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Smithing & weapons

Smithing & weapons

Design the piece, forge it at a Forge, quench and temper it if the metal allows, then fit a handle at a Workbench. Every piece gets a quality score and your name, and every metal has its own smith rank. Pieces forged before 0.3.0 are Relics: they stay as they were made and can't be engraved.

Weapon, tool and armor builder

Design a sword, dagger, spear, mace, battleaxe, pickaxe, axe, hoe, sickle, smithing hammer, plate armor or helmet the way the forge lets you, and see it drawn by the game's own art with the handling the forge shows. Every link you copy from here opens the same piece.

Best designs

Fewest blows

Forging, step by step

  1. Design. Pick a template, then shape it as far as your metal allows: copper uses the templates as they are, bronze changes the width of each row, iron sets the length of swords and spears (Short, Standard, Long), and steel, Blacksteel and Star Iron can curve a sword.
  2. Heat (+25, up to 100) until the marker sits in the metal's gold band. Cool takes 10 off.
  3. Strike to match the dashed outline: Draw narrows, Widen spreads. In the band a light blow moves an edge ½, a heavy one 1 and a Tap ⅛ (Tap from bronze up). Outside the band every blow moves only a little and adds stress.
  4. Mind the drift. From bronze up, blows in the band run a little long when the metal is hotter than the middle and short when it's cooler. Strike near mid-band and finish with Taps.
  5. Clear the stress. Blows outside the band add stress (light and tap +1, heavy +2). A light blow inside the band takes one off. Any stress left makes the piece Standard.
  6. Quench and temper (optional, iron and up, not plate armor): see below. Quenching ends the shaping.

Keys: Space strike, 1 2 3 Tap, Light, Heavy, Q Draw, E Widen, R Heat, F Cool, arrow keys pick the edge. Help → Try smithing is free practice in bronze, iron, steel and Star Iron. Discarding a paid blank loses its materials.

Metals at the forge

Quality

Every piece gets a score out of 100. It starts at 100 and loses 0.4 for each sixteenth of edge error, 1 for each blow beyond what a row needs, and 3 for each stress mark. You can't finish a piece below 50% fit.

QualityNeedsBonus
StandardUnder 80, or any stress leftNone
FineScore 80+, no stress+20% durability, +10% melee damage, +5% gathering speed, 1 stamina less per swing
MasterworkScore 95+, no stress+40% durability, +20% melee damage, +10% gathering speed, 1 stamina less per swing

Fine and Masterwork plate armor protects more; the game doesn't say how much. Star Iron below Masterwork is capped at 440 uses instead of 560. A piece at 98% fit or better with no stress gets a gleaming edge.

Design and handling

A head heavier than the recipe's first template hits harder but swings slower and costs more stamina; weight toward the tip adds a little damage. Longer blades reach farther, curved ones sweep a wider arc. The forge shows these as the piece's traits. Every template against the first one:

  • Long (iron and up, swords and spears): +0.6 m reach, +12% swing time, +8% stamina. Short is the opposite.
  • Curved (steel and up, swords): a wider arc, but up to 0.3 m less reach. A curved sword sweeps when you swing; a thin one lunges, a broad one cleaves.
  • Tools (pickaxes, axes, hoes, sickles): only the weight of the head counts, not its balance, length or curve. A head heavier than the plain template gathers up to 10% faster, hits up to 10% harder and lasts up to 15% longer, but from heavy 0.5 it costs 1 stamina more a swing; a light one (−0.5 or lighter) saves 1 but gathers slower. A smithing hammer only gets durability (up to +15%).

Quench and temper

Quench (iron and up)DamageDurabilityNotes
Oil, in the gold band+5%The safe choice.
Water, in the gold band+8%−5%Warps the piece if it's uneven (left and right edges differ by more than 1 in total) or very hot (above the top quarter of the band).
Either, outside the band (slack)−3%
Temper colourHeatDamageDurability
None (brittle)−20%
Straw, keenest40–50+5%−8%
Bronze32–40+2%
Purple26–32+6%
Blue, toughest20–26−3%+12%

Tempering is for steel, Blacksteel and Star Iron after an oil or water quench: reheat, then temper as it cools through the colour you want. A quenched steel piece you never temper is brittle and loses 20% durability. Quench and temper multiply.

