Jump to content

[RELz] Ars Metallica - Smithing Enhancement [Legendary Edition]


Arthmoor

Recommended Posts

ars-metallica-logo.jpg

The crafting system is one of Skyrim's better features, but for thieves and archers, there's not much use for the system. Light armor is dead easy to come by in already finished forms, but arrows can sometimes be scarce in the types you may want. Lockpicks have been known to be somewhat scarce too, yet are relatively basic to construct.

Ars Metallica aims to fill in some of the basic issues I had with the crafting system by doing the following:

For vanilla Skyrim:

  • Allow archers to forge their own arrows out of the various ore materials, wood, leather strips, and feathers. Indirectly making it somewhat useful to chop wood too.
  • Allow thieves to make their own lockpicks out of iron or steel.
  • Provide skill advancement for the use of the smelter to melt down ore. After all, that's as important as knowing how to shape it once refined.
  • Provide skill advancement for the use of the tanning rack to make leather. That's far more important in my mind than the skill advances from using the leather to make stuff.
  • Provide for a small amount of skill advancement from mining the ore itself out of ore veins.
  • Provide the ability to melt down existing pieces of armor and some clutter items into ingots so that you can then use those ingots to make missing pieces of a set if you want.
  • Allow members of factions to forge equipment appropriate to their guild. Thieves can make guild armor. Assassins can make Brotherhood armor. Legionnaires can make Imperial armor, and so on.

For Dawnguard:

  • Modifies the dragonbone arrow recipes and the crossbow bolt recipes to conform to the same formulas as vanilla. Disabled Dawnguard's native recipes.

For Hearthfire:

  • Provides smithing experience for using the various workbenches used to construct your homes. The drafting table does not count since nothing is actually built using it.

For Dragonborn:

  • Modifies the stalhrim and nordic arrow recipes to conform to the same formulas as the vanilla arrows.
  • Adds smelting formulas to recover ore from stalhrim and nordic carved equipment.
  • Adds crafting feathers to the Felsaad Tern.

Note that all smelting of metals requires that you know the perk associated with that metal. For example, if you wish to smelt Dwemer scrap, you need to know the Dwemer Smithing perk first. This applies not just to smelting existing goods but also to smelting raw ore. This isn't a bug, it's a feature.

Downloads

AFK Mods
TES Alliance
 
Installation Requirements

Official Skyrim patch 1.9.32.0.8 or greater.
Requires official Dawnguard DLC.
Requires official Hearthfire DLC.
Requires official Dragonborn DLC.

Installation - Wrye Bash BAIN

Drop the archive into your Skyrim Mods/Bash Installers folder, then install as usual.

If you're using Dawnguard, make sure the second ESP is also checkmarked in the ESP/ESM filter box.

Make sure the mod is active in the Wrye Bash mods tab.

Installation - Nexus Mod Manager

Use the "Download with Manager" button on the Ars Metallica page at Skyrim Nexus. The installer should take care of things from there.
Then simply make sure NMM has the mod activated.

Installation - Manual

Drop the Ars Metallica - Legendary Edition.esp and Ars Metallica - Legendary Edition.bsa files into your Data folder.
Activate the mod using whatever management tool suits you.

Uninstall

Due to the nature of Skyrim mods, especially those adding scripts, it is strongly discouraged to attempt uninstalling a mod from your active game. Any mod that is more than pure mesh or texture replacements has the possibility to leave behind permanent changes to your save that you may not want. This is not something modders can correct for. It is how the game was designed by Bethesda. No support will be provided for anyone who uninstalls this mod from an active game and continues on with that save.

To remove the mod: Delete the .esp and .bsa from your Data folder. Then reload your game as usual.

Known Issues

Silver swords and greatswords can be forged but they show up under the JEWELRY category in the UI. With Dawnguard, for unknown reasons, this has shifted to the MISC category.

