Basically, allow the trading of gear that was been binded to a player already to allow upgrades. I have a Blaster, for example, that a friend crafted for me. Obviously, he's going to buy the recipe for the next upgrade to the Blaster, and because I have him, I don't expect to buy the recipe since he's the one making the guns. Surprise comes, I can't trade my Blaster to him to upgrade, which forces me to buy the recipe to upgrade it, even if I already have someone to do the upgrade for me. That's just crowns down the drain.
My suggestion is to make Binded gear tradeable for the sole purpose of upgrading, while retaining the ownership of whoever the item was locked to first, so that it can't be held hostage. This would also help by opening a new market for item upgrades.
Oh, and to those who are just going to reply "You shouldn't be able to trade binded gear because it's binded", don't bother. Multiple other games allow for binded gear to the traded for things like refining or dying them with another color.
This has been talked about before. And I think its a good idea. If anyone has ever played World of Warcraft you can get enchantments put on your gear by others by opening a trading window and putting it in a specific slot, you don't give them the gear since it is bound to you. I think a similar thing for alchemy/crafting in this game would be effective. If someone has a 3 star recipe for my 2 star gear, I think I should be able to have them upgrade it for me even if it is bound to me. Obviously I would trade them the mats and the money / CE etc.
absolutely makes sense to me.