I wanted that. Actually in another thread (with the poll about the progression systems) I made a comment that I find it quite difficult to compare those systems, because the tier progression is (was) pretty flawed due to power balance and mod slots. For some alphas now I always progressed through tier 1 and then always skipped each tier until their level 5/6 items, because level 1-4 were weaker than level 5-6 from the previous tier. As long as that isn't fixed (and I hope this patch did a good first step, I'll have to try it first) every progression system feels flawed, because there isn't a smooth progression.
So I'm very happy about that change. Imho that's one of the best and most important changes in terms of progression they did in a long time.
Reading the second poster's data more carefully I would say it's two steps in the right direction and one step back in typical TFP style, as players cannot craft t6, they have added yet another aspect to how badly thought out the magazine system is.
I don't agree at all. While I also dislike that level 6 items aren't craftable (at least I dislike it in the current and past states of the game), I think it's less of a problem now than before. Before we had a progression gap from one tier level 5+ to the next tier level 5+, so level 6 items from lower tiers were used for quite some time. With the change those level 6 items aren't as important anymore, because you'll be able to craft the level 1 item from the higher tier and it's actually better. Of course that means that making level 6 items from lower tiers craftable would make the progression even smoother, and maybe that change will follow, but at least there isn't such a huge gap anymore. It's just a small one that doesn't hurt anyone.
Level 6 on the highest tier is another story imho. At least with how the game works now I think it should be craftable, but let's see if them being non craftable will make sense in the future.
Definitely a good change, one I have been hoping they would implement since the start of A21 exp. Feels like a good linear progression now,
I was waiting for that change since they made the change from all items having 6 mod slots to the amount of mod slots being dependent on the item quality. It never made sense to me, because of the progression gaps it created. I just weren't vocal about it, because I'm not that active in this forum and am usually rather chilled and wait for what's coming.