Please reevaluate the balance between crafted and U/U items.

[Req]

TLDR if you don't feel like reading the wall of text and my reasoning.

All of the prior content the game had such as nms, dungeons, and even alot of the stronghold keys are not worth doing/getting because of the fact that the gear obtained from them is absolutely worthless compared to crafted gear that can be materiad. They need to find a better way to balance the gear so that the old dungeons are actually worth doing over and over again, and do the same with future patches so the current content isn't rendered worthless as well

I understand that with materia you wanted to make sure there was a balance so that gear that was crafted would be useful and crafters would actually have a reason to craft items, but there is a huge problem with the logic that was used when trying to determine what could have materia added to it and what couldn't. The fact that Unique/Untradeable gear can not have materia added to them makes them completely worthless, and this negates about 80% of not only the content that was added in this patch, but a majority of the gear that was obtainable from previous content. This includes BOTH dungeons added just one patch ago and all the nms outside of world nms. Those things alone were the major selling points of 2 major patches yet it is completely pointless to do them now. I would also like to add that a majority of the gear that you get from settlements(outside of the sentinel's set) are near worthless as well because you can't add materia to them and the stats that they offer can easily be outdone with a single grade 1 or 2 materia.

My question to SE is, why do you do this? Is the +7 attack power and accuracy on a solid scale mail so game breaking that if you were to add materia to it it would become overpowered? I would honestly need to do further testing, but it seems to me like there is an incredibly low stat ceiling on stats as it is, and with buffs you are more than likely to reach that stat cap anyways. A good example of this would be the fact that I do not take any more or less damage when I pop a rampart against ifrit if I have protect II and defender on me with a bit of materia on my gear even though my defense goes from about 750 to over 900. Likewise could be said with my materiad attack gear. I added mercenarys slops and added a second materia to my hands giving me over 30 extra attack, yet my buffed attacks against ifrit has consistently stayed the same for each ifrit fight I do even with these additions. I really don't think the 5 defense on my templar's falchion, which I might add was the hardest and most sought after item in 1.18 should be made worse than a sword that you can buy for 100k just because you can't put materia on it. There is no reason that things that are Unique untradeable in beastmen strongholds should be outdone by these cheaply crafted items either.

I am an officer in one of the most active linkshells on my server and I can just see it on all of my linkshell members faces. Everyone is burnt out on ifrit runs for the most part, and there is nothing left to do other than level and farm the few worthwhile items in strongholds.

If you are worried about balance with these items just understand that the balance is in the fact that it would be incredibly difficult to get those double stacks on this gear because they are alot harder to obtain and can't be bought with money. The crafted gear could be for the people who don't have the time to invest in getting the best of the best of the best gear, while still being incredibly good and the unique untradeables that currently can't have materia added would be reserved for the people who play 40-50 hours a week and do want to go for the best. Again THIS DIFFERENCE WOULD BE INCREDIBLY MINOR and probably wouldn't even be noticeable for anyone that wasn't an elitest jerk such as myself recording what my damage output and intake is, and it would make darkhold and farming alot of the chests in strongholds that are currently worthless worth peoples time.

[Stufoo]

I'd prefer it if they had different focuses for itemization because crafted and untradeable items will have to coexist for this game to work. For example, crafted items can remain bland giving the simple bonuses like DEF, HP, MP, some +stat bonuses, etc. I think it's okay for a max level crafted item to be the best in its slot for those stats as long as it's something you work for, such as having the item HQ and using forbidden materia stacking.

However, untradeable items need to give something else besides those stats, actually unique bonuses, while remaining competitive in the simple stats. I think this is where the problem everyone is seeing now is coming from. The untradeable items we have in game now are just so boring and bland. There are two options you can take when designing an untradeable/non-crafted item, it either needs a completely unique effect or it needs to excel in on area while hurting the others. If you take a look at Alkyoneus's Bracelets from FFXI, that's a clear example of an item that excels in a certain aspect while giving a tradeoff. Situational gear is not a blatantly horrible concept, you just can't be as harsh as FFXI was since we don't equip macro as much. No one would ever equip hecatomb for example, since it gives such a harsh slow effect, but Lancers would jump all over a massive +STR +Attack -VIT -Defense item because that's what they do, and the penalty isn't so severe but still impairing.

As far as unique effects, conserve MP, fast cast, haste and double attack are good examples of things you probably won't see on vanilla crafted gear but may become available for untradeable items. I'd also like to see the return of equipment that enhances certain abilities or weapon skills, such as Aegis greatly increasing shield bash damage, or Valor Leggings making sentinel reduce more damage at first. There's an entire layer of itemization that can be focused towards certain jobs and classes that they haven't even begun to dig into, which is why I'm so anxious to see what they will do with the artifact armors. Mages would certainly give up a crafted item with MP materia for an untradeable Conserve MP or Refresh piece as long as the rest of the stats were comparable. Sure your max MP would drop a bit but your efficiency would go up as long as the effect worked.

