The fact remains that this game would have been infinitely better if they didn't go the looter shooter route, and if they worked the weapons and gear you get into the storyline and side quests in meaningful ways. They could and should have made the weapon progression a very purposeful thing with an in-depth and detailed modding and crafting system.
They could have done the following, for example:
1. Made it so we have weapon archetypes: a few types of handguns, a few types of rifles, a few types of SMG's, shotguns and DMRs (designated marksman rifle)
2. The ability to craft from each one of these types, but use both found and crafted materials to create specific builds of each archetype with controlled stats and abilities based on materials used in the crafting process. You use a specific set of materials, you get a specific type of that gun with a specific set of stats. You use crafted or more easily found materials to set the stats to specific ones, and with epic and legendary weapons, you use a very rare, specific type of world drop material to determine what unique ability the weapon would have.
3. Each outcome would create a unique weapon that you can find no where else in the game.
4. We could have gotten unique weapons that we carry with us throughout the entirety of the game as drops from bosses and story encounters, but one's that could be modified, upgraded and customized in a variety of ways using the crafting system along the way. They also could have slowly introduced various mods and augmentations to us as we progressed that allow syncing with the weapon in ways unique to each one:
Like a shotgun that shoots a cartridge full of drones (an amount of drones that could be upgraded over time with progressively better mods) that when shot into the air, the drones will follow you like a cloud, each bullet-drone seeking enemies that get too close, imbedding inside of a limb and exploding, blowing the limb off and a chunk of HP, consuming the cloud one bullet-drone at a time. But when fired directly at an enemy instead of into the air, the bullets seek the enemy, enter the body and then explode ALL AT ONCE, taking off all of their limbs and their head, killing them instantly.
See? Unique ideas. Unique weapons. It's better than the overwhelmingly mediocre looter shooter route they took. I came up with this idea in a matter of minutes. I could come up with a dozen such weapons in a single day. They could have spent their time making fewer more unique weapons and then designing a multitude of mods for the weapons (for us to find and/or to craft) to change how they behave, and augmentations for our character to interact with the weapons in unique ways.
For example, that specific shotgun only works that way with a specific set of mods and augmentations, and could do something completely different with the bullet-drones by using other mods and augmentations. Now THAT is a freaking Smart weapon, and the kind of creative design and unique named weapons that this kind of game needed.
And back to point "2." The thing that determines that drone ability for any given weapon would be the "very rare, unique world drop material" used for determining the ability. You could put this mat into any type of weapon during the crafting process and it'd imbue it with that ability, but tailored specifically for that weapon archetype. For the shotgun, it's the cloud of drones (because shotguns shoot a mass of pellets), but with the SMG, it would do something different, and something different even still with the handgun. Etc.
I'm talking legendary weapons that gamers would talk about for years afterward. "Hey, remember that gun that shot a bullet full of nanites that would enter the bad guy and then propagate through his body and take his augmentations over, turning him temporarily into a drone that would fight for you, or if you used a different type of mod in the gun, a drone that would run toward the closest enemy and explode like a suicide bomber?"
Yeah, we needed unique, named, worthwhile weapons from bosses and story encounters like that in this game. Not a bunch of literal junk that has no meaning because you're constantly replacing those legendary weapons that you want to love, but can't, because white, common weapons replace them just an hour worth of playtime later. It doesn't create a connection between the weapons and the player. It makes you not care about your weapons like you would if they truly were legendary.
A legendary weapon would never be outdone by a common one, but in CDPR's game, they are. And it ruins the experience.
It's disappointing and lazy development on CDPR's part.
I dismantle the vast majority of the weapons. You don't understand how all of those systems work together, do you? It has everything to do with crafting. The loot and combat encounters being the way they are have EVERYTHING to do with crafting being useless. They're the reason it's useless. It doesn't make sense to you because you don't seem to be able to think in the abstract.
How do you not understand that the loot and combat systems render crafting pointless? I explained it to you directly. I really don't think you're capable of thinking in the abstract. With a constant barrage of common weapons made worthwhile by easy enemies, crafting anything any better is made pointless. Not because the average person wouldn't WANT to have more interesting weapons, but because crafting was made artificially too difficult to achieve because of the stupidity of the materials situation. It's a vicious cycle of compounding issues that all have to exist within an ecosystem. The ecosystem does not function together properly. And they very much do have everything to do with one another.
They could have done the following, for example:
1. Made it so we have weapon archetypes: a few types of handguns, a few types of rifles, a few types of SMG's, shotguns and DMRs (designated marksman rifle)
2. The ability to craft from each one of these types, but use both found and crafted materials to create specific builds of each archetype with controlled stats and abilities based on materials used in the crafting process. You use a specific set of materials, you get a specific type of that gun with a specific set of stats. You use crafted or more easily found materials to set the stats to specific ones, and with epic and legendary weapons, you use a very rare, specific type of world drop material to determine what unique ability the weapon would have.
