Raising Blacksmith Skill

You will want to equip yourself and your friends as your skill rises. If you
keep your skill at 25 plus five times your level then you will always be able
to make items you can equip at their minimum level. Outside of the items you
make because you want to, or to fulfil the Blacksmith quests, there are a series
of minimum-material items you can make to advance your skill, mostly consisting
of stone, misc. items, and some low-material armour items.

Apprentice Blacksmithing Path:

This is done mostly with stone, saving your copper and bronze bars until later
except when you need to equip yourself or your friends or clients. Make Rough
Sharpening Stones (turns green at 15 and grey at 55) until you reach 25 and
learn Rough Grinding Stones. (Save and use those Sharpening Stones as a combat
buff.) Make Rough Grinding Stones (turns green at 45 and grey at 85) until
you reach skill 65, keeping them for use later in making other items. Make
Coarse Sharpening Stones (green when learned at 65, grey at 80) until you reach
75 and are a Journeyman. Copper items useful as skillups include Copper Bracers
(2 copper bars, green at 20), Copper Chain Pants (4 copper bars, green at 50)
and Copper Chain Belt (6 copper bars, green at 75).

Journeyman Blacksmithing Path:

At 75 you learn Coarse Grinding Stone, which are green when learned. Make
those until they turn grey at 100 and save them for making further items. Turn
any tin and copper into bronze bars but save them. Make Silver Rods until they
turn green at 105 (and sell them to Enchanters) then make Rough Bronze Leggings
(with your saved bronze bars) until they turn green at 145 or even to grey
at grey at 175. These take 6 Bronze Bars and sell to the vendors for 9.62 s
each, so if you can buy stacks of 20 Bronze Bars for 30 s or less, you can
actually make a profit while you skill up. Also at 125 you learn Heavy Grinding
Stone. Make these until they turn grey at 150 and keep them for making other
items. If you are able to learn the Deadly Bronze Poniard dropped plan at 125
then you can make and sell it at a profit until it turns green at 155 and grey
at 185. The Patterned Bronze Bracer (green at 150) is required for a Badlands
quest. At 145 you learn to make your first rare (blue) item, the Shining Silver
Breastplate (green at 175) which sells well.

Expert Blacksmithing Path:

Beginning at 150, make Rough Bronze Leggings until they turn grey at 175.
Iron Buckles are easy but turn grey at 155, while Golden Rods turn green at
155 and grey at 160. Golden skeleton keys are green when learned and grey at
170. You will want to equip yourself and friends with the Green Iron Set and
that will provide some skillups. If you are lucky enough to learn the Iron
Shield Spike plan at 150 then you can make and sell these at a good profit
until they turn green at 180 and grey at 210. Another profitable drop is the
Iron Counterweight, green at 190 and grey at 210. At 200 you learn Solid Grinding
Stone so make those until they turn grey at 210. To get from 210 to 225, make
Golden Scale Bracers to 215, then make Steel Plate Helms to 225. You will also
be equipping yourself with the Golden Scale armour set and the Moonsteel Broadsword
is required for a quest in Duskwallow Marsh. A number of expert weapons and
armours are saleable, including the rare Green Iron Hauberk at 180 (green at
205, grey at 230).

Artisan Blacksmithing Path:

At 225 make Steel Plate Helms until it turns green at 235. Then make Mithril
Spurs to 250 (turns green at 255). At 250 make Dense Sharpening Stones until
they turn grey at 260. The Heavy Mithril and Ornate Mithril armour items are
good for their level, so you can also skill up some on making the mithril items
for the Mithril Order quests. The Ornate Mithril Boots are popular with warriors
for their remove root effect and they (and the Ornate Mithril Helm) turn green
at 265. Go back to Mithril Spurs (which are readily saleable) until they turn
grey at 275 and then make Thorium Bracers to 280. Now make Thorium Helms to
300. An alternative is the Imperial Plate armour set, starting with the Imperial
Plate Belt and Shoulders at 265, Bracers at 270, and then Helm and Boots at
295. While these use more thorium than the Thorium armour items, they can be
sold for a profit even if you buy the materials.

Specialty Path:

As an Armorsmith or Weaponsmith you can skill up making the items for your
specialty Quest. Be sure to make them as soon as you learn them, and save the
items to turn in for the quest, so you get your skillups. An Armorsmith can
then skill up with Truesilver Gauntlets until they turn green at 245 (or grey
at 265) and Truesilver Breastplate until it turns green at 265 (or grey at
285). Those are both saleable items. A Weaponsmith can gain skillups with the
Shatterer, Phantom Blade, Blight and Truesilver Champion, as these are also
saleable.

