FF14: How To Put Materia In Gear (& How To Unlock It) (2024)

While the base stats for a weapon or armor piece primarily depend on whether it's of normal or high quality in Final Fantasy 14, Materia can further enhance an item's capacity. Materia are magical orbs varying in color and strength that can enchant player equipment, boosting its initial stats. In addition, players can attach and detach Materia to integrated gear sockets and even meld Materia beyond an item's available slot count with overmelding.

Crafting in Final Fantasy 14 is part of the fun, and it allows you to make items to your liking and make them more unique to you and your build. Crafting has changed a little with various patches and updates during the course of the game's life, but it remains a fundamental part of the game, and knowing how to use Materia correctly is a big part of it. You will want to use it to boost your equipment, but you also need to use your equipment to gain the Materia in the first place.

How To Get Materia From Equipment

100% Spiritbonds

While Materia can be earned as a quest reward or bought from players and NPC vendors, it can also be crafted in Final Fantasy 14 by reaching 100% Spiritbond with one's equipment. Spiritbond can be considered the "XP" of a gear piece. Players can increase a weapon or armor's Spiritbond by simply using it for an extended duration.

Once the "XP" reaches 100%, players can extract Materia from the item, resetting the Spiritbond to 0% but granting the player a new gear-enhancing orb.

The extracted orb depends on the piece of gear you were able to take it from, not the person wielding it. If a piece of gear was intended for a pugilist, you will receive an orb optimized for dealing with physical melee damage. Each type of gear will produce one of a few types of Materia, which can be seen in the table below:

There are a myriad of things you can do with Materia, which is described in the section below.

How To Add Materia

Questing For Answers

Materia can be earned, purchased, or sold without restriction early on in the game. However, players who wish to attach or meld Materia to their equipment will need to complete a few brief prerequisite side quests in Final Fantasy 14.

First, finish "Forging the Spirit," the Level 19 quest from Swynbroes located at The Bonfire in Central Thanalan. He will teach players the "Extracting Materia" action, which grants the ability to craft Materia by extracting it from a piece of gear with 100% Spiritbond.

Next, players must learn to add Materia to FF14 by melding it to their weapons or armor. Speak with F'hobhas, another NPC at The Bonfire near Swynbroes. Complete her Level 19 quest "Waking the Spirit" to learn how to attach Materia to gear. Bear in mind that the player must be Level 19 of a crafting job in Final Fantasy XIV, not a combat job. Melding will require one Disciple of the Hand character to do the action at least the same level as the equipment you are trying to modify.

Finally, if players wish to meld Materia above and beyond their gear's available slots, they must complete the "Melding Materia Muchly" quest at Level 25. Mutamix Bubblypots, the quest giver, is located in the same area near Swynbroes and F'hobhas. Players should note that overmelding Materia isn't always guaranteed success, and failure will result in the loss of the Materia. YouTuber Jolsn has some good tips about how to use Materia if you are still unsure.

Once players acquire the ability to meld, extract, and overmeld Materia in FF14, they have full liberty over how they wish to boost their equipment, granted their gear is within the appropriate level range for the Materia's enchantment. Materia-related Actions can be found within the Character menu or accessed by opening the drop-down menu of any piece of gear. Twelve total tiers of Materia can be crafted, resulting in quite a large variation. And that is all you need to know about using Materia in Final Fantasy 14.

Video Credit: Jolsn/YouTube

Final Fantasy 14

MMORPG

Franchise

Final Fantasy

Platform(s)

PC , PS3 , PS4 , PS5 , Xbox Series X , Xbox Series S

Released

August 27, 2013

Developer(s)

Square Enix

Publisher(s)

Square Enix

ESRB

T for Teen: Alcohol Reference, Animated Blood, Language, Suggestive Themes, Violence