Legendary recipes would be a great end game mechanic.

[eire1979]

Legendary recipes that split up the crafted parts would be great.

E.g. Stave... shaft, head piece, magical element.  Each 3 parts come from 3 legendary recipes.  Each part needs a vast amount of resources, e.g. 100 candy for the magical element.

 

This would be great to have not just your weapon, but clothes plus artifact.  A full build of legendary armour that would take weeks of gameplay to craft.

 

This way the best gear in the game is a time investment, not just a youtube/google search to find the best weapons by simply going to a location to get it.