Artificers - Tips and Tricks

Original Source: Artificer Guide by Smithers & Sirpsycho

A largely unsorted (largely due to my largely disorganised (yet large) mind) list of the tips and tricks for the aspiring artificer-san:

Equipment stashing

An artificer creates more of a mess than even rangers. You WILL need some place to stash equipment when you log off, if you want to play again after you log back on. Here are a few hints: If you have separate guild storage, like the Eldar or Frosty guilds, put your items in containers, then store the containers. There is an issue in Eldar if you try to put things in storage WITHOUT containers, as the next item someone throws in there gets clumped with yours and you won't be able to get it back again. With frosties you can "freeze' containers full of things into a block of ice that only you can pick up. But it has to either be in an arctic room or the freezer in the igloo.

If you have a friend in scythe (or you managed to join scythe before they fixed the bug that allowed you to join as an artificer!), scythe storage is the best available storage in the game. Get them to give you a hundred or so invitations. Invitations last all boot now, not just login, and they give you access to the completely impenetrable scythe rooms. If you plan on using constructs, which can't be neatly stowed away in containers, this is the best form of storage.

There are hundreds of little rooms and nooks and crannies lying around where you could store your knick-knacks, but there is no security. Another option is a drakhiya inn room (nw sw se sw from 'ficer board), but rogues can break into these (and when people used these frequently, rogues often stole everything a 'ficer had been working for - very painful!). The best places for storing your constructs is within your guild, since it is likely that your guildmates won't destroy your constructs - just don't leave them in rooms that people idle in, as they make a lot of noise!

Another good option is to make friends with someone that has a house. Lots of people around have more rooms than they need and are generally willing to lend you a room. However, probably best to store more important items on your constructs within those rooms as you never know who else might have access to that house.

Wand

Get a smither to forge a wand for a spellcrafter. That way the spellfag doesn't have to spend 2 conc more on a wand.

Wield hammer in left hand

When forging/scrapping etc, you can wield a hammer in your left hand and get the job done just as well. Saves having to unwield.

Wielding other things in off hand

Same as above, but with wands. You can enchant items when they're in your left hand fine, and wave them when they're in your left hand. Saves unwielding. So instead of unwield, wield wand, wave wand, unwield, wield weapon, you just need wield wand in left hand, wave wand, unwield wand. (ow, reading that!)

Alloys to use

Steel. Steel is the standard to use, very easy obtain, and best bet for its effort. Coal from swamps, iron from hills, tundra or scrapped from rusty chainmails/battered swords.

Next up the tier would be mithril. Mithril is decently easy to obtain, and for two levels of quality higher than steel.

Trillian. Trillian is the high end, hard to obtain due to meteorite. But its the best. Possibly best weapons in game, even better than uniques in some situations.

Scrapping

A number of unique (and non-unique!) armours scrap for good quality materials! Costs 10 sps to do.

Also note that if you mess up a forging and end up with what is essentially metal goo, you can scrap it to salvage some raw materials from the mess. If you're not happy with the weapon you make, you can scrap that too, though for less material. 1 less material for good or lower, and two less for fine and very fine.

Item	Materials	Area
Armour of Ichor	9 Mithril	Elven Crypts
Black Mithril Platemail	5 Mithril	Windmill
Great Mithril Axe	6? Mithril	Zombie Miners
a mithril dress	3 Mithril	Anakim
a mithril shirt	3 Mithril	Anakim
a mace of heavy metals	1 Mithril+Adamantite	Anakim
an ancient pike	? Mithril	Anakim
flail of demolition	? Mithril	Anakim
flail of ancient demolition	? Mithril	Anakim
Krakadoom, the warhammer	4 Adamantite	Steading
Draqisfang	1 Trillian	Drakhiya
Rakar, mattock of the giants	1 Trillian	Rune
Onix, Horn of Power	no materials	Harkke
damascene platemail cuisses	2 Steel	Treasure Maps?
Star Armour	1 Trillian, 1 Steel, 1 Adamantite	Star Caverns

Steel for lazy ficers

For less than 1k, you can 'buy mail' from the drakhiya armourer and scrap that for 1 steel, as many times as you need. This seems a fair trade to me, especially considering how well 'ficers make money! Theres these "heavy maces" from a couple npcs in dalair that scrap for 2 steel each, and are about 450 coins in shops. An even better option is steel thunt containers. Scrap for about 3 steel each, 50-150 coins in the generic shops.

Forge items for people

You can forge items FOR people - and it puts the item roughly close to their skill level (instead of, one assumes, your skill level). This is very useful - you can forge items for people with more skill than you. OR, forged items for newbies, which like take no skill to use, do greater than average damage and have amazing parry. You can really make some unique items like this.