Comments:

There is no one best path up because it depends on which dropped plans you
get a hold of, which specialty you take, and which items you can make for guild
mates or sell that give skillups, which will vary by guild and server. It also
depends on whether you learn every plan going up or only the bare minimum because
you are trying for a truly lowest cost or fastest power-levelling run up to
300. The path I outlined is a fairly optimal approach but it does include obtaining
some dropped plans at the right times.

The faster you try to skill up the more it will cost you because you are likely
going to have to vendor much of it. The market can only absorb so much of any
one item. Whenever possible, spread out the items you make over time or make
a variety so that you do not overload the market. If you want to minimize cost
by selling your items, look at the Auction House to see which desirable green
or blue items that give skillups are lacking or in short supply and go for
them, bypassing those that are in large supply already. Remember that an item
that costs 2 g to make is better than one that costs 1 g to make if you can
sell the first for a profit but the second sells for a loss.

An example of this is the Imperial Plate Armour set, all of which (except
bracer) can be sold for a profit while the cheaper Thorium or Radiant armour
items use less materials but do not sell.

Another way to help yourself is to have one of your characters be an Enchanter
and disenchant any green item that won’t sell, since you can usually then sell
the resulting reagents for more than the vendor would pay for the original
item. This can often make it better to make more costly green items rather
than the less costly white items, since you cannot disenchant the white items.

New Blacksmith Plans:

A new plan is dropped by Garr in Molten Core: Elemental Sharpening Stone.
The rare plan is Bind on Pickup, so this will be a truly rare plan. I note
that the plan does not specify sharp weapons, so I wonder if it applies to
all weapons or if there is also an Elemental Whetstone plan out there.

Elemental Sharpening Stone [300] Use: Increase critical chance on a melee
weapon by 2% for
30 minutes, Requires Level 50 (uncommon)(Rare dropped Bind on Pickup plan from
Garr in MC)
- 2 Elemental Earth, 3 Dense Stone (2.5 s)

Another new plan is:

Helm of the Great Chief [300 Armoursmith] 292 AC, +12 Stamina, +30 Spirit,
L 56, Mail (Rare)(Rare drop)
- 40 Thorium Bars, 4 Enchanted Thorium Bars, 60 Jet Black Feathers, 6 Large
Opals, 2 Huge Emeralds (242.85 s)

This has dropped from Lord Kazzak and from Risen Warrior.

Sulfuron Hammer:

You get the plan by turning in a Sulfuron Ingot to Lokhtos Darkbargainer in
the BRD bar. No reputation is required. Sulfuron Ingots are dropped by Golemagg
the Incinerator, Molten Core Boss, at a 16% rate ( once in 6 kills). When the
Sulfuron Ingot is in your inventory, you will be given a new dialogue option
with Lohktos Darkbargainer. Follow this dialogue through to obtain the Thorium
Brotherhood Contract. http://wow.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?witem=18628

Once you have the Contract, speak with him again to turn in the Contract and
the Sulfuron Ingot for the plans.

Sulfuron Hammer [300] 2H Hammer (143-239) Spd 3.00, Proc: Hurl fiery ball
for 83-101 fire + 16 damage over 8 sec., L 60, 63.7 dps, (Epic, Bind on Equip)(Unique
BoE plan sold by Lokhtos Darkbargainer in BRD bar for 1 Sulfuron Ingot via
the Thorium Brotherhood Contract)
- 8 Sulfuron Ingots, 20 Dark Iron Bars, 50 Arcanite bars, 25 Essence of Fire,
10 Blood of the Mountain, 10 Lava Core, 10 Fiery Core.
http://wow.allakhazam.com/item.html?witem=17193

That only requires Artisan Blacksmith, however the materials required are
extreme. However, there is a reason to make it. You gather the materials to
make the Sulfuron Hammer and then kill Ragnaros and get the Eye of Sulfuras
drop (6% drop chance)(http://wow.allakhazam.com/item.html?witem=17204)

You can then combine the Sulfuron Hammer and the Eye of Sulfuras to make this
Legendary 2H Hammer:

Sulfuras, Hand of Ragnaros 2H Mace (223-372) Spd 3.70, +12 Strength, +12 Stamina,
+30 Fire Resistance, Proc: Fireball for 273-333 Fire + 75 fire over 10 sec.,
Equip: Deals 5 Fire to an attacker who hits you with a melee attack., L 60,
80.4 DPS (Legendary, Bind on Pickup)
Mouseover: http://homepages.ihug.co.nz/~jacknife/sulfuras2cb.jpg
Screenshot: http://img202.echo.cx/img202/3407/sulfuras4wm.jpg

I gather that this is not a Blacksmith plan and that anyone can turn in a
Sulfuron Hammer and the Eye of Sulfuras to get Sulfuras. The Sulfuron Hammer
is not BoP so it can be made and then transferred