Interesting economics...

[Namillus]

Using synthesis to upgrade C-Rank metals to B-Rank is financially viable, as far as savings are concerned - though unless you have a Player Shop, selling them off is inadvisable.

Using synthesis to upgrade B-Rank metals to A-Rank... not so much.

Mathematics supporting this statement:

1* Metal: 100 Meseta.
4* Metal: 800 Meseta.
C > B Upgrade Board: 500 Meseta, 10 uses, 4 C Metal required.

To make 10 Peparian, you thus require 40 Carlian. This costs:

4000 for metal, 500 for board, total of 4500, as opposed to the 8000 spent simply buying the Peparian. A saving of 3500.

However:

4* Metal: 800 Meseta.
7* Metal: 2500 Meseta.
B > A Upgrade Board: 2000 Meseta, 10 uses, 4 B Metal required.

To make 10 Slaterian, you thus require 40 Peparian. This costs:

32000 for the metal, assuming you buy the Peparian straight from the shop.
2000 for the board. This is a total of 34000 Meseta. You could, instead, pay 25000 and buy the 10 Slaterian straight from the shop.

Let's now look at upgrading from C straight to A, to see if that's more worthwhile:

Requirements for 10 Slaterian:

160 Carlian, for 16000 Meseta.
4 C>B Boards, for 2000. Total of 18000.
1 B>A Board, for 2000. Total of 20000 spent. A saving of 5000.

Very interesting.

Examining Woods the same way reveals that:

Wood: 150 Meseta.
Ash: 1000 Meseta.
Wood > Ash Upgrade Board: 500 Meseta, 10 uses, 5 Wood required.

10 Ash requires 50 Wood.
7500 Meseta for Wood + 500 Meseta for Board = 8000 Meseta. Saving of 2000.

Ash: 1000 Meseta.
Ebon: 4000 Meseta.
Ash > Ebon Upgrade Board: 2000 Meseta, 10 uses, 5 Ash required.

50 Ash required for 10 Ebon.

50000 Meseta for Ash + 2000 Meseta for Board = 52000. Loss of 12000.

Requirements to upgrade Wood to Ebon:
250 Wood for 37500 Meseta.
5 C>B Boards for 2500 Meseta = 40000 Meseta.
1 B>A Board for 2000 Meseta = 42000 Meseta.

Ve-ry interesting... It seems that it is less economical to upgrade Wood to Ebon than to just buy the Ebon, yet you can upgrade Carlian to Slaterian, Harnium to Stelnium, Meganite to Teranite, Gamotite to Chicotite, and Soural to Cyral at a saving.
Maybe the Woods issue can be resolved by purchasing the wood from its home planet?

[Kitsadoodles]

Whoa, that's actually very interesting, and I guess its left up to people like you to get the good idea to figure that out! Anyway, yes, those are some very nice statistics; I guess it really leaves it to synthesis and finding materials if you want oodles of a bunch of stuff!

[pink]

I'll just find all the metals instead of buying them... but here's the thing... doing that much sythensis takes so looooooooong... those C > B and B > A upgrades boards are incredibly slow to use rapidly. XD

[Namillus]

This, of course, is fundamentally true, but so much more worth it in the long run, since you save loads.

EDIT: Okay, so Woods retail for the same price on their respective planets as they do on the Colony: You make a loss if you synth up to Ebon from Wood.

[FantasyMeister]

Another way of looking at it is if you pick up stuff as you travel through instances, like wood and ash, you eventually end up with lots of wood and ash in your storage.

Spend 2,500 Meseta on 5 x C>B boards to produce 50 Ash
Spend 2,000 Meseta on 1 x B>A board to produce 10 Ebon

Sell the 10 Ebons in your shop for 2495 each, for a total of 24,950, and that's 20,450 profit.

If you use the 2495 selling price, it basically means that each piece of wood you pick up is worth 81.8 Meseta to you, and each piece of Ash is worth 459 Meseta to you, and I'm pretty sure not many people run past a blob of 459 Meseta on the ground without picking it up pretty quickly.

Which is why (on the XBox 360 at least) you see me smashing open haystacks, chopping down trees and picking up tree-related products at every opportunity.

[pink]

Most games people play in on PS2/PC I find use the "Set in Order" distribution... so I just let others worry about gathering up the items since I'll get whatever I get. XD