3. Each outcome would create a unique weapon that you can find no where else in the game.
4. We could have gotten unique weapons that we carry with us throughout the entirety of the game as drops from bosses and story encounters, but one's that could be modified, upgraded and customized in a variety of ways using the crafting system along the way. They also could have slowly introduced various mods and augmentations to us as we progressed that allow syncing with the weapon in ways unique to each one:
Like a shotgun that shoots a cartridge full of drones (an amount of drones that could be upgraded over time with progressively better mods) that when shot into the air, the drones will follow you like a cloud, each bullet-drone seeking enemies that get too close, imbedding inside of a limb and exploding, blowing the limb off and a chunk of HP, consuming the cloud one bullet-drone at a time. But when fired directly at an enemy instead of into the air, the bullets seek the enemy, enter the body and then explode ALL AT ONCE, taking off all of their limbs and their head, killing them instantly.
See? Unique ideas. Unique weapons. It's better than the overwhelmingly mediocre looter shooter route they took. I came up with this idea in a matter of minutes. I could come up with a dozen such weapons in a single day. They could have spent their time making fewer more unique weapons and then designing a multitude of mods for the weapons (for us to find and/or to craft) to change how they behave, and augmentations for our character to interact with the weapons in unique ways.
For example, that specific shotgun only works that way with a specific set of mods and augmentations, and could do something completely different with the bullet-drones by using other mods and augmentations. Now THAT is a freaking Smart weapon, and the kind of creative design and unique named weapons that this kind of game needed.
And back to point "2." The thing that determines that drone ability for any given weapon would be the "very rare, unique world drop material" used for determining the ability. You could put this mat into any type of weapon during the crafting process and it'd imbue it with that ability, but tailored specifically for that weapon archetype. For the shotgun, it's the cloud of drones (because shotguns shoot a mass of pellets), but with the SMG, it would do something different, and something different even still with the handgun. Etc.
I'm talking legendary weapons that gamers would talk about for years afterward. "Hey, remember that gun that shot a bullet full of nanites that would enter the bad guy and then propagate through his body and take his augmentations over, turning him temporarily into a drone that would fight for you, or if you used a different type of mod in the gun, a drone that would run toward the closest enemy and explode like a suicide bomber?"
Yeah, we needed unique, named, worthwhile weapons from bosses and story encounters like that in this game. Not a bunch of literal junk that has no meaning because you're constantly replacing those legendary weapons that you want to love, but can't, because white, common weapons replace them just an hour worth of playtime later. It doesn't create a connection between the weapons and the player. It makes you not care about your weapons like you would if they truly were legendary.
A legendary weapon would never be outdone by a common one, but in CDPR's game, they are. And it ruins the experience.
It's disappointing and lazy development on CDPR's part.
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I dismantle the vast majority of the weapons. You don't understand how all of those systems work together, do you? It has everything to do with crafting. The loot and combat encounters being the way they are have EVERYTHING to do with crafting being useless. They're the reason it's useless. It doesn't make sense to you because you don't seem to be able to think in the abstract.
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Again, that has nothing to do with the looting system or the crafting system - but the encounter balance.
You're not making any sense, I'm afraid.
If you find endless weapons - then what's the problem with dismantling some? Again, the best possible DPS will come from crafted weapons - because you get 15% additional damage with them with the right perks. Even if you have to dismantle 100 legendary weapons - the one legendary weapon you end up crafting will be 15% better than anything you could possibly find, regardless.
Components can't be a problem logically, because - as you say - you find stuff to dismantle ad nauseum. Also, you can simply sell components and buy those you need, if you want to make it even easier.
So, the system works fine - and there's a logical incentive to craft stuff.
Only, you don't need that stuff - because enemies are trivial to kill because of AI and encounter design.
Conclusively, the problem is encounter balance - not a bad crafting system.
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Which is a huge step up from Witcher 3, which was terrible in every way but world building and story telling.
People just pretended it was amazing because they got caught up in the story and the pretty visuals. Visuals that Cyberpunk can easily beat without breaking a sweat, I might add.
How do you not understand that the loot and combat systems render crafting pointless? I explained it to you directly. I really don't think you're capable of thinking in the abstract. With a constant barrage of common weapons made worthwhile by easy enemies, crafting anything any better is made pointless. Not because the average person wouldn't WANT to have more interesting weapons, but because crafting was made artificially too difficult to achieve because of the stupidity of the materials situation. It's a vicious cycle of compounding issues that all have to exist within an ecosystem. The ecosystem does not function together properly. And they very much do have everything to do with one another.
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