Arrows show up under the MISC category in the UI for the same reason as the silver swords, unless you have Dawnguard installed. Then they will show up under the proper metal categories.

Both of these issues should be largely eliminated if you have the Unofficial Skyrim Patches installed.

Compatibility

Any mod that alters the vanilla mining script, MineOreScript.psc, will be incompatible.

Any mod which alters the base smelter object or the base tanning rack object is incompatible. (Mesh & Texture mods are OK though)

Any mod which alters the recipes for the vanilla ingot formulas will be incompatible.

Any mod adding items to chickens, pheasants, dead hawks, or the DeathItemHagraven leveled list will be incompatible without Wrye Bash.

Any Dawnguard mods that modify the arrow recipes, steel bolt recipe, or dwarven bolt recipe will be incompatible. The magic crossbow bolt recipes have not been altered.

Any Hearthfire mods that modify the carpenter's workbench or the other smaller workbenches in each of the houses will be incompatible.

Any Dragonborn mods that modify the two arrow recipes will be incompatible.

Disclaimer

This mod is not made, guaranteed, or supported by Microsoft, Zenimax, Bethesda Game Studios, or any of their affiliates.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'm having a really strange experience with the smithing now. When I start with Vanilla on a new start I get all the options for smelting. When I add this in, the only options for smelting are gold, iron and silver, even if I have other ores in my inventory.I haven't checked to see what happens with tanning now as far as experience goes.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

That's normal. You need to have the smithing skills for each type of ore before you can smelt it. I guess that should have been mentioned in the docs :P

Link to comment
Share on other sites

That's normal. You need to have the smithing skills for each type of ore before you can smelt it. I guess that should have been mentioned in the docs :P
Whew! Thanks for that reassurance.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

And for unknown reasons, tanning is no longer giving experience again. The experience bar showed up for awhile and now it does not again.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Odd. I wonder if it's because you can reach a certain point where no skill would be gained so the game just doesn't show you the bar?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Odd. I wonder if it's because you can reach a certain point where no skill would be gained so the game just doesn't show you the bar?
Smithing with this character just reached 20, so that is unlikely but possible.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 weeks later...

Version 1.0.1

* Added ingredient and animal part keywords to the chicken and pheasant feathers to hopefully make them easier to acquire.
* Added recipe for making Companion Wolf Armor. Requires the Advanced Armors perk.
* Added recipe for making Thieves Guildmaster Armor. Requires improved versions of the regular Thieves Guild Armor and the Advanced Armors perk.
* Added keywords to the two new feather types to get them to show up in more shops as items for sale.
* Added a recipe to make torches out of firewood and linen wraps.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Version 1.0.1

* Added ingredient and animal part keywords to the chicken and pheasant feathers to hopefully make them easier to acquire.

* Added recipe for making Companion Wolf Armor. Requires the Advanced Armors perk.

* Added recipe for making Thieves Guildmaster Armor. Requires improved versions of the regular Thieves Guild Armor and the Advanced Armors perk.

* Added keywords to the two new feather types to get them to show up in more shops as items for sale.

* Added a recipe to make torches out of firewood and linen wraps.

Thanks.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 4 weeks later...

Version 1.0.2

* Updated the Ore mining script to the current game version. Skyrim 1.6.89 is now required to run this mod.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 weeks later...

I've finally returned to playing Skyrim and have loaded this up for the first time. Would it be possible to add some configuration options? I can wait until SKSE allows custom ini files for mods. :smile: Basically I'd like to turn down some of the skill increases and would rather not have the material reclamation (so you can't melt down iron arrows to get ingots, for example).

