Blacksmithing discipline
The Blacksmithing discipline controls the creation of non-armor, non-weapon metal items such as crafting tools, large jewelry, containers, and ingots.
Currently the only open locations are the Riverhaven Forging Society, Crossing Forging Society, Shard Forging Society, Hibarnhvidar Forging Society and Rathan Forging Society.
Basics
Raw materials from mines are smelted into metal ingots, which are then formed into finished products by pounding on an anvil using hammer, tongs and additional tools. Ingots are also used as starting materials in weaponsmithing and armorsmithing.
The ANALYZE command can be used to determine certain basic properties of items, as well as the next step required during the forging process. For more specific information, APPRAISE the item CAREFULLY to tell you how its inherent properties compare on the Trader's Scale.
Techniques
As with all creation disciplines, you may learn a range techniques from a Forging Master to make Blacksmithing tasks easier. Some techniques are required in order to perform advanced tasks such as Maker Mark creation. See Blacksmithing Techniques.
Tools
See Crafting Tools for an in depth discussion of them.
- Blacksmithing Book: This book holds information on all the techniques and items that a standard smith can make.
- Stirring Rod: Used for stirring molten metals.
- Bellows: Used to keep the fires going when smelting, refining, or shaping metals.
- Shovel: Used to keep the fires going when smelting, refining, or shaping metals. Can be made with blacksmithing, and has other uses in mining. Key stat is hardness.
- Pickaxe: Used in mining. Can be made with blacksmithing, key stat is hardness.
- Borax Flux: Used to refine materials. Multiple use item, starting with 50 uses. Most likely will be created using Alchemy.
- Forging Hammer: Used to form ingots into items on the anvil. Several forms can be made via blacksmithing. According to GM Kodius, the fastest hammers are those with high quality and hardness which unfortunately also results in lack of durability.
- Tongs: Used to hold metal when shaping it. The fastest tongs have high thermal resistance.
- Oil: Used to prevent rust to metal items, as the final step in repair or forging. At present, may only be purchased.
- Aerated Salts: Used to repair crucibles. Must be purchased at a forging society.
- Wire Brush: Used to repair hammers, shovels, and tongs. Must be purchased.
Smelting
Smelting is simply the process of melting down the metal and forming it into an ingot. It is the starting point not only for blacksmithing items, but also weaponsmithing and armorsmithing.
For now, this process teaches Mech Lore up to about 25 ranks with standard metals. Magic metals should take Mech Lore up to about 100 ranks, as per GM Kodius.
See Crafting Materials for the properties of metals.
Begin by placing all the desired components into the crucible (up to 22 ingots/nuggets/etc OR up to 210 volume, whichever comes first; the mixed metals may contain no more than 8 different types). Then, holding a stirring rod and STIR or MIX CRUCIBLE WITH ROD, until a problem occurs.
- If the metal starts forming lumps or cooling in places, TURN the crucible.
- If the fire is unable to consume it's fuel, hold a set of bellows and PUSH them.
- If the fire runs out of fuel, hold a shovel and PUSH FUEL WITH SHOVEL.
Keep stirring till the product is complete.
This process is made easier by the Basic Metal Smelting Technique.
When smelting multiple items there are a couple important things to know.
- COUNT can be used to see the materials inside the crucible in a more coherent manner.
- Before any other actions occur, if steel, pewter, bronze, or brass can be made from the components, they will be. Brass will take precedence over bronze, and bronze will take precedence over pewter, if multiple alloys are possible. Steel will not form if anything other than iron and charcoal is in the crucible.
- The stats of the resulting metal will be affected depending on which of two ways the metals combine.
- If there is one component that composes 67% of the volume or more, then the base stats will be of that material, and the remaining material will only affect the density.
- Otherwise, stats will be in the form of (<material 1 stat> * <material 1 volume>)+(<material 2 stat> * <material 2 volume> ) / <total volume>, i.e. an average weighted by volume.
There is a maximum of eight metals that can be in any one ingot.
Once a combination material is made, it cannot be directly altered. For example, mixing low carbon steel with coal will never change it to high carbon or even medium carbon steel.
Refining
Refining will raise the purity of the metal added, but will reduce the volume by 50%. The Proficient Refining Technique will reduce the volume loss to only 20%.
Beyond limiting the crucible to one object at a time and changing the first step to POURing the borax flux into the crucible, the refining process is identical to that of smelting.
The process is made easier with knowledge of the Proficient Metal Refining Technique.
Reclaiming
Reclaiming is the act of melting down metal objects to regain the metal in them for other uses. Simply place the item in the crucible by itself, and proceed along the standard smelting process. The difficulty of this process is approximately the same difficulty as creating the item that is being reclaimed, including additional difficulty due to material.
Note that only fully completed items can be reclaimed, and the resulting volume will be reduced by about 20%.
The process is made easier by knowledge of the Expert Metal Reclamation Technique.
Cutting
In the northmost part of the craft hall stands an ingot cutter that can be used to slice ingots into pieces.
First, TURN CUTTER TO <#>, where the number is the volume of the piece you wish to slice off. Then PUSH INGOT WITH CUTTER to slice the ingot into two pieces.
Shaping
Shaping is the act of actually pounding an ingot into an item. The first step is to turn your blacksmithing book to the desired chapter and page, then STUDY it. After that, POUND <ingot/item> WITH HAMMER, until the item is complete or a problem is reached.
- If the fire is unable to consume it's fuel, hold a set of bellows and PUSH them.
- If the fire runs out of fuel, hold a shovel and PUSH FUEL WITH SHOVEL.
- If the item need straightening or detailing, TURN <item> WITH TONGS.
When the item is finished being shaped, PUSH TUB to cool it. For some items, a handle such as the long or short poles must be added using ASSEMBLE <item> WITH POLE. The final step is to POUR OIL ON <item>.
See Blacksmithing Products for a list of items that can be made.
Tool Repair
In the case of standard metal tools, simply RUB the tool with the wire brush, then POUR OIL on it to finish. For crucible repair, POUR the salts into the crucible while it is empty.
Once a tool has become at least "badly damaged" or worse, a repair shop is required to make the tool whole again.
Currently anvils do not take damage.
Stirring rods can now be repaired by the Riverhaven Engineering Society in the northernmost room, and in some repair shops. They can also be repaired by players, in the same way that other tools such as shovels and pickaxes can be repaired. Additionally, there is an NPC tool repairman in the Crossing Engineering Society.
Miscellaneous
It should be noted that final item weight is calculated differently from appraised ingot weight. The current theory is that this is due to items having their weight calculated to four decimals, while appraisal weight uses fewer. This can cause a difference of up to a stone at times.