For reference, I'll repeat my proposed idea for Repair: each use of a Repair Hammer repairs 20% of the item's total durability, and you can use a Repair hammer as many times as you have levels in Repair (so Repair 1 is 1 use of the hammer, Repair 5 is 5 uses of the hammer). That does not punish you for not having enough points into Repair, instead, more points gives you a benefit by reducing the amount of Repair Hammers you have to use. It's a carrot instead of a stick.
I'm not sure I'm a fan of basing the system on consumable repair hammers, unless the rate of equipment degradation were decreased very significantly compared to the current beta. I wouldn't want to have to cart around dozens of hammers just to get through a long dungeon - that's maybe exaggerating a little, but not much, if you'd only get 1-5 uses out of one hammer.
Anyway, I think I'm taking us in circles now. So as long as Larian does away with the current permanent max durability decreases, and instead implements a system that both rewards players for investing in Repair and doesn't require tedious micromanagement (e.g. durability thresholds below which nothing can be done with a piece of equipment, needing to buy a lot of hammers, etc.), I'll be good.
