Best way to train weapon & armor smithing?

[Trackstar]

Newbie here and I havent't made my base yet, so I can't farm. But I do got hunting, steal, and buy whatever fabric/leather I need. Do you get more skill gain for making more expensive things or things that take longer? Or is it all the same? For example, should I make tons of Bandanas that take very little time each, or should I make a Leather Shirt or Turtleneck that takes over a day to make just 1? I setup fabric, leather, armor storage nearby so there is minimal walking.

[Drift]

You get exp by time spent training, no matter how much material you use, so something that takes longer but uses the least amount of material or is worth the most would probably be the best way to train. Mining is the only way you're gonna get to train that stat a whole bunch though.

[Three-Headed-Monkey]

just leave your smith in the city and let him convert skins into leather while your main squad does sth else, armor smith will be 60+ in to time and you dont even have to farm that many animals for it :P

personal i'd recommend leaving weapon smith alone, atleast until you dont need anymore engineering researchs / ai cores for other stuff

[Drift]

Originally posted by Three-Headed-Monkey:

just leave your smith in the city and let him convert skins into leather

That is an incredibly cheap way to do this,
get to Flat's Lagoon if you can and bait Boneyard Wolves to the guards, I don't remember if there's a house you can buy there but it would be a basically free way of getting basic armor and armorsmith xp early game.

[Pyrrhus]

Scorchlanders have XP speed bonus for crafting so I use them for armors and weapons.

To raise armor skills is to keep on curing leathers from skins and beating iron ore into iron plates at plate beating station, keep on selling iron plates. You could have 6 plate beating stations busy as you make profits everyday selling them. Takes few game weeks to raise armor skills to 90.

To raise weapon skills is to keep on crafting desert sabre, it's faster to make and boost skills, good profit selling them too.

[Odium_Apollyon]

To train weaponsmithing never upgrade the weapons forge. Best way to train armorsmithing plate beating.

[terror923]

Whenever i AFK for long periods of time, i usually have my chars crafting.
you can easily put it in their jobs so they will get materials from chests and get food from chests.

[The Grand Mugwump]

XP gain is the same for all items. You'll gain it at a set rate as your character works.

Leather is the way to go if you haven't started finding engineering and advanced science books yet for armorsmithing. If you do get an engineering book and don't desperately need it for something else, plate armor is a super easy way to level armorsmithing too. You just need one character mining iron near a town and another beating it into armor plates. You can also make some insane money selling standard grade or higher heart protectors, which require almost no materials.

I have the easiest time levelling weaponsmithing with desert sabres. They will usually sell back to a NPC for enough to buy more iron plates and some food to keep the cycle going for free. And they take a long time to craft for the number of iron plates they use. Also, do not upgrade your weaponsmithing bench until you're ready to burn through fabric to make high quality weapons. It's easier just to keep the bench at rank 1 for levelling weaponsmithing.

[SmallGespenst]

shirts have an amazing time/resources ratio so they're a great option for getting exp if you don't have much skins or your leather storage is full, and if you have access to steel then crafting chainmail sheets is a great way to get exp since that stuff takes a really long time to craft.
as for weapons, desert sabers are pretty valuable so they're a good option, if you take the forge to its second tier it'll use cloth, but you'll also get the better upgrade recipes that take much longer so you can think of it as spending cloth to reduce the cost in iron plates (for experience at least) though you should absolutely hold off on the third tier as that replaces the iron plate requirement with steel bars, save that for when your smith can make the really good stuff.

[biochimera]

Originally posted by Odium_Apollyon:

To train weaponsmithing never upgrade the weapons forge. Best way to train armorsmithing plate beating.

Upgrading the weapon forge is a good idea. The gear from lvl 2 and 3 forges take much longer to make than lvl 1, and in the case of lvl 2 requires iron and fabric, both cheap. Lvl 3 requires steel and fabric.

Agree with platebeating, though would add tanning too if you have a good steady supply of skins.

[Radiosity]

Originally posted by Quiet:

Originally posted by Three-Headed-Monkey:

just leave your smith in the city and let him convert skins into leather

I don't remember if there's a house you can buy there but it would be a basically free way of getting basic armor and armorsmith xp early game.

There is, just one of the small ones right beside the entrance, around ~4k cats. Perfect location since it can be used as a safe spot while exploring south/southeast from Flats Lagoon. Plenty of shops for selling all your loot as well.