Confused by live letter....

[Kajidourden]

Someone help me understand. In the latest letter from the developer live there is this quote.
"The economic balance of FFXIV: ARR is set up in such a way that players save up to fill the gap created by the item level cap, or perhaps craft equipment and meld it with materia to raise their item levels faster"

Is anyone else confused by this? Since when does adding materia to a piece of gear change its item level?

[Axlle10]

he is talking about the gear AND the materia to gear faster. its much simpler to buy gear now than to farm it yourself. so darklight is being phased out by some of the newer players in place of crafted gear. whereas older players already have most dl from farming it when crafting was overpriced. adding materia does nothing to change the ilvl, the bolded part should include "craft equipment and meld it with materia to raise their item levels faster" all as one statement not picked apart. crafted equipment is meant to be melded to be superior to darklight.

[Pinworms]

I think there is going to be new recipes to make gear equal to whatever t6-9 has by adding materia. Just my thoughts.

[Penguinmayhem]

Implying that we can fill the item gaps with crafted gear is hilarious to me because of just how utterly useless the materia system is at the moment, and how completely neglected crafted gear is after about level 45.

Please, someone explain to me how exactly I'm supposed to make a cobalt cuirass better by melding a load of elemental materia to it that don't do anything? Or maybe Mind IV? I suppose I could use all these gathering materia I've got lying around...

[waca]

I think there is going to be new recipes to make gear equal to whatever t6-9 has by adding materia. Just my thoughts.

Probably not. If you use current situation as reference, 2 stars crafting gears were never on par with the best gears iLvL90 T1-T5 gears or myth gears on first release, they have same iLvl with second best gear, namely the Darklights, but slightly better than DL after full meld.
I believe they'll still use the same idea.

[MithrasInvictus]

Implying that we can fill the item gaps with crafted gear is hilarious to me because of just how utterly useless the materia system is at the moment, and how completely neglected crafted gear is after about level 45.

Please, someone explain to me how exactly I'm supposed to make a cobalt cuirass better by melding a load of elemental materia to it that don't do anything? Or maybe Mind IV? I suppose I could use all these gathering materia I've got lying around...

Why the heck would you meld elemental materia onto a piece of tanking armour?! You would put DET and CRIT onto a Cobalt Cuirass if you wanted to buff it... It will take accuracy as well, but you should be more than capable of hitting monsters regularly without a big accuracy buff in any scenario that will see you alive in ilvl49 gear.

[Mysteltain]

Why the heck would you meld elemental materia onto a piece of tanking armour?! You would put DET and CRIT onto a Cobalt Cuirass if you wanted to buff it... It will take accuracy as well, but you should be more than capable of hitting monsters regularly without a big accuracy buff in any scenario that will see you alive in ilvl49 gear.

Uh, not sure if you're aware, but they were joking.

[dspguy]

Would be nice if they changed 2-star heavy darksteel to be head, body, legs, feet as separate items. It would create a market for people that get their allagan/myth/CT piece but don't want to wear ilvl 60 stuff from AK/Haukke/etc. Mages get Vanya head/body that they can use. Why not tanks?

[waca]

Mages get Vanya head/body that they can use. Why not tanks?

How about Darklight healing/casting cowl? Should they ask the same too?

Oh wait, i have a great idea - why don't we just design a same set of uniform for all jobs?

[dspguy]

Think you missed the point.

Let's say you are a healer and have the DL Cowl of Healing. You spend the myths on the iLvl90 body piece. You have to replace your head item. Your options are either an iLvl 60 piece AK/Haukke/etc or the iLvl80 CT piece or the iLvl70 2-star crafted Vanya head item.

Now, if you are a PLD or WAR, and you have the Heavy DL Armor and you spend myths on the body piece, you get to replace your head item with only the iLvl60 stuff or the iLvl80 CT piece. Why not have crafters provide a 2-star head item? Get rid of Heavy Darksteel Armor entirely and make body/head/legs/feet all separate pieces of gear to allow for flexibility and if anything, less uniform gear.