade Skills are shared with your roster.
How to get more Trade Skill work energy
Performing any Trade Skill in Lost Ark costs work energy. Without work energy, you cannot perform any Trade Skills.
You can see how much work energy you currently have by clicking ‘B’ on your keyboard to switch to Trade Skill skills and looking at the green bar above your skills.
You can get more work energy in Lost Ark by waiting for it to regenerate or by using Minor Life Energy Potions and Leap’s Essences.
Minor Life Energy Potions increase your current work energy by 1,000, while Leap’s Essences increase your current work energy by 3,000, as well as increases the Trade Skill XP you earn.
Both Minor Life Energy Potions and Leap’s Essences can be purchased weekly with Crystals in the Shop in the bottom-right menu.
Minor Life Energy Potions and Leap’s Essence are also occasionally given from Login events. Minor Life Energy Potions are also the reward for completing some quests.
You passively regenerate Trade Skill work energy at the rate of 33 work energy per 10 minutes. If you have the Crystalline Aura, you regenerate 36 work energy every 10 minutes.
You stop regenerating work energy when you hit the maximum cap of 10,000 work energy, which is why it’s a great idea to spend it.
As soon as your work energy falls below the maximum of 10,000, you start regenerating it again till you reach the cap.
Rewards from Trade Skills
The purpose of Trade Skills is to gather resources and materials.
Here is an overview of what rewards you get from each Trade Skill in Lost Ark:
- Foraging – Flowers and Mushrooms
- Logging- Timber and Wood
- Mining – Ores
- Hunting – Meats and Leathers
- Fishing – Fish and Pearls
- Excavating – Relics
All the materials that you get from performing Trade Skills are useful and can result in your character getting stronger when utilized properly.
You also obtain World Tree Leaves through performing and upgrading your Trade Skills.
World Tree Leaves are one of the collections in the collectibles codex.
Are Trade Skills account-wide?
Yes, Trade Skills in Lost Ark are account-wide, which means that they are shared with your roster of characters.
The progress you make with Trade Skills on one character is shared with the other characters you have on the same server.
Both normal skills and mastery skills for each Trade Skill, as well as Trade Skill tools, are shared.
Trade Skills inventory
Resources and materials gathered from performing Trade Skills in Lost Ark are not stored like regular items in your main inventory.
Instead, all Trade Skill materials and resources are stored in their own separate inventory, which you can access by clicking the book icon at the top of the Inventory window.
Each Trade Skill, including your Stronghold and Events, have their own tab in this Storage part of your inventory.
If you’ve been out gathering resources and materials from Trade Skills and are wondering where they went, that’s why you don’t see them in your regular inventory.
That’s everything you need to know about Trade Skills in Lost Ark!
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