Mining and Smithing’s biggest problem isn’t XP rates or level requirements, although I personally think the level requirements should be changed. It’s that neither skill is particularly good at its own job. I’ve been thinking about making this post for a while, because I think there’s a fundamental problem with Mining and Smithing that gets overshadowed by discussions about needing 85 Mining for runite or 99 Smithing for a rune platebody. Those level requirements are obviously ridiculous relative to the equipment, but I think they’re problems that deserve to be solved but don’t inherently fix Mining and Smithing feeling awful . Mining is supposed to be the primary way we gather ores and smithing is supposed to turn those ores into useful equipment and resources, yet the game constantly incentivizes us to bypass both skills entirely. Think about it from an Ironman’s perspective, and stick with me, this applies to mains as well. Say you want to make cannonballs. Why would you spend hours mining iron and coal for steel bars when you could buy those ores from shops, get them passively from Miscellania, or accumulate supplies from PvM? Why mine gold when buying it at Blast Furnace is such an established way of training Smithing, and PvM already supplies so much of it? Even higher-tier ores, including runite, are available through alternative activities and noted PvM drops, sometimes in substantial quantities. Miscellania alone can provide up to 546 coal a day. Ordan sells the materials that Mining is supposed to provide. Bosses can drop hundreds of coal at once. Obviously these aren’t universally faster methods in every situation, and there are exceptions where Mining remains worthwhile, but that’s part of the problem: the dedicated gathering skill frequently isn’t the most attractive way to gather its own resources. And then Smithing compounds the issue. By the time you can actually smith most conventional equipment, you’ve long since acquired it from shops, monsters, or other activities. You can train Smithing through Blast Furnace or Giant’s Foundry using materials you didn’t mine and items you didn’t smith. The skills have become requirements to overcome rather than useful production skills that naturally support your account, and since the main way to source these materials to train both skills is either shops or PvM, you likely already sourced tons of money or materials or the final products themselves during other gameplay. There are exceptions, like some ammunition, certain equipment upgrades, and other specialized uses, for sure, but the progression of Smithing is just as stumped as mining, as you never get better at Smithing, you never refine bars better or get more ammunition per bar, etc. I don’t think the answer is necessarily to make Mining much faster XP, lower every requirement, or simply add another minigame with better rewards, either. I think the fundamental goal should be making Mining the most worthwhile way to obtain meaningful quantities of ores, and making Smithing a genuinely worthwhile way to process those resources into useful products. You shouldn’t think "I want iron ores to make cannonballs, I should go shop hop at the blast furnace or farm the drops from various PvM encounters, even the cannonballs themselves. And critically, how masterful you become at mining and smithing should improve as your levels increase. I had an idea, probably flawed, but bare with me, where leveling Mining progressively improves how many resources you can extract from existing rocks. For example, maybe you start collecting additional stackable ore fragments alongside ordinary ores. These fragments could be untradeable, have no direct alch value, and provide little or no additional Mining XP. You’d still need inventory space to mine the normal ores, so you still need to deal with the ores, either dropping or banking, but the fragments would gradually accumulate as a bonus. The higher your Mining level, the more efficiently you’d gather resources, including ores you’ve already unlocked. Instead of 90 Mining mostly meaning you’re better at gaining Mining XP, it could mean you’re substantially better at supplying your account with iron, coal, gold, mithril, and so on. This would also create reward space for new Mining equipment, unlocks, and interactions that enhance resource production rather than just XP rates. There’s an obvious complication: what happens when those untradeable fragments become tradeable bars or equipment? Does that introduce too many resources into the economy? Should they instead be spent on personal Smithing benefits, or should their eventual tradeable output just be balanced appropriately? I don’t have a perfect answer, and I wouldn’t want a dozen untradeable variants of every bar and item cluttering the game unless handled extremely well. But I think the underlying idea has merit. Higher Mining levels should provide increasingly meaningful material-production advantages, and higher Smithing levels should make you increasingly effective at using those materials. Imagine wanting 100,000 cannonballs and actually considering mining and smithing the required resources yourself because you’ve developed both skills enough that it’s a worthwhile option; not because you’re roleplaying, avoiding shops, or deliberately playing inefficiently, but because your skill levels make you genuinely effective at producing them. I’m not arguing PvM should stop dropping ores entirely, or that shops should disappear overnight. Those sources have their place, and any changes need to account for existing supply, alch values, and the economy, but maybe those alternatives should supplement dedicated gathering skills rather than so frequently completely replacing them. Mining should make you a better miner, smithing should make you a better smith, and investing in both should meaningfully improve your ability to supply your account with gear, ammo, and whatever else you can smith up! I think that’s the goal the rework should start with, rather than focusing exclusively on XP rates, training methods, or shifting rune armour down the level table. Not that these shouldn’t also be addressed, but in a world where the efficient option is to never interact with the skills, no amount of changes will alter the choice you make on how to acquire your raw materials or finished products. If you have any ideas on ways to solve this issue, since, like I said, mine certainly has flaws, please share them! I hope this at least gives some food for thought. Thanks for reading! TLDR: It’s never most efficient to mine manually to get materials, and usually not efficient to smith manually to get supplies. No matter what else is changed, if this isn’t fixed, mining and smithing will still be effectively dead content. I propose we scale how many ores you get per hour as you level in a new, unique way that opens reward space in the future, and scale smelting and smithing efficiency with level in a similar manner. Read the full post for the full rundown, and its potential flaws, and propose your own way to achieve this. submitted by /u/KingKj52
Originally posted by u/KingKj52 on r/2007scape