Let players craft red weapons that don’t have the glowing rune skins but the max stats and red name. This would allow those of us with terrible loot luck to actually feel we are able to progress but still give the incentive to keep playing for those sweet illusions/cosmetics.
Perhaps I have terrible luck but I’ve gotten one red in all my hundreds of hours of play. I also have nothing to craft and currently have +999 scrap.
If it costs 50 scrap to upgrade to a gold, then set the price to make a red very high but something everyone can work towards. To turn a gold into a red would cost say, 500 scrap plus a selection of dusts. It doens’t matter what the cost is, the important element of this idea is that you can, with some work get the best stats on all your loot but still have something to work for.