Note: English isn’t my first language so bear with me.

In addition to this post https://discord.com/channels/344054657443692545/768944561351163974/798273740559351848, I would like to add a dissertation of my own.

First of all, I will say that I don’t like this crafting system and even calling it a crafting system is really stretching it to some extent. It really feels more playing roulette than anything else and can’t help but to wonder if the devs designed it as if they were tantalizing the gambling devil dormant in every human being. Cos at the core, this crafting system is exactly like opening loot boxes. The exaltation of creating the perfect item vs the deception of bricking it.

Now, lets state a few facts:
• Wolcen is gear dependent. The ability to clear endgame content is in direct relation to the quality of your gear way more than the skills of the players trying to clear that content or any other understanding of the mechanics of the game. And by clearing content, I don’t mean doing 187 untainted in under 1 minute. I mean comfortably being able to farm 187/88/89 for gold, affinity, unique, mats and crafting bases.
• The weighting of the affixes for items is designed to funnel you towards crafting or either towards farming waiting for the perfect drop or in some cases like in the post referred earlier, trading. I mean the way they weighted the affixes means that the chances of finding a usable item in endgame from the get-go when it drops are abysmal. Now im not saying that god roll items should rain down from the skies, but the ratio of good items is imo way too low and basically, this is in direct relation with the affixes weight when an item drops.
• The same affixes weighting for items is used when crafting. Although there are gimmicks (when working as intended) to aim your rolls while crafting, the chances still remains the same and the chances of creating a near god roll item are also abysmal.
• The mats required for crafting (gems and reagents) are way too scarce.
• This crafting system is RNG based. So on top of the RNG involved when the item drops, you have to go through another layer of RNG when crafting.
• This crafting system is too binary in terms of output. You either succeed in creating your item or you brick it. Or you are left with a boring item that kinda have what you want with 1 or 2 useless affixes that doesn’t improve anything for your build

Now comes the metaphysical ramblings:
• Depending on the player preferences, this crafting system can be enough. But for a player like me that likes to push a build to the limit in terms of all the good stats on the good items, this is a fraking nightmare. Sure my thunderstrike build right now can shreds everything on 189, but it could shreds even more. And this is the breaking point of this crafting system. Sure you can craft decent items that will do as intended but having perfect stats for every items in every slot is nearly impossible unless you invest time and sanity of mind.
• This crafting system is a black hole for resources. As said earlier, the crafting mats are so rare that you just burn through them with no results to show for. It’s just disheartening. Having to farm crafting mats isn’t my idea of fun when playing an ARPG. If I want to farm ressources, ill go and play a Ubisoft game.
• Now considering that we’ve received new content with the Bloodtrail seasonal content and that NO changes apart from the interface (bogus) were made to the crafting system, you cant help but think that this is what the DEVs want. Extreme perfect items rarity. I agree wholeheartedly with the fact that perfect items should be hard to find/create but please, tone it the frak down a bit.
• Why tone it down? Cos for a player like me, who likes to perfect his toons, it takes too much time. So instead of creating another build going totally with another set of skills or mastery, im still chasing/farming/fuming to bring the build I have invested in to the level I want it to be.
• Some of you don’t like comparison but with a far more accessible crafting system, I was able to create 8 toons that clears all endgame content in Last Epoch for the 1/3 of the time invested in the game. In Wolcen, I have 2. And if you’re wondering, I’ve played 1,4K hours since launch last year.
• This imo leads to people following meta builds and being locked in them because they don’t have the courage of creating a new build that will require too much time, efforts and resources to just try a new build and new skills. Apart from the fact that some skills are way stronger than others (HO/AS), accessibility to good gear and the ability to easily have access to this gear opens up possibilities and right now, the lack of build diversity is not only a problem of having unbalanced skills, but also a problem of properly gearing up a toon to be able to accomplish what you want it to do.
• So it really comes down to what the DEVS wants from this game to be cos they didn’t create by mistake. It’s a philosophical choice. The catch-22 of trying to gear up by making you play more to farm resources and crafting bases because you bricked your previous rarity upgrade. The never-ending loop which means more player playtime in the books. Sometimes I feel that the DEVS WANTS to make us sweat for our gear and that opening up accessibility to good gear is a crime against god for them.
• But every player reaches its breaking point and then player fatigue kicks in. After the 20th weapon upgrade that gave you a stupid ailment status instead of a flat, cos you know, its weighted on some weapons at almost 60%. You just ALT-F4 and go watch Alice in Borderland on TV.
• This crafting system is unforgiving ands offers no room for refining. Even if you have all the right stats at the right place on the right item, you still have the chance of rolling poor stats which really is a fraking paradox: I was able to roll a perfect mediocre item !
• So in the end, the question is not: Should the DEVS fix the crafting system but really: Is this crafting system viable at all? If you read all this, you know my answer. The question is are the DEVS willing to open up the game a bit and let go of their morals high ground and do what’s best for the game : having a player base by finally giving what the players want, a good intuitive crafting system that allows you to explore possibilities of the game instead of locking you down chasing your own tail.

End of metaphysical ramblings.