Crafting Changes in SWTOR Patch 4.1

Soeren Kamper crafting, crew skills

Eric Musco just posted a forum update about the crafting changes players can expect with Patch 4.1.

With the release of 4.0 we made a pass at focusing and streamlining Crew Skills and with 4.1 we are continuing this effort. We want crafting to remain an important alternative to Mission and Operation gear. With the release of 4.1 we are releasing an alternative to the KotFE gear. This new tier of gear will be the best craftable gear that does not require exotic crafting materials, and to support this tier, we are introducing a new grade of crafting materials and missions. With this new change, we want Crafting to remain an important alternative means to collecting the most powerful gear in the galaxy – whether you’re looking to gain an edge in combat, or turning a tidy profit on the Galactic Trade Network.
There are a few terms that we will be using throughout these posts, here are the terms that you will be seeing and what their meaning is:

General Crafting Changes
Here’s a look at some of the broader, system-wide changes we will be implementing with 4.1. We will be going into greater detail for each Crew Skill and Mission in the following sections.

  • Crafting skill increases from 500 to 550
  • Introduces a new Grade, Grade 9
    • New Grade 9 crafting materials for all skills
    • New Grade 9 Schematics
    • New Grade 9 Missions
    • New harvest nodes
  • Color Crystals
    • All crafted Color Crystals have had their level requirement removed
    • Expertise Color Crystals can no longer be crafted, they are now sold directly from the “PvP Items” Vendor on the Fleet
  • Grade 8 – Grade 9 Transition
    • With this update, numerous items that previously required Grade 8 crafting materials will now require Grade 9 crafting materials
    • To help ease the player transition from Grade 8 to Grade 9, we have introduced a new Crew Skill vendor on both fleets that will sell Grade 9 materials for their comparable Grade 8 materials at a 1:1 ratio. *This new vendor is temporary and will be removed with Game Update 4.2 (Chapter XI)
    • Grade 9 Materials have also been added to the Jawa Scrap Vendors.
  • Trainable Rating 208, 216, and 220 Items
  • Augments – There will be no new augments with 4.1. However existing 200 & 208 rating augments will now be part of Grade 9, as such we will be making the following changes to the existing rating 200 & 208 Augments:
    • All Existing MK-8 and Unassigned Augment Slots will automatically become MK-9 Augment Slots. These are specifically the slots that are created when you use an augment kit on an item.
    • Rating 200 & 208 Augments will now require an MK-9 Augment Slot
    • All Rating 200 & 208 Augments will now require Grade 9 Materials to craft
    • The new MK-9 Augment kit will be sold by the new vendor; they can be purchased for MK-8 Augment Kits
    • The crafting skill required to craft these augments will remain unchanged

Individual Crafting Crew Skill Changes

  • Armormech:
    • New Grade 9 Armor Assembly Component
    • New Rating 200 & 208 Armor
    • New MK-9 Augment Kit
    • Rating 200 & 208 Endurance Armorings
  • Synthweaving:
    • New Grade 9 Synth Bonded Attachment
    • New Rating 200 & 208 Armor
    • New MK-9 Augment Kit
    • Rating 200 & 208 Mastery Armorings
  • Armstech:
    • New Grade 9 Arms Assembly Component
    • New Rating 200 & 208 Weapons & Offhands
    • New MK-9 Augment Kit
    • Rating 200 & 208 Barrels
  • Artifice
    • New Grade 9 Artifice Bonded Attachment
    • New Rating 200 & 208 Weapons
    • New Rating 200 & 208 Off-hands
    • Rating 200 & 208 Hilts
    • New Rating 200 & 208 Relics
    • New Dye Modules
    • New Color Crystals
    • Can now only craft Rating 136 (+41 stat) Crystals
      • All other Crystal Schematics have been moved to the archive section
    • All blue, red, yellow, green, and orange Crystals and Schematics have been removed from vendors. They are now trainable from the Artifice trainer at the following Grades*:
      • Grade 1: Blue Crystal
      • Grade 2: Red Crystal
      • Grade 3: Yellow Crystal
      • Grade 4: Green Crystal
      • Grade 5: Orange Crystal
    • *All crafted color crystals have had their costs adjusted to the appropriate Grade. Their Slicing material cost has also been replaced with Treasure Hunting materials.

    We felt low level Crystals no longer had a purpose in the game, as such we removed them and enabled Artifice crafters to craft max level Crystals usable by all levels immediately.

