The Ruined Forge Lava Intake dungeon is an interesting location, with some pretty good loot — especially if you need smithing stones. Some enemies on site can also be very challenging, so we’ll cover how to deal with those without dying too much.
Unique Rewards:
Lots of various Smithing Stones and Somber Smithing Stones
The first part of getting to Ruined Forge Lava Intake is getting to the eastern part of Gravesite Plain. Make your way to the Castle Front site of grace; from there, it’s a short ride along the river to the dungeon. The entrance is a hole in the wall between two stone torches.
Torches usually lead the way
Like all dungeons (don’t quote me on that) there will be a site of grace as soon as you enter — it’s unironically called Ruined Forge Lava Intake. Be sure to rest at it to fill up your health, and to have a respawn point for when you die. Follow the path down from the site of grace, and speak with the ghost. They will talk about finding the Altar of the Forge, which will also be our goal (because of loot).
The path then turns down into a large room with lava in the bottom, and a large pipe hanging on the ceiling (more on this large pipe later). Take the ladder — or don’t, as it’s a small drop-off — and you’ll be on a ledge that has a block you can read, which says “Hit them where they’re weakest.” If you didn’t know that, and you’ve made it this far in Elden Ring, then you’re a beast.
This message is obviously referring to the difficult Stone Blacksmith enemies that you’ll find in this dungeon. As a matter of fact, there’s one in a small room right around the corner from the stone you read. They’re challenging enemies, but after you get the hang of them, they’re manageable. The key is to hit the weak spot on their back, which is a small red gem.
Their attacks make that easier said than done, though. We found that being as close as possible to them, and walking around the side where they aren’t holding a weapon, was the easiest. When you’re very close, some of their attacks miss, and makes it easy to quickly flank that gem and spam attacks. After hitting it so many times, the blacksmith will stagger, and you can get a critical hit on the stone for massive damage.
The big fella can take some damage
These Stone Blacksmiths sometimes drop somber smithing stones. One dropped for us after killing this first blacksmith, and the corpse next to him has a Smithing Stone [5]. When you walk out of this small room and down the stairs, be careful as a Lava Blob will try to land on your head and do damage. Wait for them to land, and swiftly kill them. Another blob will drop just before the door to the next area. You can just run past them, put they sometimes drop smithing stones, and they’re easy to kill.
The next room is large, and has many smithing stones to loot, and enemies protecting them. Continue along to the ladder, and slide down. There’s a little area just behind you when you get off the ladder that has smithing stones on the floor. If you remember from other mine-like areas, smithing stones look like rocks that you can pick up.
Smithing stones litter the ground of this dungeon
Facing outwards into the big room (from the base of the ladder), you can go up the stairs to the right (then take another right), and grab the Greater Potentate’s Cookbook [13] off a corpse. To finish the dungeon, you actually jump on a fallen pillar at the top of the stairs, but there’s more loot to grab before that. Right next to the stairs is a Somber Smithing Stone [2] being protected by a Lava Blob. Across the room, you’ll find an alcove with another Stone Blacksmith protecting a corpse with a Somber Smithing Stone [6].
Gotta get all that loot!
Across from the alcove is a doorway that leads to a room with a ton of lava (it’s the same room from the start, but you’re at the opposite end). Straight ahead of you is a blacksmith protecting a corpse that has the Smithscript Dagger — a unique throwing blade. If you don’t feel like fighting the blacksmith, or dodging past him, you can simply get his attention then go down the ladder in the southeast corner next to the lava. He will jump down to you, but he can’t climb the ladder back up.
Beware the blacksmith by the Smithscript Dagger
After collecting all the smithing stones scattered on the ground, you can head back to the stairs where you found the cookbook. Jump on the ruins to climb up to the next level, but be careful when making the final jump because another lava blob will try to fall on you.
You can go left at this top level to grab Smithing Stone [7] x3 on a corpse, and also a Smithing Stone [4] x2 on the corpse sitting on the ledge. However, watch your back because another blob will attack you from the ledge from which you jumped down. Note that there’s no way back up from jumping onto the ledge, so you have to drop off and go back up the stairs / ruins.
Finally, when you instead take a right after jumping up to the top level, you’ll go down a ladder and find a lever that will drop the big pipe in the lava room. Drop to the floor below you, then run and jump onto the big pipe. Some Lava Blobs will be on the pipe, so be careful and don’t let them knock you off.
Why is it always lever?
At the top of the pipe, you can jump off to the right, then follow the path to the forge altar. Interact with the altar, and you’ll acquire the Anvil Hammer and Ancient Dragon Smithing Stone. Thankfully, the thingy to return you to the start of the dungeon will appear right next to the altar.
No boss? Yup, no boss.
Unfortunately, there’s no boss, unless it’s hidden and no one’s found it yet. But look on the bright side, now you have a location where you can farm smithing stones if you haven’t gotten the bell bearings you need yet.
Kelson is a spud head from out west. He is most happy when holding a milky tea with too much honey and playing a sprawling role playing game or reading a fantasy novel. His video game tastes vary but his main genres are looter shooters, RPGs, and real time strategy games.
