All Valheim players will need to craft a Forge relatively early in the game. The Forge is used to create armor and weapons in-game. The stone weapons and tools are really only viable in the first hour or so of gameplay. Survivors will have to craft the Forge to stay alive in the higher-level biomes.
Bosses and enemies with high health will not be defeated by characters with no armor and a wooden club. Gamers must use metal weapons and tools to progress in Valheim. This guide will explain how to find the necessary items to craft the Forge, and how to upgrade it.
Crafting The Forge
To build a forge, players will need to have 4 stone, 4 coal, 10 wood, and 6 copper. The Forge becomes available after defeating the first boss in the game. Stone is a plentiful resource in the biomes. There will usually be dozens of them just sitting on the ground. Coastal and rocky areas are generally good places to look. Greydwarf enemies in the Black Forest biome commonly drop stone as well. However, players will find a few stones while mining for tin and copper, the metals which are used to create bronze.
Copper ore can be found throughout the Black Forest biome as well. The copper deposits can be identified by a small shiny bronze vein in each node. Gamers will need a pickaxe to mine the ore, which is not guaranteed to contain copper. As survivors upgrade their pickaxe, they will have a higher chance of receiving ore from each vein. Players will have to build a smelter first to refine the copper ore into copper. Wood is the easiest resource to find, and there is wood in almost every biome. A simple stone axe will suffice to break down trees. Coal is a dropped from the Surtlings, who occupy the Swamp and Ashland biomes. The small fiery creatures are easy to spot at nighttime. Random chests will sometimes contain coal as well.
Upgrading The Forge
Forges in Valheim can be upgraded to a max level of 7. The higher the forge level is, the better the items it creates will be. Weapons will do more damage and be more durable if the Forge is max level, for example. The difference between a level 1 Forge and a level five Forge is drastic. For weapons, the damage discrepancy can be 18 points or more. Likewise, level four armor provides 6 additional armor points.
The Forge is also necessary to repair armor and weapons. If the Forge is not a high enough level, survivors will not be able to repair certain items. Gamers will be able to make most of the upgrades after defeating the Elder, the second boss in the game. At that point, players will be able to farm all of the materials they need for the various upgrades.
Forge Bellows
The first upgrade players can make is the Forge Bellows. Gamers will need to collect 5 wood, 5 deer hide, and 4 chain. The only items survivors may have trouble finding is chain. The material is dropped from Wraith which frequent the Swamp biomes. Additionally, there are mudpiles in the Swamp crypts which have a chance to contain chain.
Anvils
Players will only need 5 wood and 5 bronze to craft the Anvils. As stated above, copper and tin create bronze alloy. Both copper and tin ore can be mined in the Black Forest biome.
Grinding Wheel
The next upgrade has two ingredients, 25 wood, and a sharpening stone. Survivors will need a Stonecutter to craft the sharpening stone. Players will need two iron to craft it, which can be found in the Swamp crypts after defeating the Elder. Like the chains, gamers can find the metal scraps in the crypt mudpiles.
Smith's Anvil
Fourth on the list of upgrades is the Smith's Anvil improvement. Apart from 5 wood, gamers will need to search the crypts again for 20 metal scraps and smelt more iron. It would be prudent to have the Megingjord Belt for extra inventory capacity before loading up on scraps.
Forge Cooler
The Forge Cooler is another easy upgrade. Players can farm the 10 copper ore in the Black Forest and chop down trees for fine wood in either the Meadows or the dangerous Plains.
Forge Toolrack
The final upgrade gamers can make to the Forge is adding a Toolrack. It is unclear how it would improve the quality of the Forge conceptually, but it will be an easy upgrade nonetheless. Gamers will need just 10 wood and 15 iron for the upgrade. It seems that organization really does improve quality. With this final upgrade, survivors will produce the highest grade armor and weapons when using the Forge.