Upgrading U/U items to make them better.

[Razor]

i wouldn't say materia is very powerful, the high numbers are just obnoxious.

It's because SE had to substantially water down the effect of 1 point in any given value to make it not insane. Look at Magic Attack Potency in XI vs XIV. Magic Attack Bonus +1 equaled a solid 1% damage increase. As such MAB wasn't typically available in large quantities and there was an expected difficulty in acquiring a MAB+3 item vs a MAB+5. In XIV since any given mage can wander around with Attack Magic Potency +1~80(or higher?), that 1% increase withered away to something much less noticeable. Unless SE lets stats cap at 9999 instead of 999, we're going to feel like we're on Primeval Brew 24/7 lol