Star Citizen Crafting Guide: RediMake, Blueprints, and Material Quality

Citizen [DADDY] GroovyGravyJuly 3, 2026Guide

Crafting in Star Citizen is finally starting to matter.

It is still early, still a bit clunky, and still very much subject to change, but the core idea is simple: earn blueprints, gather materials, use a fabricator, and craft gear with stats influenced by the quality of the materials you put in.

That means crafting is not just about making an item.

It is about making a better version of that item.

With Alpha 4.8, the blueprint pool expanded to include ship weapons and components, and that pool is continuing to grow with each patch.

So if you have been ignoring crafting so far, now is probably a good time to start paying attention.

This guide explains the basics of Star Citizen crafting, how blueprints work, what material quality means, and how to use the SCANZ.SPACE RediMake Assistant to plan a craft before wasting materials in-game.

What is crafting in Star Citizen?

Crafting lets players create items using a combination of:

A blueprint
Required materials
A fabricator
Material quality

When crafting first arrived, the focus was mostly on FPS gear such as weapons, armor, ammo, and related personal equipment.

With Alpha 4.8, that pool started expanding into ship weapons and ship components as well.

That is the important part.

Crafting is no longer just about making a better gun for bunker runs. It is becoming a broader progression system that touches more of the game with each patch.

The blueprint pool is expanding, and that means the value of understanding crafting is only going up.

Right now, crafting is best understood as a growing progression layer built on top of missions, reputation, looting, mining, salvaging, events, and material gathering.

You do content. You earn blueprints. You gather materials. You craft better gear.

Simple in theory.

Absolute spreadsheet gremlin behaviour in practice.

The basic crafting loop

The crafting loop looks something like this:

Unlock or earn a blueprint
Gather the required materials
Check the material quality
Preview how those materials affect the craft
Use a fabricator
Craft the item
Review the finished result

The important bit is step four.

Material quality can change the final stats of the crafted item, so it is worth checking what your materials are likely to do before you commit them.

Two players using the same blueprint may not end up with the exact same result if they use different quality materials.

That is where crafting starts to get interesting.

And annoying.

Mostly both.

What are blueprints?

Blueprints are the recipes or unlocks that allow you to craft specific items.

If you do not have the blueprint, you cannot craft that item.

A blueprint usually tells the fabricator what item can be made and what materials are required to make it. Once you have the blueprint, the next job is gathering the correct resources and deciding what quality of materials you are willing to spend.

The blueprint pool is also not static.

Early crafting focused heavily on FPS gear, but Alpha 4.8 expanded the pool to include ship components and ship weapons. As new patches arrive, more items are being added to the crafting ecosystem.

That makes blueprints one of the more important forms of progression in Star Citizen.

A crafted item can be lost. A weapon can be left behind. A ship component can be destroyed, sold, misplaced, or sacrificed to whatever dark ritual caused your inventory to bug out this time.

But the blueprint is the thing that lets you make it again.

That is why blueprint rewards are worth paying attention to, especially during events, reputation grinds, and new patch cycles.

Do blueprints persist after wipes?

So far, earned blueprints have been treated differently from normal gear in at least some wipe conditions.

In Alpha 4.8, CIG performed a long-term persistence wipe while preserving earned blueprints. That means normal items, reputation, money, ships, and other progress were reset, but earned blueprints were kept.

That does not mean every future wipe will behave the same way forever.

This is Star Citizen. Never tattoo patch behaviour onto your body.

But it does suggest blueprints are intended to be a more persistent form of progression than a random gun sitting in your inventory.

If you are deciding whether to grind an event, reputation chain, or mission series, blueprint rewards are usually worth paying attention to.

The blueprint pool is expanding

The most important thing to understand about crafting is that the current system is not the final shape of it.

The blueprint pool is growing.

What started as a more limited crafting system for personal gear is already expanding into broader item categories, including ship weapons and ship components.

That means crafting is likely to become more important over time, not less.

For players, this changes how you should think about blueprints.

