One of the features included in Taleworld’s newest entry into the Mount and Blade franchise includes a new smithing system. In Mount and Blade: Bannerlord players can craft their own custom weapons using an in-depth customization system. This can include different hilts, blades, handles and you name it! This does not mean, however, you can just start crafting out beautiful Tamaskene swords right off the bat.
In Bannerlord you character will have a Smithing skill which will limit the power of the weapons that you can create. Through leveling the smithing skill your character can start to make more powerful weapons. What are some of the best ways to level up the smithing skill in Bannerlord? Read on to find out!
How Does the Smithing Skill Work?
In Mount and Blade: Bannerlord you can raise up a total of 18 different skills. Some of these are combat related and make you better at swinging a sword or shooting with a bow and some are non-combat related. Smithing is a non-combat related skill which is only used to create weapons in the Blacksmith in towns. (That being said, some of the perks in smithing can raise your combat skills).
When you are creating an item at the blacksmith, different parts will add a Difficulty level to the weapon. The difficulty of creating the weapon will depend on which parts you would like to add to the weapon and what type of weapon it is. For example, creating a basic wooden polearm with a rake as the head is very easy to do. A smith with very minor skills can do this. Creating a large steel two-handed axe with an engraved handle however, will be much more difficult.
If your character attempts to create something that is out of their difficulty range that does not mean that they cannot forge the weapon. What this means is that the stats will be lower than expected if your smithing level doesn’t shape up. As you can see in the image above at the top left there is a bar. This will show you how difficult the currently created weapon is to smith and show you where your character’s smithing level is at.
How to Level Up Smithing in Bannerlord
So you’re on your way to becoming a master smith. Smithing weapons in Bannerlord is a great way of making money in the game. In fact, it is probably the single best and easiest way to make a lot of money fast. But if you’re going to create great and costly weapons, you will have to raise your smithing level first. All of the ways that you can raise your smithing level are done at the smithy at any town. Basically any action you can take in this menu is going to raise your smithing level.
The different ways you can level up your smithing skill include:
- Smelting weapons: You can smelt down any appropriate weapons from your character’s inventory. These can be weapons found as loot from looter battlers or battles from lords as well. You can also smelt down weapons that you’ve purchased from a trader. Smelting down weapons is a great way to increase your smithing skill and gain materials to forge new weapons.
- Refining materials: At the smithy you can also refine materials. Using the refine tab you can create charcoal by using 2 hardwood to begin with. Charcoal is important for forging new weapons and smelting down old ones. All refining actions will give your character some smithing experience.
- Forging new weapons: This is the big one. Every time your character forges a weapon they will gain some Smithing experience. I will go into detail about this point below.
The Best Way to Raise Smithing Level in Bannerlord -Forging Weapons
As you may have guessed from the heading, the best way to raise the smithing skill is by forging great weapons. “But I thought you will need a high skill level to create expensive weapons?” Wrong! When you forge a new weapons the amount of experience you gain seems to be relative to the value of the weapon you have created. In simple terms, creating expensive weapons will give you more experience. That doesn’t mean you have to go all out and use all of the best materials to create anything.
There are some great ways of making weapons with very cheap materials that are worth a lot of money and thus, worth great smithing experience. Some of the best things you can do is make really long slashing weapons. For example, check out this polearm in the image below.
Using just one unit of Iron, 1 Hardwood and 1 Charcoal we have created a a long polearm with a very high slashing damage. This polearm sells anywhere from 3,000 to 4,000 denars. Once you have created a few of these and unlocked some new pieces you can start to find other customization options which will have even higher stats. Another great thing to do is to create a two handed sword at lower levels and find the blade with the highest slashing damage output. Slide it to make it huge and throw it on the largest handle you can find. These generally go for a lot of money as well.
In my game at the moment I am making two-handed polearms which have a value of around 25,000 denars when traded in the game. I am using the Long Glaive Head and Long Ash shaft. They only require two units of Fine Steel and one unit of Hardwood to create so there’s a HUGE profit margin on them. My character also gets a level in smithing every 2 or so times they create it. So just keep on forging up high difficulty weapons and you will have a master smith in no time!