I think the real problem with smithing is...

[Freakiie]

Personally I feel that material cost should get a massive overhaul and that actual materials used should be far more significant for the price formula (so no more 300 denar Pugio's!).

Just think about it, you take a tiny dagger (Everyone's favorite Pugio) and smelt that into 6 ingots. Take a small wooden hammer, break that down, and it turns into 3 pieces of hardwood. Then you recombine those materials and turn them into 3 big polearms. If you ask me, something there sure doesn't add up! Oh and you might even have some leftover materials afterwards. Not to mention that each of those polearms will be far more valuable than the Puglio because they do more damage. A massive shaft for a 2h pole arm/axe/pike shouldn't cost the same as a tiny wooden pommel on your sword. Nor should a massive blade on a 2h polearm cost far less than the ingots going into a tiny dagger.

Just make bigger weapons cost a lot more materials. That way it will be much harder to spam them and print money, you can rework the cost formula for weapons to include materials so you can't cheese by mass melting cheap Puglios any more and top tier items still retain their current value so it's not like you could suddenly buy tons of them.

 

[FuseiN]

This discussion started me thinking about smithing.
I've started a new playthrough with self imposed limits that mirror my suggestions. I've actually decided to not ever buy weapons of any kind to smelt, and only ever smelt captured or crafted weapons.

Still very early game, but so far, it feels pretty good.

That's how I play too. Tbf though, orders still vastly outshines pretty much any other money making legit means (trading is funnily pretty bad at making money probably a hint there).

EDIT : wrong quote ^^"

 

[ssssnake]

Even without smelting any purchased weapons, smithing still provides more money than anything else.

In my new playthrough, I'm Clan Tier 2. My two workshops are generating just under 200 each, for about 370 total. A few minutes of smithing can easily generate 10k in profits.

The big drawback of not smelting purchased weapons turns out to not be lower profits. The big drawback is that you now have to choose to not take the "curious smith" and "curious smelter" perks (which increase part unlock chances) because you need to be able to refine your own steel and fine steel.

Maybe smithing feels so economically over powered in part because workshops are so bad.
I'm not sure why Taleworlds put a low limit on numbers of workshops. For workshops to be viable at all in ofsetting your daily expenses, you need more of them than one per clan tier.

 

[Ask]

Only problem is it noob trap, thinking it's good deal but not. Thinking it's overpower but it's not.

I agree, I wasn't considering how slow leveling becomes. It looks decent on paper but in practice it's just a massive pain in the ass.

Yeah the only real problem with smithing is the money making aspect in the sense that just sitting in a town all day from the very start will give you money quickly and risk free, while other methods have some risks associated and tend to take longer. Farming lords require you to at least be a mercenary and have about 50-60 troops to beat the weaker ones, trading requires 20-30 troops so bandits don't attack you, some amount of money to start buying your first horses and then a lot of time travelling back and forth.

 

[Ask]

Sorry for double posting, it seems you can't add more replies when editting a post

That's how I play too. Tbf though, orders still vastly outshines pretty much any other money making legit means (trading is funnily pretty bad at making money probably a hint there).

EDIT : wrong quote ^^"

At the very least, orders require you to hit a certain level of smithing to be able to access the higher level orders, even if failing them gives half the rewards which is still a lot. And they take some time to replenish so you have to travel around towns to get something done. Orders should be the only way to get money with smithing if you ask me, and other money making methods need enough of a buff to be viable. Trading is indeed not that good. I wouldn't say bad, but next to smithing everything seems that way. I just wish leveling trade and their perks had a bigger influence in your profits, because currently trading at lvl 1 or lvl 330 trader has like a 5% profit difference.

Even without smelting any purchased weapons, smithing still provides more money than anything else.

In my new playthrough, I'm Clan Tier 2. My two workshops are generating just under 200 each, for about 370 total. A few minutes of smithing can easily generate 10k in profits.

The big drawback of not smelting purchased weapons turns out to not be lower profits. The big drawback is that you now have to choose to not take the "curious smith" and "curious smelter" perks (which increase part unlock chances) because you need to be able to refine your own steel and fine steel.

Maybe smithing feels so economically over powered in part because workshops are so bad.
I'm not sure why Taleworlds put a low limit on numbers of workshops. For workshops to be viable at all in ofsetting your daily expenses, you need more of them than one per clan tier.

