I find this thread intensely interesting because the little story I'm writing down in the Town Square section involves a character doing research into Soul Crystals.
How I'm viewing it is not so much that people gather blank stones and then just wander around embedding knowledge and know-how into it. I see it more like... converting gear into materia, oddly enough. Bear with me on this, I'll go into a bit more detail.
With your gear, you bind yourself to it and attune it before breaking it down into a crystal that carries some of the power that was once in it. Since the soul returns to the Aether to be borne anew later, I kind of see one's body as something like that too. As a person accrues skills and experiences, they have a chance to reach... well... "100% Soulbound" by the time of their death.
Then, along with their soul returning to the Aether, a bit of them is left behind in the form of a Soul Crystal. Life's materia. That's why all the Soul Crystals we come across allow us to piggyback and take shortcuts through training - just like socketing materia in your gear makes you able to hit harder or absorb more damage.
That would also explain why they're so rare and so special (for the most part) - a Soul Crystal is the remnants of someone who mastered their craft, whatever it is. I would even go so far to say that if Chachan's father passed away, he could very likely leave behind a Smith Soul Crystal.
... but that's just me, and I put a lot of weird thought into the oddest things.
How I'm viewing it is not so much that people gather blank stones and then just wander around embedding knowledge and know-how into it. I see it more like... converting gear into materia, oddly enough. Bear with me on this, I'll go into a bit more detail.
With your gear, you bind yourself to it and attune it before breaking it down into a crystal that carries some of the power that was once in it. Since the soul returns to the Aether to be borne anew later, I kind of see one's body as something like that too. As a person accrues skills and experiences, they have a chance to reach... well... "100% Soulbound" by the time of their death.
Then, along with their soul returning to the Aether, a bit of them is left behind in the form of a Soul Crystal. Life's materia. That's why all the Soul Crystals we come across allow us to piggyback and take shortcuts through training - just like socketing materia in your gear makes you able to hit harder or absorb more damage.
That would also explain why they're so rare and so special (for the most part) - a Soul Crystal is the remnants of someone who mastered their craft, whatever it is. I would even go so far to say that if Chachan's father passed away, he could very likely leave behind a Smith Soul Crystal.
... but that's just me, and I put a lot of weird thought into the oddest things.
~