Forging Legends: A Comprehensive Guide to Reaching Smithing Level 100 in Skyrim

Skyrim, the vast and breathtaking land of dragons, magic, and adventure, offers a multitude of paths for the Dragonborn to tread. Among these, the path of the blacksmith, the master of metal and fire, is one that many choose to embark upon. Reaching the pinnacle of this craft, Smithing level 100, is no easy feat, but with the right knowledge, strategy, and a touch of patience, even the most novice adventurer can become a legendary smith. This guide will provide a comprehensive walkthrough, breaking down the journey into manageable steps, offering tips and tricks to optimize your training, and ensuring you have all the tools necessary to forge the most powerful armor and weapons in the land.

Understanding the Smithing Skill

Before diving into the nitty-gritty of leveling, it’s crucial to understand how the Smithing skill works. In Skyrim, your Smithing level directly influences the quality of items you can craft and improve. Higher levels unlock access to superior materials and techniques, allowing you to create gear with significantly better stats. The experience gained when smithing is tied to the base value of the created item, so more expensive items give more experience.

Here are the key factors affecting your Smithing skill:

• Crafting: Creating items at a forge or anvil is the primary way to increase your Smithing skill.
• Improving: Sharpening weapons on a grindstone and improving armor at a workbench also contributes to your skill.
• Perks: The Smithing skill tree offers perks that enhance your crafting abilities and unlock new materials.
• Standing Stones: The Warrior Stone offers a 20% bonus to all combat skills, including smithing.
• Fortify Smithing: Various items, potions and spells can temporarily boost your smithing skill.

Preparation: Setting Yourself Up for Success

Before you begin your smithing journey, some preparation will make your life significantly easier:

1. Gathering Resources: Stockpiling materials is crucial. Iron ingots, leather strips and ores are your first concern. You’ll also need other materials like dwarven metal, ebony, gold and quicksilver as you progress. Mining and trading are the main ways to get resources. Consider buying out all the iron ore and leather from shopkeepers when you visit cities. Mine iron ore whenever you can find it.
2. Choosing a Location: A location with easy access to a forge, anvil, workbench, grindstone, and ideally, a merchant, is optimal. Whiterun, with Warmaiden’s, Adrianne Avenicci, and the Skyforge, is a popular choice. Markarth’s Understone Keep is another great location with easy access to everything, including a smelter.
3. Starting Gold: You’ll need gold to buy materials. Completing some early quests or selling unneeded equipment will give you a good start.
4. The Warrior Stone: Located near Helgen, this stone provides a 20% boost to combat skills, making smithing level faster. Activating it before you start smithing is advisable.
5. The Lover Stone: Located East of Markarth, The Lover Stone grants 15% bonus to ALL skill experience gain, making it a great alternative if you are looking to grind your smithing skill while also training other skills simultaneously.
6. Resting Bonus: A good night’s sleep in an owned bed grants a temporary 10% skill XP boost. If you are a member of any guild this can go up to 15%. (Lovers Comfort bonus if your spouse is close to you will also work)
7. Fortify Smithing Gear: Before you start working on your actual smithing it’s best to acquire gear that boosts your smithing skill, this will make the whole process much faster and easier. Look for items with ‘Fortify Smithing’ enchantments, such as gauntlets, rings, necklaces, and armor. You can disenchant items with this enchantment to learn it yourself.
8. Fortify Smithing Potions: Potions that increase Smithing skill also help greatly. You can buy these or brew them yourself. A very common and easy to obtain potion to make is with a combination of Blisterwort, Sabre Cat Tooth and Spriggan Sap.

The Leveling Process: A Detailed Guide

Now, let’s break down the leveling process step-by-step, from novice to master blacksmith:

Level 1-30: The Early Grind

The initial stages are relatively simple. Your main focus should be on crafting iron daggers and leather bracers. These are cheap to make, and with the warrior stone bonus and rest bonus you will be able to level fast.

1. Acquire Iron and Leather: Head to Warmaiden’s or any shop with a forge and buy all their iron ore, iron ingots, and leather strips. Mine iron whenever you see it.
2. Smelt the Ore: If you bought iron ore, use the smelter to turn them into ingots.
3. Craft Iron Daggers: These are the most efficient iron item for experience. Use the iron ingots to craft as many daggers as possible. Do this until you run out of iron.
4. Craft Leather Bracers: Use leather strips to create leather bracers. These provide great starting smithing experience. Do this until you run out of leather.
5. Improve Items: Once you have crafted a set of items, improve them on the workbench or grindstone. This will give you additional XP.
6. Sell Items: Sell your created items to merchants. This will allow you to gain gold and repurchase needed resources.
7. Repeat: Continuously repeat these steps: buy, craft, improve, and sell.

At this stage, you should also start collecting ores like corundum, malachite and moonstone. Remember to visit blacksmiths in every town as they restock their supplies every two days. Do not forget to sell your smithing products.

Level 30-60: Branching Out and Finding Your Niche

As you progress, the iron daggers may become less efficient. This is the time to unlock your first perks and explore new crafting options. Here is where you can start focusing on certain sets of items that will yield greater experience.

