So because I don't think any of us want to spend half a year or more to craft a single masterwork item (though that's fairly realistic), I'm proposing a new set of rules for crafting.
Base idea: http://www.paperspencils.com/2013/01/29/crafting-weapons-armor-in-pathfinder/ (http://www.paperspencils.com/2013/01/29/crafting-weapons-armor-in-pathfinder/)
This is the best solution I came across, but there are two things I want to balance out, as how they resolve crafting ends up making magic item creation lackluster, and somewhat breaks crafting.
Issues with above link:
1)The crafting time is now too SHORT (1 week), instead of extremely long.
2)Magic items can be created based on character level, which is good. But it basically made the "Craft magic arms and armor" feat unnecessary, and removed the requirement of being a caster to make them. This doesn't sit well with me.
For the second, my thought is that there should be a feat for regular crafters to make magic items based on an insane amount of craft skill instead of magical aptitude. They would still require someone to cast the appropriate spell for special abilities, but otherwise could to everything themselves. It would be like combining the "Master Craftsman" feat and the item creation feats, then splitting them into separate specializations. [i.e. Master Craftsman (Magical Arms and Armor)].
The first one is a little more unclear. How long SHOULD it take to create an item? 1 week feels too short, and would break NPC item creation. Maybe a month for masterwork, with reduction in time based on how much you beat the check by? (1.5 times the DC -> 3/4 time, 2 times -> 1/2, 3 times -> 1/3, etc.)
Please help me out here!
Month per masterwork seems fine. Though I'm not sure how I want to handle this in terms of earning money. I think as long as there's good case that this crafting will be used or gifted, and not for profits it'll be okay. Otherwise money earnings would end up getting a lot more broken. We already have the Crafts & Professions stuff.
Oh, yea, this is just gifting/item creation rules. Though since we already buffed the amount of gold made by crafting, maybe this change is the justification for that haha.
Oh also removing the feat with making magical gear, and being caster also doesn't sit well with me either. You have a proposed fix?
EDIT: Just read, yeah a feat would be good. XD Have it require a good amount of craft ranks though.
Well, considering how master craftsman was designed for a level 5+ (Needs 5 ranks in the craft), I think that's good enough. After that, we can follow the table in the link I shared in the original post for the crafting DCs.
This way, Crafters can only make magic items starting at level 5, and couldn't make them anything too strong until later anyways. If you feel I should increase the ranks, lemme know. I just feel level 5 is a good start point.
That's why the world of Elodria is so highly concentrated in magic! :D