Tool Ladders
Tool Ladders are permanent Amber-and-materials upgrades that speed up gathering. Each of the four gathering skills — Foraging, Logging, Mining and Fishing — has its own tool that climbs six ranks, from a crude Flint tool up to a Starfall tool. Every rank you buy makes that skill's actions 4% faster, so a fully-laddered tool cuts action time by 24%.
Tool Ladders are the second stage of the late-game Amber sink, sitting alongside the Shop's upgrades and the Exotic Broker.
The four tools
| Skill | Tool |
|---|---|
| Foraging | Sickle |
| Logging | Axe |
| Mining | Pick |
| Fishing | Rod |
Ranks and cost
The Amber cost and skill-level gate for each rank are the same across all four skills — only the materials differ by tool. Ranks must be bought in order.
| Rank | Tier | Skill level | Amber |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Flint | 10 | 2,000 |
| 2 | Bronze | 25 | 8,000 |
| 3 | Iron | 45 | 32,000 |
| 4 | Silver | 65 | 128,000 |
| 5 | Obsidian | 82 | 512,000 |
| 6 | Starfall | 94 | 1,360,000 |
Ranks 1–5 cost about 682,000 Amber per tool — roughly 2.7 million to bring all four skills to Obsidian. The Starfall rank (6) is a post-99 trophy: it needs level 94 in the skill and a top-tier material bill.
Materials
Every tool at a given rank shares a common mineral core; each tool then adds its own flavour materials (a wooden haft at Silver, a rare component at Starfall).
Shared core (all four tools):
| Rank | Shared materials |
|---|---|
| 1 Flint | 20 Flint, 10 Fernwood |
| 2 Bronze | 30 Copper Ore, 30 Tin Ore, 10 Podocarp Log |
| 3 Iron | 60 Iron Ore, 30 Coal, 20 Araucaria Log, 10 Limestone |
| 4 Silver | 80 Silver Ore, 40 Cobalt Ore |
| 5 Obsidian | 100 Obsidian, 40 Gold Ore, 20 Ironbark Log |
| 6 Starfall | 120 Moonstone, 20 Skysteel Ore, 20 Cloudwood Log, 20 Worldroot Log |
Per-tool additions:
| Tool | Rank 4 (Silver) haft | Rank 5–6 extras |
|---|---|---|
| Sickle (Foraging) | +20 Palmfern Log | Starfall: +2 Sunpetal Resin |
| Axe (Logging) | +20 Kelpwood Log | Starfall: +2 Heartwood Core |
| Pick (Mining) | +20 Palmfern Log | Starfall: +2 Starmetal Ore |
| Rod (Fishing) | +20 Kelpwood Log | Starfall: +2 Abyssal Pearl |
The Rod also needs 10 Horsetail Reed at ranks 1 and 2. Every listed material can be produced within a few levels of the rank's own gate, so no rank ever asks for something far out of reach.