Smith ranks

  • Every metal from bronze up has its own rank: Apprentice, Journeyman, Master. A Master in iron is still an Apprentice in steel until they work steel. Copper and tin have no ranks.
  • Heat decides where a blow lands. From bronze up, a blow struck hotter than the middle of the gold band does more, a cooler one runs short, and one dead in the centre lands true. The heat label tells you which you'll get. Harder metals drift more (bronze least, Blacksteel and Star Iron most).
  • Rank only changes the wobble. On top of the heat there's a small random wobble: an Apprentice gets all of it, a Journeyman half, and a Master none, so every blow lands exactly where the heat says.
  • Ranking up: keep forging that metal. Every head or armor piece you finish counts the ingots it used, old heads too. Journeyman also takes 2 pieces at Fine or better; Master takes 2 Masterworks in bronze and 3 in every other metal. You're promoted the moment you finish the piece that meets the requirement.
  • Your progress: open any recipe at the forge. Since 0.3.2 it shows your rank in that metal and what the next one needs, like "6 of 10 ingots, 1 of 2 Fine pieces to Journeyman".
  • Engraving options unlock with your best rank in any metal.
MetalJourneymanMaster
Bronze10 ingots + 2 Fine40 ingots + 2 Masterworks
Iron16 ingots + 2 Fine60 ingots + 3 Masterworks
Steel21 ingots + 2 Fine75 ingots + 3 Masterworks
Blacksteel10 ingots + 2 Fine36 ingots + 3 Masterworks
Star Iron6 ingots + 2 Fine24 ingots + 3 Masterworks

From the game's developer (0.3.0, and a note after 0.3.1). Ingots count once they're worked into a finished head or armor piece. Star Iron ranks go up since 0.3.2; before that everyone was stuck at Apprentice. The forge recipe shows the current numbers.

Smithing hammers

Carry an assembled smithing hammer in your Pack to steady your blows. The forge picks your best one that isn't worn out and whose metal is at least as hard as the work (copper, bronze, iron, steel, Blacksteel, Star Iron). Its forging quality sets how much it helps: a Standard hammer cuts the wobble to 80%, Fine to 60%, Masterwork to 40%. Hammers come in bronze (40 uses) up to Star Iron (140).

Workshop upgrades

StationFirst upgradeSecond upgrade
ForgeBellows Forge: metal cools 25% slower.
6 planks, 4 leather, 2 iron ingots
Crucible Forge: 50% slower.
8 cut stone, 6 obsidian, 6 emberstone
AnvilSteel Anvil: blows run 20% truer (less heat drift); gold, pearl and silver inlays.
6 steel ingots
Blacksteel Anvil: 40% truer; ember and star inlays.
4 Blacksteel ingots, 2 obsidian
SmelterBlast Smelter: the only smelter hot enough for Blacksteel and Star Iron ingots.
6 cut stone, 4 obsidian, 6 emberstone
--

The owner pays for an upgrade at the station (costs from the game's developer). The best anvil within 8 m of your forge counts.

Engraving

At the Anvil you can give a forged piece a surface, a pattern, an inlay, a hilt finish and one of 24 maker's marks. An inlay fills a pattern or mark. Clearing it all grinds the engraving off.

Unlocks atSurfacePatternHilt finishMaker's marks
ApprenticePolished, HammeredWaves, Stars, LinePlain, Blackened (2 charcoal)♦ ♣ ♠ ♥ ☼ ♪ ♫ ▲
JourneymanEtchedRunes, Vines, ScalesGilded (2 gold flecks), Silvered (1 silver ingot)Ω Σ Φ Θ δ ∞ ≡ §
MasterKnotwork, Flames, LightningPearl-set (1 pearl), Ember-set (1 emberstone)¶ ↑ ⌂ ☺ ♀ ♂ π µ
InlayAnvilCosts
CopperAny1 copper ingot
Gold, Pearl, SilverSteel Anvil3 gold flecks · 1 pearl · 1 silver ingot
Ember, StarBlacksteel Anvil2 emberstone · 1 Star Iron ingot

Armor and helmets

Plate armor and helmets are forged like everything else (no handle needed) and worn from the Pack. Better metal protects more and weighs less; Fine and Masterwork pieces protect more again. A leather tunic gives 10% and a hood 4%.

Handle × binding

Bonus uses add up. A Wooden Handle is made and fitted from 2 sticks in one step; craft Reinforced or Antler handles at the Workbench first. Sinew has no recipe: deer and alpine ibex drop it. Take apart at a Workbench gives back the head, handle and binding to swap a head onto a new handle; repair the tool first.

HandleNo bindingLeather (+5%)Sinew (+10%)
Wooden (2 sticks)+0%+5%+10%
Reinforced (+10%)+10%+15%+20%
Antler (+15%, +1 dmg, −1 stamina)+15%+20%+25% best

Durability calculator

Works for every tool and weapon: handles, bindings and forging quality add up, as the Workbench shows when you assemble.

Final uses

MetalStandard, woodenStandard, antler + sinewFine, antler + sinewMasterwork, antler + sinew
Copper60758799
Bronze160200232264
Iron240300348396
Steel320400464528
Blacksteel440550638726
Star Iron440*550*638*924

*Below Masterwork, Star Iron counts as 440 base uses, the same as Blacksteel; only Masterwork unlocks its full 560. Sharpening doesn't add uses. Design, quench and temper change durability further (see above).

Longest-lasting: a Masterwork Star Iron head + antler handle + sinew: 924 uses, +20% and +1 damage, and +10% more for 20 uses after each sharpening. An oil quench and a blue temper raise its durability further.
Show the original infographic (before 0.3.0)Every sword infographic