  • Expertise Color Crystals are no longer trainable.
  • The following Color Crystal Schematics have had their skill requirement reduced to skill level 350:
    • White-Purple-Blue
    • White-Yellow-Orange
  • New rating 212 Relics can now be crafted by Artifice
  • Cybertech
    • New Grade 9 Cyber Assembly Component
    • New Rating 200 & 208 Earpieces
    • Rating 200 & 208 Mods & Enhancements
    • New Grade 9 Grenades
  • Biochem
    • New Grade 9 Cell Graft
    • New Rating 200 & 208 Implants
    • New Grade 9 Stimpaks, Adrenals, & Medpaks
      • A new Grade 9 Accuracy Stimpack will now be trainable, this Stimpack grants Accuracy and Critical Rating.
      • There will be no Grade 9 Accuracy Adrenal, the existing Accuracy Adrenal will remain unchanged to be replaced by the aforementioned Accuracy Stimpak.
    • All existing Shield/Absorb Adrenals have changed. They all now grant a shield that absorbs 20% of damage, up to a large amount of damage for 15 seconds. The shield ends either when the damage threshold is reached, or the duration ends.

Mission Crew Skill changes
With the release of 4.0 we unlocked all Crew Skill Missions. While this made it easier for players to run the specific Missions they wanted, it also exposed how redundant and unorganized these Missions were. With 4.1 we made a pass to both simplify and organize these Missions so that you have less Missions, but they are more focused on the things you really need.
For reference in this section, order of result from best to worst:

  • Wealthy
  • Rich
  • Bountiful
  • Abundant
  • Moderate

General Changes:

  • Wealthy, Rich, and Bountiful are the only result of Missions that can provide Artifact (purple) quality crafting materials
  • Prosperous level Missions no longer exist. All existing prosperous Mission Schematics that are currently in players inventories will be converted to Wealthy Schematics with the release of 4.1
  • All non-material specific Missions, such as lockboxes and vendor materials, now have only one result level. For example there are no longer any Moderate or Rich Companion Gift Missions, they are now simply “Companion Gift Missions”
  • Companion Gift Missions are now only available in Grade 1-5, in order to be consistent with the Companion Gift Ranks. Example, Companion Gifts of Rank 4 are only available from Grade 4 Missions
  • Companion Gift Missions no longer reward Premium (green) Quality. These Missions now reward Protoype (blue) quality, or Artifact (purple) quality on a critical result
  • There are now Moderate, Abundant, Bountiful, or Rich Material Missions for every Grade.
    • Most Mission skills have two Missions, per Grade, per Yield. In the future, we will look to address any instances where there is only one Mission.
  • Mission credit costs have been standardized. Mission costs are now based on the type of Mission and its Grade.
  • Missions will now progress in the following order as the skill is improved:
    • Moderate
    • Vendor Materials
    • Abundant
    • Companion Gifts
    • Bountiful
    • Lockboxes / Color Crystals
    • Rich
    • Wealthy
  • To accommodate these changes, a number of Missions have been moved between different Grades. A small amount of Missions have been removed altogether, but we will look to reintroduce them in the future

Investigation:

Treasure Hunting

  • Mostly two Moderate, Abundant, Bountiful, and Rich Missions per Grade; there are some gaps we hope to fill in the future
  • Three Companion Gift Missions per Grade
  • Two Lockbox Missions per Grade that drop new lockboxes
  • Lockbox Missions will reward two lockboxes when a critical result is achieved
  • Lockboxes now always drop a small amount of credits
  • Lockboxes now drop a single item from the random drop tables appropriate to the Grade of the lockbox

Diplomacy

  • Mostly two Moderate, Abundant, Bountiful, and Rich Missions per Grade;there are some gaps we hope to fill in the future
  • Three Companion Gift Missions per Grade
  • Companion Gift Missions no longer grant light or dark side points
  • Wealthy Missions no longer grant light or dark side points

Underworld Trading

  • Mostly two Moderate, Abundant, Bountiful, and Rich Metal Missions per Grad;, there are some gaps we hope to fill in the future
  • Mostly two Moderate, Abundant, Bountiful, and Rich Fabric Missions per Grade; there are some gaps we hope to fill in the future
  • Three Companion Gift Missions per Grade

Slicing

  • Mostly two Moderate, Abundant, Bountiful, and Rich Missions per Grade;there are some gaps we hope to fill in the future
  • Two Lockbox Missions per Grade that drop new lockboxes
  • Lockbox Missions will reward Mission discoveries when a critical is achieved
  • Lockboxes contain a sizable amount of credits that sometimes offset the cost of the Mission.

Archaeology

  • Mostly two Moderate, Abundant, Bountiful, and Rich Missions per Grade, there are some gaps we hope to fill in the future
  • One vendor material Mission per Grade.
  • One Color Crystal Mission per Grade

Scavenging & Bioanalysis

  • Mostly two Moderate, Abundant, Bountiful, and Rich Missions per Grade, there are some gaps we hope to fill in the future
  • One vendor material Mission per Grade.

Thank you all for taking the time to read through all of the changes we have planned for Game Update 4.1. As always, these changes are subject to change and you should review the 4.1 Patch Notes for the final changes.