Interesting thoughts and opinions folks, thanks! Let's keep it going.

Upon reading another Massively article regarding crafting systems, I'm seeing some irony (in a good way) that many people feel this WoW clone, FFXIV, has the best/most robust crafting system of the current crop of major titles.

How then, can we increase the synergy between high-end crafting and high-end content while ensuring that players who place importance on their time spent on said high-end content feel satisfied while also giving continued relevance for the time spent leveling crafting?

Some more of my thoughts going on the assumption that most high-end FCs have at least one max level DoH for each discipline in them:

1. Give high-end raiders/PVPers access to content/ranke-exclusive glamour skins to go over crafted gear.

2. Make all materials needed to make and upgrade high-end gear exclusive drops in specific raids (FCoB gear mats drop in FCoB, etc) or require a certain PVP rank to purchase.

3. Make raid/rank exclusive crafting patterns available as drops (PVE) or for purchase (PVP).

Just some idle musings from a guy bored at work today...