Forge items for NPCs/undead

You can forge for NPCs/undead too. Good for getting the right size hammer for your constructs.

Clubs and maces for constructs

Talking of constructs and weapons, stick with big clubs and maces for your centaurs. They don't have skill in much of anything besides club. So, clubs. Preferably big spellforged warhammers.

Best Construct for You

The three "best" constructs are the centaur, the wyvern and the scorpion, all for their own reasons. The scorpion is the tank, has the best health and AC of any construct, but still has decent damage. The wyvern is middle ground, it has very good+consistant damage and still very good health, also note they get the most specials of any construct. The centaur is the ultimate basher, highest damage potential with a good weapon, but quite a bit flimsier than the wyvern and the scorpion.

Of these three you should play around until you find the one that suits your play style best.

Learn grasslands locations

Learn grasslands locations - they're always the hardest things to get, especially meteorite. Infidian is a very good place for this, as it has much more grassland than Anguish.

3 runes in a room

You can put up to three runes in a room. So, you can put in three glyphs to do three times the (sucky) damage of a normal glyph. Leave rune, enter rune 2, activate rune, leave rune, enter rune 3, activate rune. Woo!

Sell formulae

Make money selling formulae to people who don't have time to collect their own. Also make use of caeculus as much as possible, especially at low levels. Everything you research can be converted into money, and an easier time for other artificers.

Specific formuale, just 'study x'

If you're looking for one specific formulae, don't bother researching. Just go to the library and 'study blah'. It doesn't cost sp if it's not there, so you can zoom around many libraries quickly until you learn it.

Specific ingredient, just 'collect x'

Similar to above, if you need a specific ingredient, type 'collect blah' in rooms. If it's not there, it doesn't cost you sp. Only saves 2 sp for assaying, but every little helps.

Use int uniques for temporary conc boost

You only need concentration to make items. Once items are made, you could lower your concentration and still keep the items. So if you need things at a pinch, always remember you can borrow int uniques for five minutes and then return them later.

Raising abilities

• Craftsman - Forge, scrap, forge, scrap. Smelt smelt smelt. Repeat... Or sell and dance in the $$$
• Alchemy - If you REALLY need it fast, brew black ink. If not, just dissect.
• Rune lore - Damage scrolls. Maybe with the cost of paper, try enscribing runes instead. Blade ward easy, white chalk, from plain ficer library.
• Staves and wands - Recharge if you can. If you can't, make rings of climbing or something.
• Spellsmithing - No fast ways I'm afraid. Just stick to small, easy to do enchantments on small, easy to get objects. You can get it to 100 in a week if you concentrate hard on it. I've heard helm of brilliance seems to be a good form. Look for it.
• Artifice - Mass fabrication is fast. Repair is more fun.

Ability boosts will SLOW DOWN raising

Ability plusses will SLOW DOWN your ability raising, not speed it up. It'll think you're making the item at a higher ability, and so you won't get as many gains. Note that this isn't true for skill plusses.

Ability boosts

I was reluctant to put this in here, but it seems everyone knows about it: In the area in which Flaw resides (see library dirs!) there are a few books on her shelf that artificers would be interested in. If you are carrying them you receive a temporary +5 bonus to certain abilities as follows:

• De re metallica: Artifice
• Art of chrysopoeia: Artifice
• Book of scrolls: Rune lore
• Book of amulets(?): Staves & Wands
• Huge hammer, small hammer from iceforge. Huge hammer = +15. Small hammer = +3. Dual wielding works, stacks with other bonuses.

Just be sure to drop the books when you are done with them, or else no other ficer can use them! They will return automagically to their bookshelf.

Ability cap

You can reach your ability caps at level 24. You can reach 100 in your specialist areas, and 95 in others. When levelling, your ability caps for your specialty are 10 higher than your non specialties, to give you an impression of how far you can go without giving you the exact formula.

Selling and getting your conc back

If you are spellcraft specialist and you want to sell weapons and armour you make for moola, make silver items. You can sell these to the silversmith in neville and you will get your concentration back. He also offers a better price for silver items than the main shops! The Mystic Fair in infidian is another good place to sell things to get your concentration back, though their prices are quite bad. Finally, the mining shop(Uena) within iceforge clan will buy your wares and give you concentration back. Others may become available as new areas open!

Hammer spellforges for Warhammers

Want to spellforge your warhammer with something cool, but only have hammer formulae? You can spellforge your warhammers with hammer spellforges! These are actually better than your warhammer spellforges, as the skillfulness/excellence/mastery ones also increase your craftsman ability!