What's your badge crafting strategy?

I don't have one.
I don't know.

I only craft badges for the games I like, and sell the other cards to fund the former. It's not like badges have an actual value anyway...

I craft the cheapest badges.

I just craft badges that i like the look of or for games i like. Make exceptions if the badges are dirt cheap, like CS:GO.

A noob question here: why a lot of people craft badges? I mean, what give you back level upping on steam? I can see only an increase of % to get a booster pack (Never get one for eligible games).

If I'm in crafting mood I'll hit up steam cards exchange and see what the bot has. That's pretty much it. I don't go looking for trades on the forums or even with my steam friends.

There are a few I won't level up furhter because I like them. If it wasn't Christmas I'd have them displayed on my profile instead of the Christmas theme I have going.

Selling trading cards to nerds in order to get free money instead of numbers on one's profile that don't actually do anything.

My level is on sweet spot, so I 'll go for the look of it and as long as it's cheap enough (<0.1$). Also I'm going to craft my first and probably only foil badge too.

I craft the cheapest ones and the ones from games I like.
Leveling up just because it's fun and I dont have a better use for the money.
Passed from level 22 to level 85 with this event :D

Sell all the Cards, use money to get collector badges instead

If the game gives me cards i go and check if the game has good emotes to offer , if the game does, i craft the badge ... other than that i just store the cards and trade them later.

first i crafted to get some steam lvls to get higher chances for booster pack drops
im on lvl 30+ and chance should be now 60% higher and i still get only 1 booster pack per month.

total not worth the money ... now i just sell all cards and buy more games from it

1) Buy the cards.

2) Click Ready.

3)Craft it.

I do it for the showcases

Hoard cards at cheap prices, wait till Summer or Winter sale, craft them all to get event cards instead of useless coupons, craft everything (including event cards) for levels and bling and sell what you don't like.

About Steam Holiday cards, do you think it's better to craft 'em now or later? or maybe sell them? And...if you choose to craft 'em what's the reward?

my strategy goes like this

I gather the drops. Trade a bit to get the other half of the set. And then I craft the badge! It's a pretty effective strategy for crafting badges, you should definitely try it.

i just sell all cards on market and use the profit to buy games.

steam level, badges, achievments and all that kind of useless crap is of no interest for me.

I usually only craft the badges that look appealing, or if I really loved the game.

If the badge I want is expensive (as is the case with most new games), I'll sell the cards high and buy them cheap later.

And I'm only going as far as either level 30 or 40, for the showcases, then I'll probably just sell them all as they come in.

I wait for holidays sales, because crafting then it gives you one of the holiday cards which cost more than the normal game cards. Then I get all the drops I can. This year with the gems event I also got rid of all my duplicated stuff, got 12k gems so I created booster packs for each game I got all the drops ready, then used steamcardexchange.net to get some cards I didn't had, and also bought a few cards I needed to complete the set. With the holiday cards I got when crafting normal badges I crafted the holiday badge, and after selling the duplicated holiday cards I got a few cents more than I spent on the cards I bought to complete the sets. So I crafted like 14 badges for free.

i craft some just for the holidays sales so i can get some dirt money over holidays fan badges, last year i got around 30 usd from 10usd invested, some ppl like to craft badges to their favorite games , its cheaper than the "ultimate plus ultra version" and some badges look really cool, take witcher as example.