Do not only ask:

Is this blueprint useful today?

Also ask:

Could this blueprint become more valuable later?

As more systems interact with crafting, repair, insurance, economy, player trading, and org logistics, useful blueprints may become a major reason to run certain missions or events.

This is especially true for group-focused players.

If your org can reliably craft useful weapons, armor, ship components, or replacement gear, that becomes a real advantage. Not in a sweaty mandatory-doctrine-spreadsheet way, but in a practical “we can gear people quickly without everyone panic-shopping before an op” kind of way.

Blueprints are becoming infrastructure.

Tiny little recipe cards of power.

What is material quality?

Material quality affects the final stats of crafted items.

Higher quality materials can produce better crafted results, depending on the item and the blueprint.

That does not always mean “higher number equals better in every possible way.” Different items care about different stats, and different materials may influence different parts of the final output.

For FPS weapons, material quality may affect the finished item differently to armor, ammo, ship weapons, or ship components.

For ship components, quality may become especially important as more component types enter the blueprint pool. A better crafted component is not just a nice number on a stat sheet. It may change how useful that item is in an actual build.

The exact outcome depends on the blueprint and the materials involved.

This is why blindly throwing your best materials into every craft is not always smart.

Sometimes you are making a serious combat item.

Sometimes you are making a test craft.

Sometimes you are about to turn rare materials into a disappointing little object of regret.

Why material quality matters

Material quality matters because crafting is not just binary.

You are not only asking:

Can I craft this?

You are asking:

Is this craft worth these materials?

That is a much better question.

A high-quality craft should usually be reserved for gear you actually intend to use, keep, trade, test, or build around.

A mid-quality craft may still be useful if it gets you close to, equal to, or slightly above the standard version of an item.

But low-quality materials can be a trap.

If your material quality drops below 500, you can end up with negative stat changes that make the crafted item worse than the store-bought version.

That means sub-500 materials are not really “budget crafting.”

They are downgrade crafting.

Useful for testing. Useful for learning. Useful for seeing how a blueprint behaves.

Not ideal for anything you actually plan to use.

Good crafting decisions are about matching the quality of the materials to the importance of the item.

Do not waste premium resources on gear you are going to lose to a ladder bug, a bunker elevator, or a deeply suspicious “friendly” grenade.

But also do not waste your time crafting a worse version of something you could have bought off the shelf.

What is RediMake?

RediMake is the crafting and fabrication system players use to turn blueprints and materials into crafted items.

For most players, the actual crafting process is fairly straightforward once you have the required blueprint and materials.

The harder part is planning.

You need to know:

What blueprint you are using
What materials are required
What quality those materials are
Which stats are affected
Whether the final item is actually worth crafting

That is where planning tools become useful.

Use the SCANZ.SPACE RediMake Assistant

The SCANZ.SPACE RediMake Assistant is designed to help you plan a craft before wasting materials in-game.

Instead of guessing what your material quality will do, you can check the blueprint, adjust the quality sliders, and preview how the crafted item changes.

Use it here:

https://scanz.space/verse/redimake-assistant

The goal is simple:

Plan the craft before you burn the mats.

This is especially useful when working with higher-quality materials, rare blueprints, ship weapons, ship components, or items where the final stats actually matter.

If you are crafting something important, check it first.

Future you will be less annoyed.

How to use the RediMake Assistant

Open the RediMake Assistant
Search for the blueprint or item you want to craft
Review the required materials
Adjust the material quality sliders
Preview how the crafted stats change
Decide whether the craft is worth doing in-game

This lets you compare low-quality, mid-quality, and high-quality inputs before committing resources.

For example, you might find that one item only gets a minor improvement from better materials, while another becomes significantly stronger with high-quality inputs.

You may also find that using materials below 500 creates a worse item than the standard version.

That is exactly the kind of mistake you want to spot before you commit the resources in-game.

That is the difference between crafting with a plan and crafting like a raccoon with a keyboard.

Should you always use the highest quality materials?

No, but you should be careful with anything below 500 quality.

