I think the crafting skills are highly worth it now... besides already mentioned overpowered fusion recipes, all the required skills (fusion recipes can require 1-4 other crafting skills among those I can see) can produce good stuff.
This is what my < 2 Tailoring created, among a dozen pairs of shoes:
Imagine what can be made at higher levels...
Is this Elona+?
If so, does it have a full english translation? Or at least something that won't confuse me?
Yes, it's Elona+ 1.08. It's not fully translated yet, but the untranslated content are mostly in South Tyris (yes Plus added South Tyris). Since you won't be able to gain access to South Tyris until you've beat the vanilla main quest, Elona+ is very good for us non-Japanese speakers.
For North Tyris untranslated stuff, there is a new guy outside the Cyberdome, and a female master in the Dojo (a new location where you pay to leave your pet behind to train). The Dojo master is easily figured out; I couldn't get any real reaction out of the guy. I heard he's only relevant after you gain access to South Tyris.
So yeah, go Elona+ now!
I think so. Most of the new content isn't translated, but luckily most of the new content doesn't need translating, and is mostly tweaks. Dunno about the translation status crafting thing kcwong's doing, but I'm sure if push came to shove he could throw up a short tutorial, considering it'd prolly consist of "Go to this dude, select the top option, select the top option, middle option, enter".
For the crafting stuff, it seems Elona+ enhanced vanilla's crafting skills (tailoring, jeweler, carpentry, alchemy), and added a new crafting mode: fusion.
First you buy/find a fusion pot (looks like a black cauldron with white gooey stuff inside, the kind a witch would use). Then you use it and get a page of recipes. The recipes require a bunch of items (some quite rare), and often a combination of skills (tailoring, jeweler, carpentry, alchemy, cooking, gardening, gene engineering).
It seems there are a lot of recipes, but they only show you as your crafting skills increase. So far I'm only able to make mysterious diaries and fake gold bars. I'm trying very hard to increase my skills and finding materials... I'm dying to find out what this can do:
If it allows you to create undead version of the owner of the heart, I'm going to make me an army of undead putits and rule the world!
Also, there seems to be new actions you can use. I must have missed the announcement when I received it, so I have no idea what skill this is based on:
Directive is for switching your pets offensive/defensive stance. Useful when you are trying to use pokeballs!
(I'm a Claymore with medium armor, using nothing but a claymore, throwing and firearms for combat, with a heavy focus on crafting skills.)
But I can't argue with the results:
See those black tiles on the map? I created them. Basically the skill allows me to attack the whole map.