market for blacksmiths?

[ship2]

I've had a GM blacksmith on catskills and siege for years. Is there a good market for blacksmithed weapons and armor here, or is magic stuff more powerful and largely preferred?

I'm discovering that making a GM blacksmith is going to take quite the investment of time and effort... making stuff nobody wants won't be much fun as a reward.

Would a smith doing repairs for tips at a public forge get some business?

[Dagon]

of course magics are more powerful and preferred, 90% of the server are tank mage pks

there's also far too many smiths as it is to have another congesting the server. that's my opinion but it's true. there's a smith vendor every 5 tiles. but do what you want, it's UO afterall.

[BobDobbs]

Yes, you can make money as a GM blacksmith here.

Will you make as much gold as you would simply mining ingots and selling them? No, but if you're playing a blacksmith because you enjoyed playing a blacksmith on OSI you won't be disappointed. I mainly played a blacksmith on GL, and that's what I mainly play here. I enjoy it and I make gold doing it.

[ship2]

Yes I mostly enjoy the smithing role, so as long as I can sell something I'll probably consider it worth the effort.

I know this server strives to stay true to a particular release of UO. With that rule set in mind (or as an ultimate goal) does that mean that an exceptional quality item will always have identical stats (AR, durability, damage, etc..) between two GM blacksmiths?

[Pirul]

Yes. All exceptional items are created equal...even if it's not from a GM smith.

Being a BS is not as profitable as it was in OSI. I remember standing in the smithshop in Brit and having a constant flow of people coming and going wanting repairs. Man, you'd make 15-20k in no time just standing there talking to people. Now, hardly anyone looks for repairs. Magic weps and armor are so widely available that they are almost disposable.

I also have a BS vendor here, and sales are very variable, there are days when they'll clean your vendor out twice the same day, and then no one will buy anything for a week. Also, offer variety. Variety of colors in armor. Variety of types of weps. Sell some poisoned weps, if you have a poisoner. That will keep people coming back, and will most likely improve your sales.

[ship2]

bleh... that doesn't sound fun at all.

[nightshark]

you won't make any money standing at a forge doing sales/repairs for people.. if i see people standing at public forges i just think they're a confused new player waiting to be stolen from

[Theograd]

you won't make any money standing at a forge doing sales/repairs for people.. if i see people standing at public forges i just think they're a confused new player waiting to be stolen from

I've got to disagree with this, I've made quite a bit from tips on doing free repairs, and had some good conversations. Granted, you might need to build your reputation up first, since people are handing over higher end items sometimes.