How to farm crafting ores when Talani’s shop stocks one chapter behind due to first entering in Ch.1?

[wml22]

I’m in Chapter 2 now on the hardest difficulty. I discovered Talani's shop in Chapter 1. I need to find more Iron Ore and need Fire Essences as well to upgrade my gear but I'm at an impasse because Talani's shop is apparently stocking a chapter late due to how the inventory is programmed to update when reaching a new chapter, but based on what chapter you were in when you first entered the shop. It seems like extremely bad game design that my playthrough has been permanently gimped for the entire game just because I entered the shop in Chapter 1 - now apparently if I want to buy anything in the shop it will be outdated and obsolete, a chapter behind, for the rest of the game. This is incredibly aggravating. How am I supposed to get enough iron ore to keep upgrading equipment in Chapter 2? I can't even beat the gatekeepers in front of Castle Atana despite tons of grinding because on the hardest difficulty it's too hard without also being able to upgrade equipment enough, and I can't do that because Talani's shop is gimped. Is there a way to edit the save file to fix this?

[Frost]

Talani's shop won't sell iron ore until a little further in the game - she's meant to catch you up in case you fall behind on gear. There should be a vendor west of the Castle Atana entrance that sells lots of crafting mats if you still need any tier 2 upgrades.

You'll be able to buy iron ore once you reach Silvara, the Holy Lands, Orlian Village, or iirc reach a certain party level.

For the gate guards battle, if their aoe attack is causing you trouble, you can reset your stats and put more points into defense. I'd also recommend using ice to keep the attack-down debuff on enemies. And if you haven't unlocked any specialization classes yet, I'd highly recommend exploring the world to unlock the spec classes for all 4 characters. You'll get stronger and gain levels in the process, and they're really fun.

[kab_reg]

It's possible to upgrade all equipment without buying any crafting materials apart from a single platinum ingot. Everything else can be found, not bought.

BTW, there is a small glitch related to that. When you get your first silver ingot, it cannot be sold because it does not appear in the list of sellable materials. However, once you get more silver ingots, they can be sold normally.