I believe if they made more unique materia, those that did more than simply adding stats, it would keep a much better balance between crafted gear and boss drops

Fine, have the Ifrit's Battleaxe simply have the best base damage of any other axe, that's fine, but if you could craft an axe and slot it with materia that let you proc Slow on hit, then perhaps you'd prefer that to raw DPS. I'm all for unique and off the wall character builds