Why is crafting such a grind at 50?

[Rainsford]

Using common sense, a crafted piece of gear should cost roughly the same number of tomestone items as its DL equivalent. So, 2-3 for accessories, 4-5 for body would make sense. The idea seems to have been that, while the crafted gear would be overall superior, it would take significantly more work to make/meld, and the DL gear is "good enough".

Unfortunately, lots of Legacy players came over with items like Coke and Potash. It seems like the increase in item requirement was to throttle the legacy servers more than the non-legacies, and we just fell victim to SE's "don't do any tweaking based on type of server" policy. Interestingly, the same policy is what has led to the rise in RMT on non-legacies thanks to no real way to generate gil at 50, where as the issue on legacy servers is a surplus of gil.

[Manila]

Using common sense, a crafted piece of gear should cost roughly the same number of tomestone items as its DL equivalent. So, 2-3 for accessories, 4-5 for body would make sense. The idea seems to have been that, while the crafted gear would be overall superior, it would take significantly more work to make/meld, and the DL gear is "good enough".

Unfortunately, lots of Legacy players came over with items like Coke and Potash. It seems like the increase in item requirement was to throttle the legacy servers more than the non-legacies, and we just fell victim to SE's "don't do any tweaking based on type of server" policy. Interestingly, the same policy is what has led to the rise in RMT on non-legacies thanks to no real way to generate gil at 50, where as the issue on legacy servers is a surplus of gil.

I actually think it should cost slightly more. The philo tomes items are tradeable, and you can acquire them without ever setting foot in a dungeon, so there should be a convenience fee associated with the cost. I don't want to guess what the most appropriate price is, but slightly more is entirely reasonable.

One of my biggest complaints with the whole 2 star crafting system is the complete inconsistency in material costs across the board, even among the same slot. For instance, the monk pants cost 9 tome items while the Bard pants costs 18, and the Vanya pants cost 27 (nothing should cost this much). Its like this was pulled out of a randomizer. It doesnt make any sense at all, and it needs to be revisited very soon.

If 9 is the magic number (its probably not), then everything should cost 9. Not 18, and definitely not 27. Except with alchemy. Having a consumable, especially a relatively useless one that's also available in dungeon chests, cost 9 tome items is trolling.

Variable 2 star component cost only really makes sense if the cost of a 2star component is much more reasonable, and it should never be so incongruous among same slots without a compelling reason. If the cost were 2-4 tome items per 2 star component, there'd be more room for this kind of cost variation among separate slots.