Link to comment
Share on other sites

So in other words.... eviscerate half the mod? :blink: The skill increases are beyond the mod's control btw. Those are all hardcoded.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well I like getting points for creating leather and all that stuff. I just found that I was gaining an awful lot from just creating a few leather pieces and ingots. I've bumped my smithing up by two levels already (like it went from 28 to 30, or something like that) and I haven't even crafted anything yet. And in terms of melting stuff down, it was more a case that it's very confusing and I'm afraid of melting something down by mistake. I almost melted my armour and arrows! lmao.gif I think Elys can control the rate of skill increases - I guess that's because it's a SKSE plugin? I just wonder if things need balancing out a little since you earn points for so many things now.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well unfortunately one cannot block equipped items from showing up in the menu so you just need to be careful about it.

 

I don't actually see anything wrong with advancing levels just from smelting and making ingots. The progression you're getting from that right now won't maintain itself at the same pace once you've reached 60 or so. You'll be begging for legit ways to make it advance by then.

 

Yes, Elys can control that stuff because it's an SKSE plugin so I'd recommend just using that if the rates are too fast for you right now. You'll probably need to adjust it later though because it'll probably choke itself off at some point.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 weeks later...

By the way, while I'm here, I just have to say I love this mod.My new orc is up to level 7 just on mining and smithing alone. :D I don't consider it a cheat, it's an enhancement. Features that should have been in the vanilla game.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Out of curiosity, does anyone know the respawn time for ore veins? My poor Orc is trying to make a living out of mining and nothing's respawned yet. The veins look recoloured and ready but not getting a prompt.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Ore veins failing to respawn is a known bug that doesn't have a solution yet. It may require intervention from Bethesda to fix.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

Version 1.1

* A new feather object has been created called "Crafting Feathers" and will replace the pheasant and chicken feathers. This will be added as drops on hagravens and hawks as well.
+ Any pheasant feathers you are carrying will be automatically converted into the new type when the game loads. Pheasant feathers stored in containers or on the ground will be converted when you pick them up. Chicken feathers were directly edited to become crafting feathers so they are already taken care of.

* Added a patch file to provide proper support with Dawnguard installed.
+ This add-on file disables Dawnguard's own arrow recipes in favor of the ones requiring feathers and leather strips.
+ Crossbow bolts will now require feathers and leather strips, but the yield has been raised to 15 instead of 10.
+ Crossbows can be melted down in the smelter.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 4 weeks later...

EDIT: Seems that Crafting feathers do not show up with the vendors anymore with the latest version. After checking through the mod's details, I see that there is no connection between it and the vendors. Was it intentional that you stopped the vendors from selling the feathers? If so, would you consider adding that back in? On their own, crafting feathers are somewhat difficult to obtain, as lots of the pheasants you find are owned, killing chickens makes you wanted for murder (without USKP, of course), and hawks and hagravens are few and far between (and hard to kill).Personally, I don't care if you say no, since I'm DIYing it back in for my own tastes, just curious as to what your plans are with selling those feathers.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

That wasn't intentional. I thought it had all the right keywords for that but apparently not?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well, how were you getting the vendors to sell the items before? I see no edits to either base containers or vendor Leveled Lists to give them the feathers. Nor are there any scripts I can see to provide them.My fix was simply to create a new list containing the feathers and adding that list onto the LItemLeatherAndStrips list and the LItemBlacksmithMinimum list. Compatibility problems caused by this can be solved with Wrye Bash.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

All I did was set the vendor keywords on the old chicken feathers and pheasant feathers. That's not enough to get things into the right hands? It sure seemed to work before. The crafting feathers have got the same set of keywords on them. I never added them to any leveled lists.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Nope, just setting the Keywords doesn't automatically hand the items over to the vendors, and I am unsure as to why it even worked in the first place since both types of feathers are non-vanilla objects that never got added to any of the vendor lists. All the Keywords do is make sure the vendors buy and sell the correct items.Trivial to fix, though. Blacksmiths and General stores strike me as the places that would stock them, so plugging them into those two lists will do the trick. I used a list that doles them out five at a time, so the vendors should always have enough for at least one set of arrows to be made.EDIT: You'll also need to add them onto the LItemMiscVendorAnimalPart75 list for general merchants to sell them.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...