Pikko: a brief (!) comment regarding crafting to carry to the DevTeam, which could be summarized in the following question: "The fighting jobs have to meet Maat from time to time to prove their worthiness to go further, but this is not reflected in the crafts (i) Synth crafts: the "cap" items are in no way comparable to a true test of ability; (ii) the HELM crafts (and here I include fishing, gardening, choco digging, etc.) may have some gradations but they are almost totally informal when actually present. Is there any way to model the synth/ HELM side of the game to recapitulate the status of having to do G5?"

General theses:

1. Each of these two crafting arenas should have a master craftsman level; reward for reaching this level would need to be (a) significant, (b) personal, (c) worthwhile, and (d) identifiable.

2. Durables need a means of modification to reduce supply over time.

3. Crafters in general should be placed in a position where they do not get totally overshelmed by gear, etc. from new areas (CoP/TAU Assault, etc.) and should have a reasonable chance to compete.

Commentary:

1) Example on the synth side: having 340 craft levels under your belt on a single character, including any +skill crafter items ... effectively meaning reaching 100 in one craft and 60 in 4 other crafts) that would be hard to get to but not at all impossible. This in the opinion of many would truly be a master craftsman. (Test could be a signed item at, say, level 68 from any 5 different crafts.) Of course, people are going to freak out about their crafting mules... so maybe something could be done creatively there, but not sure what. People will also look at my sig and say I am biased in this suggestion, but I assure you that I thought very hard about using mules or doing crafting on a single character when I returned to the game, and decided that doing it on a single character would be tougher and more challenging.

2) Some durables do not have a synth equivalent (e.g. PCC), so some items of very high value could remain unique and unaffected. However, the great majority of gear, even the sky/sea items, should be bifurcated. NQ items would last a long time before deterioration (say 2 Earth years), but HQ items would only retain HQ status for a more limited period (say 6 Earth months), and then revert to NQ status and subject to further deterioriation.

a) Major exception: if a Master Craftsman creates a HQ item and only uses it for personal use, there would be no deterioration of status.
b) System should be in place for Master Craftsman to do recrafting (NQ > HQ), extension crafting (extending life of NQ), etc. Each application would be capable of being crystal signed.
c) Craftspersons should have a means of advertising their skills, and the use of the special crystals is probably the best way to go about doing it...meaning I am fully in favor of the suggestions of being able to buy stacks of them from the guilds.
d) The "supergear" from assault, sky, etc. should all still have some craftable component that permits the guild system to at least participate in that side of the game.

3) On the HELM side, a system similar to fishing could be developed for each of the subcrafts (as is to some extent the case for choco digging), and Pikko should be named Grand Vizir of Gardening Matters (joking aside, it would really be nice to have a skill system for gardening). Appropriate levels and rewards would need to be developed and explained (for example, in choco digging, the certainly is a system, but reference is made to the arguments as to whether A5 exists....).

Hope some of this is food for thought. Best regards.