In practical terms, 500 quality is the baseline. Materials around 500 generally represent the point where a crafted item sits around store-bought performance.

Anything below 500 can push the crafted item into negative stat territory, meaning you may end up with gear that is worse than the standard version you could have bought normally.

That makes low-quality materials mostly useful for testing the crafting process, checking blueprint requirements, or experimenting when you do not care about the final item.

They are not ideal for gear you actually plan to use.

Use higher-quality materials when the item matters.

Good candidates include:

Weapons you regularly use
Armor for serious FPS content
Ship weapons you want to test properly
Ship components for planned builds
Event gear
Rare or annoying-to-replace items
Items for org operations
Items you want to compare against store-bought alternatives

Materials below 500 are mainly useful for:

Learning how the crafting system works
Testing blueprint requirements
Checking how stats move before using better materials
Throwaway experiments
Crafts where the final item does not matter

The simple rule is:

If you want to use the item, avoid sub-500 materials where possible.

The best material is not always the highest quality one.

But it should probably be at least good enough that you are not crafting a worse version of something you could have bought off the shelf.

Beginner crafting tips

Start with cheap test crafts

Do not begin by throwing your best resources into something you barely understand.

Make a few low-risk items first. Learn how the interface works, how the blueprint behaves, and what the material quality actually changes.

Just remember that low-quality test crafts are mostly for learning, not for making useful gear.

Preview the craft before committing

If you are using quality materials, preview the craft first.

A few seconds of planning can save you a lot of wasted resource gathering.

This matters even more if your materials are below 500, because you may be crafting a worse item than the store-bought version.

Treat blueprints as progression

Items come and go.

Blueprints are the thing to watch.

If an event rewards unique blueprints, that event is probably worth paying attention to.

Keep notes on useful crafts

If you find a strong combination of blueprint and material quality, write it down or save it somewhere.

The best crafting knowledge will likely come from player testing, shared builds, and community tools.

Do not trust old information blindly

Crafting is new and balance will change.

A good craft in one patch may be average in the next. Always check current data where possible.

What should you craft first?

For most players, the best first crafts are practical items you will actually use or items that help you understand the system.

Good early targets include:

A weapon you already like
Armor for bunker missions
Backup FPS gear
Ship weapons you want to test
Ship components for a build you are already using
Items you regularly lose
Gear for group events

If you are testing, use materials you do not care about.

If you are crafting something you actually plan to use, avoid sub-500 materials where possible.

Do not craft something just because it looks rare.

Craft something because you will use it, test it, or learn something useful from it.

The point of crafting is not to create museum pieces. It is to make useful gear and slowly improve the quality of what you bring into the field.

Unless you are making museum pieces.

In which case, please label them clearly so someone does not wear your priceless artefact into a bunker and die to a door.

Is crafting worth it?

Yes, but with some caveats.

Crafting is worth it if you care about:

Better item stats
Long-term progression
Blueprint collecting
Resource gathering
Player-driven preparation
Building gear for yourself or your group
Testing ship weapons and components
Preparing for a future where crafting matters more

Crafting is probably not worth obsessing over if you just want to log in, grab a gun, and go explode in a hallway.

Both approaches are valid.

But as more items, components, blueprints, and resource systems are added, crafting is likely to become a bigger part of Star Citizen’s economy and progression.

Getting familiar with it now is not a bad idea.

Just remember: not every craft is automatically an upgrade.

If the materials are poor, especially below 500 quality, you may be crafting something worse than the standard version.

Check before you cook.

Final thoughts

Crafting in Star Citizen is still early, but the foundation is already interesting.

Blueprints give players something to chase. Material quality gives crafted items room to vary. Ship weapons and components are now part of the growing blueprint pool. Tools like the RediMake Assistant make it easier to plan before wasting resources.

The most important thing to understand is that crafting is not just about whether you can make an item.

It is about whether the item is worth making with the materials you have.

Check the blueprint. Check the materials. Preview the stats. Avoid sub-500 disappointment. Then craft.