Here's my two cents on the current crafting situation, I'm hoping it will;
A) cap the ridiculously massive amount of crafted items that are currently raping our economy,
B) discourage alting and dual/fast logging as emphasis will be taken off of mining and moved to scavenging.
C) put poor/lone/new players on more equal footing in your average encounter with old players since high tier items will not be as commonly used around the waste. My hope is that high tier items become more precious as a result.
D) encourage player cooperation and
GET PEOPLE OUT OF THEIR CAVES!
First of all since scavenging does not require great stamina as much as it requires patients there should be either a far shorter cooldown or the cooldown should be completely avoidable by eating food (as per scypiors post), mining can stay as is but will no longer be as important.
Crafting of weapons should mostly be limited to modifications, i.e. you can't make a FAL but if you get one you can modify it's magazine capacity etc. This way you don't need to horde materials as you will only need them when you find or purchase an item that can be upgraded.
The ONLY weapons that should be totally craftable imo are improvised weapons such as the pipe-rifles, zip guns, flamer, laser pistol, molotovs, spears, and knives. Spiked knuckles can be fashioned from brass knuckles witch perhaps should be craftable too.
Everything else is factory made and factory made things aren't created at a workbench in a cave!As for armor, I think that leather jackets should be purchasable, they are cheap anyway and I don't know anyone who actually makes them (ok, maybe they are craftable but i still think most people will opt to buy them instead considering it can be a pain in the ass to find fibre, unless you don't have a knife with you, then you see it everywhere
). Then you should be able to upgrade it to a combat leather jacket, which can be upgraded to leather armor, which can then be upgraded to leather armor MK2 with an increasing requisite of repair for each stage.
Metal armor is also only purchasable but can be modified into metal armor MK2 with enough repair AND/OR science skill which can then be modified into tesla armor with high enough science skill.
Combat armor is only purchasable, however it can be upgraded to MK2 with high enough repair AND/OR science skill.
BA is only obtainable from the brotherhood (if they are willing to sell it at all).
PA of course is very rare if it's even obtainable at all. However if it is obtainable then I don't see why it shouldn't/couldn't be hardened by players with enough science.
some of you are going to hate this and some will love it, I guess its just that kind of suggestion