Larian Studios Forums Divinity - Original Sin Divinity Original Sin - Help/Tips/Tricks Blacksmithing weapons, what the heck?

According to the wiki page (http://divinity.wikia.com/wiki/Divinity:_Original_Sin_Items), at 3 Blacksmithing, your sword has 3 base min damage and 3+2 base max damage, with a -10% "boost."

At 4 Blacksmithing, it's still 3 min and 3+2 max, but with a -15% "boost." At 5 Blacksmithing, it's the same but with a -20% boost.

So damage gets WORSE as you get higher Blacksmithing? Why?

Custom Made Sword really better, than Polished Sword. Superior Sword have lvl 5 Crafting Effect & can be more effective, than Custom Made Sword.

Thats the note at the bottom of the table. I don't know. Doesn't make sense. Perhaps the guide is wrong or is missing some other stat that makes the level 5 sword better. I highly doubt that a lvl 3 sword is better than a lvl 5. That wouldn't make sense from a design standpoint. Someone should test this out. I can't now as my moose edit is broken awaiting a fix. Also, if you do test be aware that character level influences stats on crafted weapons.

I just tested this multiple times, with many different permutations. It seems that for Daggers, it's absolutely better to craft them at B3 than B5. With Swords, it depends. These tests were all done at level 20.

For Swords:
Crafting at B3 gives a sword with 114-197 damage.
Whetstone at B3 increases to 126-218 damage.
Whetstone at B5 increases to 139-240 damage.

Crafting at B5 gives you one of two swords:
A: No mods, 139-240 damage. Using the Whetstone on this sword has no effect.
B: +1 Max AP, 101-175 damage.
For B, using the Whetstone at B3 increases the damage to 114-197 (same as crafted B3, but with +1 Max AP bonus). Using the Whetstone at B5 increases the damage to 126-218.

So it seems you need B5 in order to get the max damage (139-240) from a crafted sword. You also need B5 to get a 126-218 sword with +1 AP. However, you can get the same damage but without the +1 AP at only B3.

Also, crafting at B4 gives 108-186 damage, and whetstone makes it 120-208. So crafting and upgrading a sword at B4 is strictly worse than doing it at B3.

For Daggers:
Crafting at B3 gives you a dagger with 83-139 damage.
Whetstone increases it to 92-154, regardless of level (B3 or B5).

Crafting at B5 gives you a dagger with 79-131 damage plus some (mostly useless) bonus.
Whetstone increases it to 88-147, regardless of level.

So it seems like it's better to stay at B3 for daggers. Also, at B4, it's 79-131 damage base, 88-147 with whetstone. So crafting and upgrading a dagger at B4 is strictly worse than doing it at B3. Which is messed up.

[Edit: Typos, formatting]

First, thanks for bringing this up and more importantly test it (I hope multiple times at each level?)

Second, looking at the incredible small differences between B3 and B4, I will not care a bit.

Regards,
Thorsten

The differences may appear small per hit, but thinking just about daggers, the diff is 4-7 damage.

With Guerilla and Backstab, that difference becomes 16-28 per hit.

With 5 double-hits per round (which is easy with Glass cannon), that's 160-280 less damage per round, which is not trivial. [Edit] With +50% damage from weapon skills, that becomes 240-420 less damage per round, and even more with elemental or Tenebrium damage added.

Of course, it's much less for a sword-based character, but...Rogues beware.

[Edit] The main point, though, is why is B4 worse than B3? It doesn't make any sense to me.

Personally, i believe the simplest answer is a typo on the developer's side.

The -10, -15, -20 was probably supposed to be a positive value.

Most likely. But the way the fights are designed in DOS even as a RPG newbie I very much doubt I would notice the difference except playing with a 4 rogue party.

Regards,
Thorsten

It's more noticeable in extended fights using a 2-person group. Not a huge difference, but still, there's no good reason why crafting at higher levels should make you worse off! You'd expect it to be the opposite.

I've found the best value to crafting weapons is:

a) You're broke and near a forge but not a store (self-defense)

b) You're broke, near a forge and a store (quick source of store cash)

Both conditions are more apt to occur in the earlier parts of the game, imo.

Crafted weapons are among the highest-damage weapons in the game...legendaries and uniques have the potential to be better if they're at your level, but you're not going to get one of those every level on every character!

Thatｴs the point. Anybody telling different has simply no idea. Or an outlandish amount of luck/patience to always find fitting gear.

And I did not even mention the sword of planets ...

Regards,
Thorsten