Why gear should be craftable:

[Devil_Ether]

Shai,

You are making a really good point.
It is important that the need/use of crafters doesn't diminish.
You mentioned a fine line about the above issue, but at the moment that line is blurry.
We've hopped from one side of the spectrum to another, and perhaps we are further from that line than we were before.
But that doesn't mean the game is going into absolute turd-om, or that the new vision of this game is terrible.
Sometimes you have to make a mistake to make things better than they ever were.

I feel like your pretty doom n gloomy about this situation, and that's not helping it get any better. Don't write it off as an effect of Yoshi-P'ism, but do something to make it clear and better.

If gifts idea was implemented it would create a use for crafters to make NM gear better. (win/win) Yeah, a new system might have to be implemented to upgrade NM gear to HQ +1 etc, but it's a possible solution.

[giftforce]

As for the materia situation.

That isn't a solution.

I don't want to be a materia crafter.

I want to craft recipes with lots of obscure materials that require teamwork and effort to bring together, with a group of invested players putting in the work to get the reward. (Like Silver Tricorne +3. To get one requires a collective effort of several people/friends).

(Or you can just be happy with a NQ for a fraction of the effort.)

Throwing a materia at a weapon with an empty materia slot and praying to your God Yoshi that it is a sucess isn't the same thing.