I had noticed this as well, it wanted to give my units Longswords instead of Boreal Blades. Kind of understand why it would do that, crystal can be hard to get. How about we split it so instead of just a one-handed weapons category, we have a non-magical and magical versions of it (likewise for the other weapon types)? And it would be really nice to be able to tell the game to stick with a certain weapon type when you designed a unit around a certain weapon attack ability, as currently when you upgrade it just gives you whatever it thinks is best, and suddenly you go from swords to maces and that really isn't equivalent at all.

Seems like they should pull up the unit designer and let you pick the upgrades.  Put them on horses or wargs, fit them out with pendants and rings, etc.

Yes, this is my #1 complaint with LH over FE.  I want blunt/cutting/pierce to be separated again.  Auto-upgrade is "broken" because of lumping all 1 or 2 handed weapons together.

I would also like to split out the magical items form the auto-upgrade path because crystal is rare enough that all of a sudden all your troops needing crystal becomes a problem.  My personal habit is to design 1 elite troop type which has "everything" and then a cannon fodder type troop to flesh out my army when I've run out of crystal.  (I also use mages.)

Speaking of mages, can we have all elements of staves/wands from the beginning?  Also, the unit designer says wands are 1-handed, but then will not allow the mage to equip a shield.  What up???

i think the weird upgrade paths are going to be adressed in the next patch.

0.52 change log contains this item:

"New system for weapon upgrades where we can define types (some axemen always upgrade to axes, swordsmen to swords, etc)"

i guess that means no more club > axe > mace > longsword, or spear > boar spear > battle axe > maul

still, i'd personally prefer the other suggestion that has been brought up in several threads already (option to upgrade to a different design instead of just incremental upgrade of specific components)

the change log only mentions weapon upgrades, so it probably won't include armor. i don't actually think armor is all that important. i mean - if you have leather armor and get the low level magic techs before you unlock the mail armor tech, you probably shouldn't use the upgrade function (unless you actually can/want to invest crystal to switch from leather breastplates to monk robes).

if you deliberately design units around monk robes, you'll probably also add other dodge bonuses, so you don't want to upgrade them at all - the "upgrade" to mail armor would likely make them worse by removing some of the dodge (and possibly reducing their initiative) and the upgrade to aegis robes removes the 5 dodge for 2(?) more armor - probably not worth it either.

the only real concern (imo) is leather+wood shields - if you unlock monk robes before the first shield upgrade (at blacksmithing i think?), you have no way of upgrading only the shields without also switching the chest piece.

Upgradeable weapons give my archers Ignys Longbows. However, I'm playing as Tarth, making Rams' Horn Longbows FAR better because of the armor piercing mechanic. The only way for me to get around this is to specify the RHL as weapon of choice for the unit - and the game still offers to let me upgrade the weapons!