Hello,

I understand that the present crafting system was purposely made to be tedious and boring in order to ensure not everyone picks up crafting.

This ensures there can be a 'community' of crafters who cater to the needs of others who desire their wares.

If this were not the case (i.e. crafting was easy/fun to level up) then everyone would be self-sufficient and not need a crafting community. This would leave those who like crafting unable to support (help/sell-to/etc) others.

However, I am wondering if 'boredom and tedium' are the only ways to address this? Perhaps there is a way to ensure that no one can be fully self-sufficient by levelling their crafts, yet still not be so tedious that no one desires to do so.

For example, what if there was a way to choose specialization that was based on multiple character aspects. I.e.:

Woodworking - Specialty: Magical Staffs
Benefit: Unlocks quest which unlocks recipe to craft staffs for White Mage
Requirement: Level 50 Woodworking, Level 50 White Mage

Goldsmithing - Specialty: Magical Wands
Benefit: Unlocks quest which unlocks recipe to craft wands for Black Mage
Requirement: Level 50 Goldsmithing, Level 50 Black Mage

Additionally: To gain access to additional quests to unlock additional recipes not only would the DoH level need to be increased, so would the related DoW/DoM level.

Those who do not wish to level DoW/DoM would not need to, but then they would not get access to special exclusive recipes.

This makes lore sense:
Those who craft specialty weapons usually have some experience in using those weapons.

With these requirements in place, the act of levelling up the crafts can be made easier (or more fun!). (Sidenote: I've always thought of levelling up exclusively through leves (or quests) would be better than grinding, and one should really not get xp from grinding).


This would also open up the door to even more specialized skills via quests, for example:
Quest - Apprenticeship In the Art Of Magical Melding
Reward: AF Hat for Goldsmith/Woodworking : +10% on all melding attempts of Magical Staff and Magical Wands
Requirement: 50 BLM + 50 CNJ + Specialty: Magical Staff + Specialty: Magical Wand


It takes a lot of work to go down this route, but it should be 'fun' work rather than 'tedious' work. Therefore it still limits who can do it (thus making it more exclusive) but not at the cost of boredom.


Thoughts? Do you see this as preventing crafting exclusivity? Or just boring? Or even fun?!