That's the thing, in the end once you hit a high enough smithing level to get materials consistently, even the weakest 2h swords you can craft sell for 1k to 3k. And then you can craft 7-8 with a full stamina bar, getting 10k profits from just killing looters and sitting in town for a day, and it only gets stronger from there.

Workshops are so pitiful, even the best ones take 50 days to pay themselves, and then in 50 more days they'll generate enough money as selling crappy 2h swords do in one day.

Hopefuly they'll add leveled workshops and those will generate more income, or increase the limit. Or just balance the economy in general, it's such a giant mess.

 

[Sweynforkbeard]

As Humility said, smithing is fundamentally a noob trap.

It only really makes sense if you were to pair smithing with the lvl 300 trade perk and then just buy your way to owning everything. But, that would still require and aweful lot of clicks and it would be insanely tedious.

Trading can be ok early. Partly because you can naturally combine it with raising an army along the way and partly because it will allow you to sell loot at a better price later.

But for the rest, you are only going to see any kind of real progression once you can muster a decent lordkiller army. Smithing does nothing help that along and is thus basically useless.

 

[five bucks]

Smithing makes you rich but it doesn't help you build and lead armies at all, doesn't boost your renown and it takes a LOT of time sitting around on the map, so unless you're going for a 300 trade playthrough where you buy fiefs (which requires agonisingly grinding 300 trade, a process that would make you rich on its own anyway) it's not going to do you much good. (After writing this post I realised Sweyn basically said the same thing).

So: what can you do with lots of money? Hire good troops and stock full garrisons, get good combat gear, and best of all, potentially economically bankrupt fiefs to weaken them so it's easier to take them over.

But getting good troops is limited by your small party size, because spending all day in town instead of the field means you aren't gaining renown. You're a millionaire who troops have never heard of and don't trust to follow into combat. And if TW ever fixes early game Leadership gain, this will be exacerbated as spending time smithing will mean you miss out on Leadership XP.

Getting good gear is limited by the fact that you can already one shot many enemies by just using a glaive from horseback, and buying top tier armor is of very limited usefulness when it provides poor damage reduction. However this might be less limited if TW fixes armor.

Bankrupting fiefs is nice but without Engineering skill you will still have a lot of difficulty actually taking them yourself. If Engineering skill is fixed so it actually has more impact on siegeing time, this will become an even bigger downside for smithing.

Considering TW has nerfed the outputs gain multiple times already, I think it's approaching a balanced state. If TW just made the materials (inputs) gain from cheap weapons lower, and made it take more stamina to make higher tier weapons, I think it will be balanced well.

 

[Ananda_The_Destroyer]

So: what can you do with lots of money? Hire good troops and stock full garrisons, get good combat gear, and best of all, potentially economically bankrupt fiefs to weaken them so it's easier to take them over.

Exactly. money is not a useful or needed as people think. According to @Lesser_Scholar you should be able to get just about any clan to join you if you have 6M on hand and can pay them about 2m, don't remember if that includes town owning clans or not though. Combine that with 300 trade perk and you can buy fiefs for several M and buy a clan for 2m and you have a clan, big woopy doo. You can instead with COMPETANT play just kick down the door of a fief and defeat enemies until you have 500 influence (you'll get 50 from the siege) and raise up a clan from a wanderer for 20K and your influence and new fief, this can be done (I've done it) IMEDIATLY when getting clan rank 4 and continued as many times as you wish as long as you aren't trying to hoard fiefs for yourself. It's so much faster and better then trying to buy fiefs and clans after raising smithing and trading, it's silly to even suggest doing so unless you're using exploits to raise trade and such.

 

[ssssnake]

Unlike some of the posters above, I find smithing for money to be extremely useful. It doesn't feel like a noob trap at all to me. Indeed, it feels so useful that it eclipses all the other means of making money.

I like to field armies and build garrisons of Fian Champions and Khan's Guard. These sorts of elite armies wreck enemies, but cost a lot to maintain. Smithing is the only avenue to completely eliminate the need to worry about costs. I wish there were more viable avenues for maintaining a passive income. I've played a lot of Prophesy of Pendor, and one of the first priorities in those games is to build workshops in every city, so you have a steady source of gold flowing in that is not reliant on battles.