1. Unlock Steel Smithing: Spend your Smithing perk point to learn Steel Smithing. Crafting steel items will give you better experience compared to iron.
2. Craft Steel Items: Start crafting steel weapons and armor. Steel helmets and swords are particularly useful at this stage.
3. Dwarven Smithing: Begin making Dwarven items, they are cheap and give great experience at this level. You can find Dwarven Metal in Dwarven Ruins, but you can also purchase it from blacksmiths. You will require a perk point for this.
4. Transmute Ores: If you have any extra iron ore you can use the spell Transmute which you can purchase from Halted Stream Camp to turn it into silver or gold. This is important for your next level advancement.
5. Jewelry Crafting: Begin crafting gold and silver rings and necklaces. These will give more experience than lower tier items, and use the transmuted silver and gold.
6. Sell High Value Items: Your inventory is now probably filled with a lot of high tier items you have crafted, ensure to sell them to merchants to get more gold.

During this phase, begin exploring new locations to gather more resources. Mines are your friend. And do not forget to get a follower that you can equip with your crafted armor and weapons. By having them equip your crafted items, you get a visual feedback of your own progress, and they will make use of gear that you would normally sell.

Level 60-80: Advanced Materials and Techniques

With a solid foundation, you are now ready to tackle more advanced materials. At this point you have a few options that work really well. Continue with Dwarven equipment, go for Orcish equipment, or if you are adventurous go for jewelry making.

1. Unlock Orcish Smithing: If you haven’t already, invest a perk point into learning how to craft Orcish equipment.
2. Orcish Equipment: Craft Orcish Armor and weaponry. Orcish ingots require Orichalcum ore and 1 Iron ingot per unit, so this might be a bit more tedious to get, but the results will be worth it.
3. Gold Jewelry: If you focused on jewelry making you may have collected a significant amount of precious stones. Use them to craft rings and necklaces. Keep an eye out for flawless gems which greatly enhance experience gains when crafting jewerly.
4. Ebony Smithing: This path will give you a significant jump in smithing experience. Start collecting ebony ore, or purchasing them. You will need a perk point to learn this skill. You will begin to focus on ebony gear.
5. Improve Your Skills: Continue improving crafted items on the grindstone and workbench.
6. Complete Smithing Quests: If you have joined a guild, such as the Companions, keep your eye out for any quest that asks you to craft or improve items.

At this level, consider exploring Dwemer ruins to find Dwarven metal in large quantities. With the pickaxe and a good strategy you will be able to acquire a massive amount of this resource. If you can find a way to make your carry weight a lot higher, then that will only make this method more efficient.

Level 80-100: The Final Push

The last stretch is the most challenging. You are almost a master smith. To reach level 100 the most optimal and fastest way at this level is to focus on a single and very effective tactic. By this time you should have already acquired the dragonborn DLC. By completing the main quest line of this expansion you will unlock a special smithing perk called Bonemold Smithing.

1. Acquire Dragon Bone and Scale: Kill dragons. You will need a lot of their bones and scales.
2. Craft Dragon Equipment: With the perk mentioned above, craft dragonscale and dragonbone armors and weapons. These will yield you the largest amount of smithing experience.
3. Complete Smithing Quests: Continue completing quests that asks you to craft or improve items.
4. Legendary Smithing: If you have reached level 100, and wish to continue progressing with the skill, you can make the skill Legendary to reset it to level 15 and start again with all of the perks refunded.

The final stretch is a test of patience. But once you hit level 100, you will become a true master of the forge. Your armor will be of legendary quality, and your weapons will cut down the strongest of enemies.

Optimizing Your Training: Tips and Tricks

To make your leveling process smoother and more efficient, consider these tips:

• Stack Fortify Smithing: Use Fortify Smithing gear, potions, and spells to maximize your experience gains.
• The Aetherial Crown: This allows you to keep two standing stone bonuses. Use the warrior and lover stone for optimal smithing experience gains.
• Resting Bonuses: Always rest in an owned bed before starting your smithing session.
• Skill Books: If you are aiming for level 100 fast, be on the look out for skill books. They can be found randomly in chests, or even in plain sight in libraries and bookshelves.
• Merchants’ Gold: If you need to sell a lot of your crafted items, you can wait for the merchant’s gold to reset, or you can visit different merchants at different cities, as each will have its own stock of gold.
• Keep a Follower: Having a follower to carry some of your loot is great, but it’s even better if they are a merchant follower. Then you will be able to sell your crafted items directly to them, whenever you want.
• Enchanting: As you level smithing, you will also level enchanting by disenchanting items. With enchanting, you will also be able to make new items and enchant them to boost smithing.

Conclusion: From Novice to Master

Reaching Smithing level 100 in Skyrim is a time-consuming but rewarding journey. By following this guide, gathering resources, using fortifying enchantments, and dedicating time and effort, you can become a legendary blacksmith. The ability to craft your own powerful armor and weapons will significantly enhance your adventures throughout Skyrim. So grab your hammer, ignite the forge, and begin your journey to master smithing.