Smithing

The Smithing Process

The process of making armor is very resource consuming. For instance, making a single piece of dyed fine steel requires the following:

• A low quality skin, or a medium or high quality skin and a skinning knife. Skins do not stack. Quality skins are available in most zones - Everfrost, East/West Commons and East Karana are very good zones to find quality skins. Making low quality skins out of medium or high quality skins requires a skinning knife and a sewing kit.
• two spiderling silks. Spiderling silks do not stack. 
• making a silk thread from spiderling silks. Requires a sewing kit. Silk threads stack.
• making leather backing from low quality skin. Requires a sewing kit. Leather backing stacks.
• buying medium quality blocks of ore. Medium quality ore is only available in Highhold keep, Steamfont and Rathe Mountains. Blocks weigh 18.0 and do not stack. (You can also buy medium quality large bricks of ore. Large bricks weigh 25.5 and do not stack.3 large bricks and water make 1 block, however, there is no cost incentive to do this, the gain from all the work required to do it is on the order of a few gold)
• making medium quality folded metal sheets out of the blocks. Sheets are heavy and do not stack.
• buying a mold. Molds are expensive (1-30 pp) and only available in cities. Molds do not stack.
• smithing the armor. This step also requires the smithing hammer (which is not consumed, but is very heavy). Armor pieces do not stack and are heavy.
• finding a dye component. The easiest seems to be permafrost crystals, which drop pretty frequently in Permafrost. Dye components stack and weigh close to nothing.
• creating an extract. This must be done by an alchemist (shaman using alchemist's bag) or poison maker (rogue using whatever it is those villains use). It requires an empty vial and water. Empty vials are for sale in Highhold keep, Steamfont and Rathe Mountains, and stack. Extracts stack and weigh very little. Pottery made vials cannot be used.
• making a medium clay jar. This requires a medium clay jar sketch, clay, water, quality firing sheet and a pottery wheel and kiln. Sketches are available close to most cities, as are clay, sheets, kiln and wheel, however with the exception of Halas, they are never all in the same zone. 
• combining an extract and resins in the clay jar, to make dye. Resins are for sale in the same places as ore for about 5 p and stack. Resin stacks and weighs little but will tie up a significant amount of cash. There is no skill check at this stage for making the dye. (At least there isn't supposed to be one - according to Yakatizma - many reports state that some armor-dye combinations do in fact apply a skill check, and that it is the blacksmithing skill that is checked).
• dyeing the piece of armor in a forge. This requires dye and a piece of armor, as well as jars of laquere and acid. Laquere and acid do not stack and must be bought at the one of the ore merchants (Highkeep, Steamfont, Rathe Mountains). There is no skill check for this final step.

All in all, a few dozen components are used. Keeping them in stock takes up inventory space and ties up cash. Sewing kits, alchemy bags etc cannot be stored in containers. The heavy components (blocks and bricks or ore, folded sheets of metal) can only be carried a few at a time for any longer distances.

Some hints on good components to stock: 

• Stock silk threads and leather backing. Always have silk threads in stock, and the second you get a quality pelt, turn it into leather backing.
• Stock dye components. If you have a shaman or rogue, carry a stack of water and a stack of vials. The second you get a dye component, turn it into extract. Extracts can be stored by the smith (or whoever will dye the armor), the dye component isn't usable to someone who cannot make extract out of it.
• Store extracts, resin and medium clay jar sketches. All stack. There are a couple of different extracts but all these will easily fit in a backpack. When you need to dye, go to a pottery merchant and get clay and firing sheets, visit the wheel and kiln and make the desired dye. (This assumes the character dyeing the piece of armor has 36+ skill in pottery) Then go to a forge and dye the armor.
• Whoever does the smithing will need to keep ore and sheets in stock. There is no way around this.
• Whoever does the dyeing will need to keep laquere and acid in stock.

The points about dye apply in a similar way for tempers. The skill used for tempers is brewing instead of pottery, and the skill needed is much higher (136 trivial). Tempers will need to be at hand when actually smithing the armor piece (not after as for dyes).

Cultural armor follows a similar process to fine plate, but require extra steps when creating the metal sheets used in forging, require chain jointing (which is a bit more complicated to make than leather backing) and tempers. Enchanted or imbued armor pieces also require added material and the cooperation of some caster.

Also note that at this point, steel metal rings (basic material for chain mail types of cultural armor using HQ ore, and a component for chain jointing which is used for all the cultural plate armor types using HQ ore) is only possible to make in the Halas Northman forge - this is definitely a bug but until it is corrected, manufacture of the human cultural armors will be limited. Some recipes may be entirely impossible to make until this is corrected.

Locations

Ore Merchants - these merchants sell dye items (vials, acid, laquere), medium quality ore and sheets:

• Highhold Keep: Grahm EmberSmith (Opposite the banker and turn left, in basement 40, -275)
• Steamfont Mountains: Godbin Strumharp (At windmill 50, -600)
• Rathe Mountains: Ukla (1730, 1300)

Mold Merchants - these merchants sell mold for fine plate and other plate armors:

• tbd
• Full plate - Full plate molds are only available in Qeynos. Full plate uses different mold than all other types of armor.

The armor types

Short description of the armor types:

Chain armor types:

• Banded mail: Low AC.
• Seafarer's ringmail: Standard ring mail class armor - same classes as banded.
• Northman ringmail: Standard ring mail class armor - same classes as banded.
• Ogre war splint: Standard ring mail class armor - same classes as banded.
• Cabilis scale armor: Standard ring mail class armor - same classes as banded. Slightly lower AC than three previous, but better than banded.
• Koada'dal mithril chainmail: Caster wearable ringmail - lower AC than banded.
• Tier'dal adamantite chainmail: Caster wearable ringmail - lower AC than banded.
• Ornate chain: No info.

Plate armor types:

• Fine plate: Lowest AC but still better than store bought plate or bronze. Can be dyed.
• Field plate: Normal cultural plate type.
• Tier'dal adamantite plate: Normal cultural plate type.
• Koada'dal mithril plate: Normal cultural plate type.
• Ogre war plate: Slightly better AC than normal cultural plate.
• Dwarven brellium plate: Slightly better AC than normal cultural plate, and adds small amounts of resist vs fire to each piece.
• Full plate: Slightly better AC than normal cultural plate. 4 different variants to recipe - not fully explored.