The smelter and forge are two crafting stations that are absolutely vital to advancing in Valheim. We are going to focus on how to craft a smelter, a forge and how to use both of them. This article will go in depth and try to help players that are having trouble figuring out the process of building and crafting these two items and where they can be placed.
How to Craft the Smelter in Valheim
To craft your own smelter equip the hammer item. With the hammer equipped right-click to open up the building menu and from the available sections select the section that says crafting. Find the smelter in this list of items (shown in the image below) and select it. You will need to have 5 Surtling Cores, 20 Stone and be within the building radius of a Workbench in order to build the smelter. If you have fulfilled all of these requirements simply place the smelter down either on a relatively flat area of ground or one a stone floor.
Please note that smelters cannot be build on wooden floors in the current version of the game. The crafting recipe for the smelter will not be unlocked until the player has found and picked up at least 1 unit of stone and 1 Surtling Core.
For information on how to find Surtling Cores, click here. To learn how and when you can build with stone, click here.
How to Build a Forge in Valheim
Building a forge in Valheim is similar to building a Smelter. You will need to build a smelter first before you can build a forge as a forge required 6 bars of processed copper to build. To build the forge, you will have to equip the hammer item and right-click to open up the building menu. Then, go to the section marked ‘Crafting’. Then you can find the forge in the crafting menu. Check the image below to see what the forge will look like in the hammer’s crafting menu. Unlike the smelter, the forge can be placed on wooden flooring as well as outside on the ground as well as it is relatively flat.
Materials Requires to Build Forge
To build the forge you will need to acquire 6 units of copper, 10 units of wood, 4 coal and 4 stone. You will also need to be within the building radius of a workbench. You can place the forge in many places although to actually use the forge for crafting it will need to have a roof over it and be relatively protected from the elements. This functions much like the Workbench.
How to Use the Smelter
One the smelter is placed down you will be able to start using it. Be aware that if you plan to use a smelter inside you will have to have some way of dealing with the smoke, like creating a chimney on your roof. Much like the fireplace, the smelter will smoke up a room and damage players that are engulfed in the smog. There are three different parts to the smelter that have their own function. Check the image below and read on for more detail on these parts.
Ore Insert
This is located on the left side of the smelter (when looking from the front) and this is the area where you will place you unprocessed metal ores. To place ores in this part of the smelter, simply have them in your inventory and walk up to the hole in this side of the smelter. You can press E to put your ore into the smelter. If you have multiple different types of ores in your inventory and want to smelt a specific ore you can drag that stack of ore to one of the numbered slots of your inventory. Now approach the ore insert and press the corresponding number where you have the ore. This will place the ore inside the smelter ready to be processed.
There are 4 different types of materials and metals that can be smelted and processed in the smelter:
- Copper Ore
- Tin Ore
- Scrap Iron
- Silver Ore
Adding Coal to the Smelter
On the right hand side of the smelter (when looking from the front) you will find the area where coal can be inserted into the smelter. in order to process any metal or ore you will need to have coal burning inside the smelter. If you do not have ore in the smelter you won’t be burning any coal. Coal will only be used in the smelter when there is something to smelt.
Simply have coal in your inventory and interact with this hole in the side of the smelter in order to place coal inside of it. You do not need to have the coal in a numbered slot in your inventory. You can only put coal into this area, no type of wood can be put here.
Check out this guide if you are having trouble getting coal.
Output Area
At the front of the smelter is the part where the metal comes out. After a certain amount of time, if you have both an ore type and coal in the smelter a processed bar of metal will come out the front. Many users are placing their smelters in different areas of the base and creating funnels which use the gravity of the game to transfer the metal to a place where it can be collected in bulk.
Once the metal comes our of this area the player is able to pick it up and place it into their inventory. The metal will be processed in the order that it was put into the smelter. For example, if you put 3 scrap iron into the smelter and then 7 copper, the 3 iron will be processed first.
How to Use the Forge in Valheim
Once you have built the forge in a place where it can be used you will be able to interact with the forge and use it. The forge covers pretty much every part of the players journey in Valheim and will be used for the entire game. You can use the forge to craft weapons, armors and items, to repair items that you created at the forge and build certain objects.
Crafting Items at the Forge
Now that you’ve processed metal in the smelter you are going to have to use it somehow! Metal items are created at the forge. To open up the crafting menu for the forge press the interaction key when close enough to it. Once you open up the forge crafting menu you will see it bears many similarities to the Workbench crafting menu. Check the image below for an overview of the different areas of the forge crafting menu.
To craft items at the forge simply select the item you would like to craft from the list on the left of the forge UI. You can see the required materials to craft the items at the bottom of the forge menu. To craft the item and use the materials, select the button at the bottom of the menu which reads ‘Craft’.
Upgrading Armor and Weapons at the Forge
You can use this forge menu to upgrade your weapons and armor. To upgrade an items that you have crafted make sure you first have that specific item in your inventory. Then, head over to the tab in the forge menu which reads Upgrade. Find the item you wish to upgrade in the list of available items. It takes different materials to upgrade an item in Valheim. What material you need with depend on the item. From this menu you can see what resources you will need to collect in order to upgrade the item.
When you check the item you will also see a number in a star value. This number means that you will have to have your forge at that upgrade level in order to craft or upgrade the item. See below to find out about upgrading the forge.
Upgrading the Forge
There are different levels of upgrades that you can do for the forge in order to craft higher level gear and upgrade your gear to higher levels. Upgrading the forge will allow you to craft and upgrade the items that have that specific level as seen by the star level in their crafting menu next to the requirements. To upgrade the forge, you will need to use the hammer to build different upgrade items.
If you open up the hammer’s building menu, under the crafting tab, menu items that have a star next to their icon. These buildings are used to raise the crafting level of nearby workbenches or forges. Check the image below to see an example of one of the upgrades that is available for the forge, the Anvils. You can see from the description below, above the item requirements that it is an improvement specifically for the forge. Multiple items of the same type will not upgrade the forge. For example 2 Anvils will only raise the forge by one level.
Repairing Armor at the Forge
You can repair items and weapons at the forge by pressing the repair button found at the top left of the forge menu. The button has a hammer icon over it. Pressing this button will repair your weapons, tools and armors which were crafted at the forge. It does not cost anything to repair items at the forge. You can repair items as much as you want without any kind of restriction. You will have to have a forge at the level of the item in order to repair it. For example if you have a level 3 piece of armor created at a fully upgraded forge you will need at least a level 3 forge in order to repair it. you can see this level by hovering the item and check it’s information.
That covers how to build the smelter and forge, how to use both of these things and the many applications of both of them. Now get out there and get crafting Vikings!
Related: How to Tame Boars in Valheim | How to Craft and Equip Weapons and Armors
