Materia System

[Lerris]

In this example, you are the person that both sells the glass and makes the house. You can thus charge whatever the hell you please for the glass and they have to pay it.

In a balanced system, you would have to purchase the glass from someone who isn't you.

In this case, crafters get to pay themselves with gatherers' and battlers' money.

Crafter still has to purchase raw materials/finished gear + materia + catalyst. We're not selling the same sword twice unless we've bought it back.

What is needed is a mechanism where a crafter can join materia to gear while it is in the owner's possession. Something like the current bazaar repairs ( which also need to be improved as mentioned elswhere so that buyers can provide their own repair materials ).

[Peregrine]

Crafter still has to purchase raw materials/finished gear + materia + catalyst. We're not selling the same sword twice unless we've bought it back.

And that doesn't matter one bit, because the crafter can turn around and re-charge whoever they sell that materia'd gear to. Again, battlers and gatherers end up paying everything they ever charge crafters, and more.

Crafters have two avenues of profit from this system, and they are the MOST IMPORTANT ONES: the FIRST and the LAST.
You can't START materia unless you buy something from a crafter. HELLO profit.
You can't USE materia unless you get something from a crafter. HELLO profit.

Again, this is absolutely ridiculous. It can't happen.