An idea on how to improve materia and repair systems.

Back before the official forums, dark matter, and the addition of repair NPCs to the camps and outpost, I sent SE a suggestion on a way to make repairs better. The idea was simple enough, allow crafters the ability to make repair kits that could be sold in the wards, but used by anyone to repair their own items. These could be made from a combination of monster dropped items as well as DoL gathered items. This would also give it a bit of economy, something for crafters, adventures, and DoL to all sell, depending on how many types of kits where implemented as well as the drops needed to make them.

With the current repair, the only reason crafters still need to be involved is to repair a item to 100% so that you can sell it or have someone attach materia to it, or for accessory repairs. Many put a gil offer when seeking repairs in their bazar, but there is still pretty little economy in the system. There is about to be even less with Grade 5 Dark Matter being able to repair anything, as well as the coming addition of NPCs to repair jewelery. Calling the repair items Dark Matter never made much sense to me either, seems like we could have the exact same system as it is now, but they could just rename the items Repair Kit 1 - Repair Kit 5. With the system as it is now, it seems there probably is not a point to having repair kits be something crafters could make, but at least rename them...

Thinking about that old suggestion of repair kits and some of the issues with the current materia system, I thought this idea might be nice for the materia system as well. It could possibly improve the system, bring a bit more economical incentive to crafters and DoL, as well as give adventures a bit more control. It would also help with the issue of finding someone to attach your materia. SE has stated they are looking into a system, similar to repairs, that would allow adventures to seek materia melds, but I am not sure I would want to use this system for trying to attach more than 1 materia to an item.

The idea is pretty simple, at least in my mind. Rather than having crafters attach materia directly to the item, crafters would instead create "materia kits", name to be determined, that any adventure could attach themselves. Spiritbinding items would work almost the same as it does now, but instead of getting the exact materia item with stats already on it, you would get the main ingredient for a specific materia. This main ingredient would need to be crafted with a catalyst supplied by Diciples of the Land.

Now, this is where it gets a little bit complex. The main item you get when you materia a spiritbound item would be for a specific type of materia but would also have a quality like any other crafting material. The higher the quality, the more the chance of a HQ or better stats when crafted. Catalyst could also be changed to have quality ratings. Example, breaking down a Hart Guisarme would give you a better chance at a Heavens Fist Crystal +3 or Savage Might Crystal +3. Breaking down the lower level items would be much less of a chance for +1 through +3 items.

Combining a Savage Might +3 and Cretified Matter +3 would give a much higher chance for a Savage Might Kit IV with +50 Crit (the higher end of the range). Combing a normal Materia Crystal with a normal catalyst would still give a small chance at a Savage Might Kit III or IV, just like when you HQ armor with normal mats today, but a high chance the item would also be on the lower end of the stat range.

The kits could then be sold in the Wards/AH as well as just made for LS friends. The chance of HQs and higher quality synths, as well as the ability to use some of the lower end ones for skilling up a craft should keep crafters interested. The end result, the "materia kit" would be something you put on your gear yourself without the need of a crafter to attach it for you. The chance to succeed could be like it is now, with the same penalties, etc. but at least be in your own hands.

The fact that the system would still have a high chance of failure would mean a constantly high demand, much like it is now and crafters should stay interested. A chance for higher quality catalyst would be good for Disciples of the Land as well. And any random adventurer willing to spiritbind items would have a chance at HQ and Rare ingredients so that they can sell them to fund other materia/gear purchases, much like we already see today.

I know the devil is in the details and there would be many details to consider and work out in order to implement this kind of system. I certainly don't pretend to have the answers to all the problems this type of system could present. All I do know is that, to me, it seems like this system would make the materia system a bit more flexible for all three major roles, DoM/W, DoL, and DoH. It also seems to me that very few people attach materia to lower level gear anyway, so I think letting 40+ crafters make all the kits would not be much of a problem either, but I could be wrong. Maybe there is a way to implement something like this with different tiers of recipes so that lower level crafters could use it similar to how it works now?

I also see this as a possible way to introduce a avenue for higher chances of success when trying forbidden materia synths yourself. Today attaching multiple materia to a HQ armor or weapon ups the chances a little bit. Higher quality kits could be made to improve your chances slightly as well. Or adventures could be presented with a quest or other type of goal they can achieve to get a buff that raises their chances slightly. Many have suggested a way to get a buff like this for today's system, but the main flaw I see with that suggestion is that if you make the buff hard to obtain, such as a lengthy quest, much of the player base would end up stuck begging crafters to get the buff before trying their meld.