Quote Disclaimer: Here and there I will reference changes that I've heard will be brought along in patch 1.2. If these rumors are true, the "problem" I am about to discuss has some super-serious implications. However, even if they are false, the problem is still there (just less super-serious). Regardless, a problem is a problem, and I think it should be fixed.



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The Problem (for TL;DR, skip to "The Suggestion")

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To preface the suggestion I'm about to make, I'd like to state what I mean by "class-based crew skill pigeonholing". The heart of the problem is companion crew-skill bonuses. For one thing, critical bonuses are far superior to efficiency bonuses in nearly every way. Secondly, critical bonuses available to players are few and far between, and don't allow for very much variety for any individual character that a player wishes to maximize returns on.



For example, if you take a look at empire side companions and the critical bonuses to crafting skills alone, it basically boils down to this: Only one empire-side companion has a critical bonus to Armormech (an Agent companion), only one companion has a critical bonus to Armstech (Bounty Hunter), only one for Biochem (Bounty Hunter again), and finally, only one for Synthweaving (Sith Warrior). If you care enough about crafting to limit yourself to picking only a crafting skill that you can get a critical bonus for, there's no real choice (except Bounty Hunters, which have the luxury of choosing between Armstech and Biochem). Additionally, Sith Inquisitors have no critical bonus to a crafting skill whatsoever.



The situation is slightly different for republic side companions in that no class cannot get a critical bonus to a crafting skill and that more than one class gets a bonus to Armstech (although this can be overlooked, being that the Consular gets a +2 bonus and the skill cannot make anything useful for the Consular itself, and that it pales in comparison to the Smuggler's +5 bonus).



The cases are few and far between where you can actually earn a critical bonus to not only a given crafting skill, but the gathering/mission skills associated with it, on a single character. So if you were to pick your crew skills across the board based on critical bonuses (gathering/mission included), you will very unlikely end up with 3 crew skills that were "meant" for each other. (A Bounty Hunter can pick Armstech for crit, but cannot get critical bonuses to it's associated gathering/mission skills, Scavenging and Investigation).



Moving along, with the news of critical crafting bonuses increasing significantly in true usefulness (I hear we'll all be ending up with custom-quality crafted gear with augment slots or something), any players that had not picked the "correct" crafting skill for their class will be at a severe disadvantage.



Take my case, for example. When I made my Sith Sorcerer in early access (which is still and forever will be my main), I picked up Synthweaving to accommodate the needs of my guild, and picked Archaeology and Underworld Trading to go along with it. I take my crafting very seriously in any MMO, and immediately became interested in collecting as many Synthweaving recipes as I could. As of the time of this post, I have 59 out of the 78 available prototype quality "looted" schematics and 72 out of the 89 custom quality "looted" schematics that can be worn by empire players. I haven't compiled a spreadsheet of the artifact quality schematics obtainable from operations.... but I can say that I have most of them (I'm my guild's primary Synthweaver with very little competition on schematics, and we've had all operations on full clear on at least hard mode for over a month and a half).



It wasn't until probably a month or so into the game and after having collected a LOT of recipes that I realized that I would have been MUCH better off if I had done it all on a Sith Warrior instead. A Sith Warrior's +5 critical bonus to Synthweaving from Jaesa vs. my no-crit-to-anything really makes me feel like I've pretty much been heavily penalized in terms of crafting, simply because I picked the "wrong" class/craft combination. It's almost bad enough to the point where I'm putting serious consideration into picking up Synthweaving on a Sith Warrior alt, collecting all the recipes all over again, and dropping my Sorc's Synthweaving altogether in favor of... oh i don't know.... probably slicing.



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The Suggestion

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With Armoring slots being unlocked and custom-quality augment-slotted crafted gear coming to the forefront of gear quality in 1.2, this whole crafting crit issue should seriously be changed to allow each character, regardless of class, to "swap-out" crafting bonuses rewarded by their companions that they don't need, and pick up ones that they can make effective use of.



There are a number of ways that this can be done. The simplest, quickest, easiest fix would be to add a new item slot to each companion, in which an item can be placed that replaces that companions default crafting bonuses. These items could be obtained by any number of means you can think of. They could be purchased with credits or Daily Commendations, dropped off bosses in flashpoints or operations (really, the possibilities are endless).



Alternatively, companion quests could be added that permanently replace a companion's crew skill bonuses (perhaps also add quests that would allow them to be changed back, and/or make them repeatable so that switching back and forth would be possible, though the quests would have to be made to take enough time to discourage frequent switches).



For that matter, crew skill bonuses could be made to be unlearnable in the same fashion that skill tree points can be unlearned. Could just be made to be expensive and have a hefty month-long cooldown or something.



Bottom line, any time a patch is released that brings endgame crafting into serious contention in the grand-scheme of things (like 1.2 is expected to), issues like this are going to need to be ironed out. Players should not be forced into specific class/crafting combinations if they expect to achieve maximum returns. I would favor having companion crew skill bonuses removed altogether, rather than the current system.