My suggestion is, as titled, an additional option in the crafting station set as either “Repair item” or “Upgrade item”.
What it would do:
This option would allow players to use money and crafting resources to add stat points to a desired item - thus increasing the gear rating.
Why add this:
- As mentioned by the devs in the crafting post, they want to eliminate some RNG. They also want to enable players to customize weapons with the blessings they want, well this gives an additional customization option.
- There is no current way to increase a weapon’s base stat rating (outside of consecration’s tiny, unscaled bump) - this would allow that.
- Finding your preferred weapon is very RNG, between the shops and random drops, and the stats are also RNG - this gives a player the ability to customize to their play style.
- Currently, players are searching for RNG god roll white items of their choice to upgrade. This would eliminate that need.
- Lore wise it makes sense that we would hold onto and upgrade/repair an existing weapon rather than pick up scraps (especially since devs claim “refining” a weapon is an option to scour the corruption off your weapon)
How it would work:
Find the weapon of your choice, in whatever rarity, though min/maxers will obviously want gray/white items for this process. Then bring it to the crafting station and pay crafting resources and currency to have the crafter upgrade/repair your weapon, to bring out more of its potential. Choosing from the stats already listed on the weapon (obviously not curios), you boost that particular stat by a chosen amount, or if fatshark prefers, a range of say 10-50 points. Rarity of the item would decide the cost of each stat bump, as well as the limit to how high the total gear rating can be.
There would obviously need to be a limit to this, or a drawback. I have 2 thoughts on that, and prefer the second, but would obviously leave that to fatshark to determine.
1 - limit the customizable stats to, for example, 3 stats. This means if you choose to boost damage, cleave and mobility, you would ONLY be able to upgrade those stats further, locking you out of upgrading other stats. This would mean a player still has to find a RNG weapon of choice with good rolls to balance the process out.
2 - (this would be my preference) Make stats that are customized impact other stats after passing a specific threshold. For example, once you level a weapon’s damage stat past 80% of maximum, it starts impacting ammo count or mobility. Or, if after passing 75% max cleave damage, it starts cutting into cleave targets.
- This would mean min/maxers will have to make a choice on how they want to play and upgrade a weapon. While at the same time, players who want a well rounded weapon could stop upgrades before hitting a stats’ threshold to avoid reducing other stats.
Now for the more nitty gritty.
These are all just examples, Fatshark would have to choose actual values, so please keep that in mind. And again, 1 stat bump could be 1 actual stat point , or perhaps a range like 10-20, allowing for some RNG in a more controlled process.
White/gray items [Up to 400 gear rating]
- 1 stat bump = 10 plasteel + 100 currency (to pay for the upgrade)
Green items [Up to 450 gear rating]
- 1 stat bump = 15 plasteel + 1000 currency
Blue items [Up to 500 gear rating]
- 1 stat bump = 20 plasteel + 5000 currency
Purple items [Up to 550 gear rating]
- 1 stat bump = 10 diamantine + 20 plasteel + 7500 currency
Orange items [Up to [600 gear rating]
- 1 stat bump = 20 diamantine + 20 plasteel + 10000 currency
Red items (veteran, maybe?) [Up to 650 gear rating]
- 1 stat bump = 30 diamantine + 50 plasteel + 10000 currency
Now, obviously, for this process, you would want to wait till max level before starting on upgrading a gray/white item in order to min/max your cost effectiveness, though that would mean waiting for that high gear rating RNG store item of your choice before proceeding. However, it also gives players the option to continue along with their chosen weapon throughout their leveling journey, by keeping its gear rating and stats relevant.
TL;DR:
Give players the ability to increase chosen stats (perhaps at cost to other stats) in order to raise gear rating and customize weapons to specific play styles through the crafting station.