[Balance]Tier 3 weapon smithing not profitable

[Ygdrad]

I could make a pretty nice profit with the Weapon Smith II since it used cheap iron plates, but once I switched to a Weapon Smith III and its use of the more expensive steel bars, most weapons sold for less than their materials and even the most valuable ones, like a Mk III Katana made only a 775c profit IF you only look at average price of materials and this is for a 48h craft.

Tier 3 weapon smithing is entirely unprofitable at the moment.

[Charlie-VN]

You can make high tier weapon with that Weapon Smithing III, like Edge I~II for example, my craftman can smith Ringed Sabre Edge II, which can be sell for 4,281 cat, really worth it.

[Ygdrad]

You can make high tier weapon with that Weapon Smithing III, like Edge I~II for example, my craftman can smith Ringed Sabre Edge II, which can be sell for 4,281 cat, really worth it.

Weird, my stat screen says my blacksmith should be able to make edge 1 but he's still making Mk3, I thought the tier was limited by the smithy and that I needed a weaponsmith 4. Even the price you give me for the ringed saber seems unprofitable though. I don't know how much material the ringed saber takes, but surely more than a katana. The katana takes 7 steel bars and 7 fabric which amount to a value of 4977c if sold at average price, higher if you sell at a profitable town.

[swillo]

It also depends on the skill of your blacksmith. You have a higher percent chance to get a better weapon the higher your skill is.
And if you want to make it more profitable then you just need to control your resource chain. If you are buying the resources then it's going to be less profitable, but if you are mining, smelting and making the steel yourself, then it's all pure profit. Less work means smaller reward.

[Ygdrad]

It also depends on the skill of your blacksmith. You have a higher percent chance to get a better weapon the higher your skill is.
And if you want to make it more profitable then you just need to control your resource chain. If you are buying the resources then it's going to be less profitable, but if you are mining, smelting and making the steel yourself, then it's all pure profit. Less work means smaller reward.

But if I can just sell the materials for more than the weapon that is a profit loss for a lot of extra work. This is what I'm saying needs balancing. Everything else has its value go up when crafted into stuff except weapon smith 3 stuff(with one or two exception weapons which have the tiniest of profit margins).

[Ocram]

Could actually be a future "feature", I mean you start crafting no profit weapons just for the purpose of skilling, this for every weapon bench upgrade, but at some point you get profit in that weapon smith tier. Weapon melting furnace is winking at me.

[Sol Lignum]

I understand your concern, meanwhile, who said it should necessarily be entirely about profits?

When you need to equip a large squad with best gear possible, and your smiths are capable of making MkIII and higher, why not use this opportunity, and save some time and effort? I doubt it'd be faster and cheaper to look for 40-50 specific pieces of weaponry at the specific quality

[Ocram]

Honestly never sold a single crafted weapon, I just crafted and melted repeatly, but I guess makes sense as a way to get some money once the economy stabilizes.

[Revage]

I have my crafters make Edge 1 and 2 weapons and it turns out nicely for profit, something like 6,700 cats for an Edge 1 Guardless Katana, which I found to be the most resource-efficient product relative to resale value.

The problem you may run in to at that point is that many merchants don't seem to have 6,700 cats laying around these days, I'm noticing this as an increasing problem and have switched to things like Copper Alloy Plates and Armor Plates for simplicity sake, stacked in to Garru convoys. I reserve the sword production resale for when I buy high-value bionics.

[philthymcnasty]

The game needs crafting contracts. If you can demonstrate the ability to make a grade of weapon, then you should be approached with a an offer to provide a faction with x amount of a certain weapon type and grade. Or y amount of armor. This would not only be neat but a great way to unlock blue prints. So if you have high grade armor, and the holy nation sees this, they can approach you and ask you to make inquisitor equipment for them, in exchange for prestige and the ability to craft that armor.