MATERIA for RARE/EX GEAR

[Physic]

sooo you want to make materia U/U items not only the best items in game, but also the easiest to obtain? the fact that you lose the items slows down materia considerably, and increases the cost and effort to make dramatically. If you have a base weapon that never blows up, that will be the easiest to meld.

i had a long complicated post about a way in which they could make items add materia, without elimnating the need for gatherers or crafters, involving making a proxy version of the item that they could add a materia to, then add that to u/u weapons, but its a lot of work to execute, and at the end of the day you will still need crafters, and the materia u/u should still not be the best equip, but only equal to teh crafted ones.

but at the end of the day
gatherers must gather
crafters must craft
battlers must battle

you cant give battlers complete control over making items via battle. (ie defeating monsters for finished drops)