I also support being able to meld untradeable items, but only once. You should not be able to risk those items with forbidden materia, both for balance and linkshell sanity reasons. You brought up the templar's falchion, would you really want to redo that speedrun and get even more of them just because some jackass blew his up?

[Req]

Personally, I wouldn't mind if our main tank blew up his templars if it meant my linkshell would eventually have one of the best tanks on the server gear wise, thats really just my linkshell first mentality though and the fact that it would add a ton of replayability, but I do understand where you are coming from. I really like your idea about the unique effects for unique gear though, I honestly hadn't even thought about that. That is really the only reason why some of the stronghold items are even worth getting. They give stats that can't be obtained via materia, either at all, or for that specific gear slot. I am really just looking for SE to give us any reason at all to do previous content. Another idea I had that would probably be less popular is turning those items into Unique/Untradeable materia that can't be gotten through any other means with either superior, or unique stats compared to the current materia. Of course, they would have to implement a system that allows people to put materia on gear without having to trade them for this to work.

[Leknaat]

Another idea I had that would probably be less popular is turning those items into Unique/Untradeable materia that can't be gotten through any other means with either superior, or unique stats compared to the current materia.

I'm pretty sure Yoshi-P said something about that (maybe just in the JP forums) but they were considering allowing people to convert U/U items into materia (but it wouldn't be different from the materia that comes from the same type).

[Irondude]

your post would be a lot more effective if it wasn't so long winded, but I agree with what you are saying. Think about it if you see a piece or rare/ex gear with materia in it, that means that person has crafted it themselves because its untradable. If you see stacked rare/ex it means they have gone to multiple runs to get that item so they can keep attempting to put materia in it.

Basically if you see someone with a 5 socketed rare/ex items its like they win the game. like how bill gates just got an honorary degree from some college. You just GET the win.

[Req]

your post would be a lot more effective if it wasn't so long winded, but I agree with what you are saying. Think about it if you see a piece or rare/ex gear with materia in it, that means that person has crafted it themselves because its untradable. If you see stacked rare/ex it means they have gone to multiple runs to get that item so they can keep attempting to put materia in it.

Basically if you see someone with a 5 socketed rare/ex items its like they win the game. like how bill gates just got an honorary degree from some college. You just GET the win.

Yeah, that definitely seems to be a problem I have with just about any topic I make. I try to express a simple opinion on hwo things need to be and then I end up writing a 2 page essay on why I think it needs to be this way. Anyways, heres a thank you to anyone that actually reads and responds that wall of text.

In my, admittedly biased, opinion: crafted gear should always be better than dropped gear otherwise there is no point in having crafting at all.

I would argue it takes a lot longer to grind a craft and then make a decent piece of gear than it does to repeatedly camp and kill an NM that spawns every five minutes. I don't find obtaining dropped gear to be hard at all.

As for this, the problem I see with that logic is, sure it takes awhile to get a craft up, but once you do you can mass produce all the items necessary to add materia to in a matter of moments if you buy the materials from the market wards. Whereas with dungeons and farming coffers in strongholds you are going to go days without getting the same piece of equipment unless you have a really, really generous linkshell throwing the items at you every time one drops.

[Wynn]

In my, admittedly biased, opinion: crafted gear should always be better than dropped gear otherwise there is no point in having crafting at all.

I would argue it takes a lot longer to grind a craft and then make a decent piece of gear than it does to repeatedly camp and kill an NM that spawns every five minutes. I don't find obtaining dropped gear to be hard at all.

[Bluetaro]

In my, admittedly biased, opinion: crafted gear should always be better than dropped gear otherwise there is no point in having crafting at all.

I would argue it takes a lot longer to grind a craft and then make a decent piece of gear than it does to repeatedly camp and kill an NM that spawns every five minutes. I don't find obtaining dropped gear to be hard at all.

Problem with this is then you wouldn't have to run any of the in-game content to get gear. You could just hit up the market place and walk out with pimp status equips.

[Lavani]

In my, admittedly biased, opinion: crafted gear should always be better than dropped gear otherwise there is no point in having crafting at all.

I would argue it takes a lot longer to grind a craft and then make a decent piece of gear than it does to repeatedly camp and kill an NM that spawns every five minutes. I don't find obtaining dropped gear to be hard at all.

Cool, so you wan't to buy victory on the market wards. That gives no incentive for doing added boss fights more than once, and that's only to say you did it.

Maybe if they added drops that people could get from bosses/mobs (similar to how Monster Hunter works) and have crafters use those materials to make you the gear, people would still raid.

[Wynn]

Maybe if they added drops that people could get from bosses/mobs (similar to how Monster Hunter works) and have crafters use those materials to make you the gear, people would still raid.

This is exactly how it used to work with drops before full on equipment was added to loot tables. That's why we have things like the Dodore doublet. Why they changed it, I have no idea.