Even with a leader at 300 smithing and 10 Endurance, I've not had a problem with leveling other skills. My leader generally has high Stewardship (which is easy to level with food) high Charm (again easy to level by releasing lords and normal interactions.)

Combat skills don't have to be maxed out. Riding needs to be high enough to ride a warhorse, and bow skill needs to be high enough to use an noble bow. Some skill in pole arm and 2 handed rounds out the combat skills. Armed with crafted weapons, you can pretty much one shot most enemies.
.

 

[humility925]

Smithing is not a time effective, even trade sping of gold help with passive income better than smithing in long terms, smithing isn't passive, you would too busy fighting or dealing with many lord at late game, had no time for smithing, lot of time to defend from attack on your kingdom, and lot of time to attack their kingdom.

Smithing got in the kind of way, too many day spent on trying take over castle/town, keep enemies off from take over your castle/town, you can't afford to spent time on smithing if you plan to be rulership or lord in late game. Too much tense to find resource and limited carry goods where you must had large army and those army eat lot of food and lot of food eat up your limited carry stuff easy, but I do said one thing useful athletics at near almost before last perk, that 20% food less for your army is useful, even thought steward do offer little less food as well, I think it's should stacked buff. Petty painful to level up athletics after level riding as well.

It's too tense to do smithing, ensure you had resource that cost your party space carry good where most are should be food because siege and more time to get other thing done like deal with lord attack your town/castle/village unexpectedly so you don't had to go back town, waste time if you try to min food, I rather max out food so I can counter at anytime, lot of click, rest town to do smithing all over again, town are very limited buy your weapon with limited fund, you can't sell weapon to enemies town, so go on, especially more and more as time went by many kingdom want make war on player's kingdom (I'm petty sure a.i is human hater since they design to get a.i attack player primarily more than any a.i.) on left and right.

smithing is very situation, and as rulership/lord, you already busy as it is, you need passive income more than try to make money on active, as time is precious, especially birth and death is on.

Of course I was try playing/role playing good lord, playing as cruel lord is easier to play as you kill every lord after battle so they don't come back and bit you back? I'm told it's will mess up your kingdom in long term, crime go up, or something like that.

Unless you willing to pay per day for try to peace with all faction, then smithing to make profit to cover the cost, but I see that kind of set back, slow down, too much manage move in and out of resource to craft, too much rest to restore stamina that cost lot of time (because you need that time to travel and dealing with your lord, or try find lord to join your kingdom, so go on, not sitting duck in the town to do smithing unless you try to make babies at same time)

Now, if smithing do not had stamina at all, you can smithing on the go, and town had resource everything you need to craft to make profit, then I guess smithing may had worth it, but with stamina limited design, with resource available in town are a very limited or no resource to craft (I don't need to carry all those craft resource, I need mostly carry space for food for army for stay longer power on the world map and troop morale and save some space for loot to sell off after all troop max out level (if you got perk that gave weapon and clothing for level up troop faster), then no. not worth it for rulership/lord to run kingdom, it's seem easier that way, smithing is just more of burden, and not passive income then eat up time that gave your enemies time to ruin your kingdom's day.

i suppose you could dump whole bunch of craft resource in your most safe town chest as much you can during peaceful time, but I'm not sure chest had limited number to stroage for crafing and sell during war time, but that is not seem wise to do that, while enemies ruin your village/castle/other town.

Pay kingdom for peace could cost you anywhere 1,500 to 10,000 per day, along your wage of troop, and companions's war party wage as well. Town limited buy weapon, anywhere up to 80,000, but per day, I don't know, town would get lot of money on next day after pay all that, but as I said, I see this is nothing more than set back and waste time or so I thoughts. Correct me I'm wrong?

 

[RozBritanicus]

yep at the moment just build two handed swords and then buy shops then build two handed swords. its a broken system.

 

[Sweynforkbeard]

Combat skills don't have to be maxed out. Riding needs to be high enough to ride a warhorse, and bow skill needs to be high enough to use an noble bow. Some skill in pole arm and 2 handed rounds out the combat skills. Armed with crafted weapons, you can pretty much one shot most enemies.
.

That really depends on what you consider important. If you want maximize your chars ability to lvl up you are going to have to invest in bow or crossbow and horseriding.