Like i said, its an interesting idea. From a lore perspective its understandable. From a programming and game balance perspective? Not gonna happen in this game. Your idea(add ____ to recipe to change ____) would mean throwing out the entire crafting system they built for the game and building a new one. Dynamic variables in stats would mean throwing out the entire item system we have and building a new one. That would be a mountain of work for a change that would be poorly received by a lot of the community, and wouldnt necessarily make the game any better. That isnt the type of change you undertake a decade+ into a games lifespan. Those are the types of ideas you design your game around from the beginning. And as for "I see no reason that the one forging the weapon shouldn't be able to dictate what the original look will turn out like" - that IS the glam system. Except it isnt limited to crafted weapons, and if i buy a sword from you i dont have to stick with your idea of what it should look like.