How to Get Materials in Sword & Shield Simulator

You cannot forge a legend out of empty air. Sword & Shield Simulator makes gathering a second job: pickaxe on ore, axe on marked trees, cart on the battlefield, trader as a last resort. The best bars are usually the ones you hauled yourself. This page is the field companion to How to Forge and the materials list. For what to load when the cart is already groaning, use the cart priority tool.

Mining and fuel

A forge needs metal and fire. Devlogs name coal as furnace fuel and iron ore as the basic weapon and tool metal. Cupronickel is called a rarer metal for alloys with different hardness and flexibility. Traders sometimes sell these, but mining is described as cheaper. Take a pickaxe, look for deposits outside the city, and do not treat every sparkle as cupronickel.

If a vein is guarded by terrain or a quest flag, do not nerd-pole the camera through it. Early Access collision is not a puzzle. Come back after the related story beat, or walk the Danburg and Bloodlands pages for context instead of forcing a clip.

Wood, hides, and the hunting trap

Shields, tools, and some fittings want wood. Travel to nearby forest, equip an axe, and harvest designated trees. Clear-cutting everything in sight is a good way to lose time and clip into trunks. Chop what the contract needs, haul it, leave.

Hunting is in the feature list. A long Steam review described male deer that could not be sold or stored, then duplicated into a blocking pile at the forge. The Day One Patch added a deer-meat preview and fixed the axe resetting on wolves. It did not claim the duplicate-deer pile is gone. Hunt only if a quest demands it, and do not treat carcasses as a reliable market. Full loop: hunting. Female deer being storable while males are not is player-reported, not a design document. Do not build a production chain on it.

Battlefield salvage

This is the fantasy shot: quiet field, scattered swords, armour, helmets, a choice to help or to rob. Load the cart. Remember the cart cannot carry everything. Salvage is not a completionist checklist. It is a smelter feed.

The smelter is supposed to return metal based on true weight. A pile of light helmets can become two bars. That matches reviews where a rich-looking haul collapsed in the shop. Prioritise heavy broken swords, thick armour plates, and anything that looks dense. Leave decorative scraps if the wheels are already complaining. Cart wheels taking damage from rocks you did not hit is another reported bug; drive like the left wheel is cursed anyway. Repair shows up in the feature list as cart repair — use it before a long run to Grainmill.

If loot vanishes from the wagon, or appears in a storage mesh but not in inventory, stop stacking. That is the inventory ghost problem from day-one reviews. Save, relog, and read Performance and Bugs. Do not smelt a ghost.

Traders, chests, and lockpicks

Merchants exist so you can buy a missing part or a stack of ore when the mine is dry. They are not a substitute for the loop. Hidden chests and underground tunnels around Danburg are teased in the Thieves Guild devlog. Craft lockpicks at the anvil before you commit to a cellar. Prison is a real failure state for careless lockpicking.

Do not spend your last coin on a pretty pommel if you still need coal. Parts are covered on sword parts. Fuel keeps the furnace honest.

A gathering circuit that does not melt your evening

1. Check the contract or the next travel gate so you know which metal you actually need.
2. Mine coal and iron if stocks are low.
3. Take one battlefield loop with a cart rule: heavy metal first, wood second, trophies never.
4. Smelt, then forge. Do not store raw scrap forever; ghost bugs love piles.
5. Only then visit a trader for a specific gap.

That circuit feeds Getting Started players and veterans who just unlocked a new region. When Talstein and the deeper mine arrive, this page will gain nodes. Until then, do not invent a secret ore map. Walk the world, weigh the cart, and let the smelter tell you whether the haul was real.