whats the best way to level up blacksmithing? i've been making leather gloves since that seems like the most efficient use of material. going the heavy armor route since im getting close to rank70 which will make it weigh nothing (same perk exists for light armor, but that doesnt seem like it's worth it)
I like leather braces, because they are cheap. I think iron daggers are slightly more profitable, though.
better profit, though, and overall leveling:
transmute: iron ore -> silver ore -> gold ore -> smelt gold ingot
smith -> 2 gold rings
enchant -> destruction, petty
sell 2x destruction gold rings
so, you get 2 gold rings from 2 iron ore, level up alteration magic, smithing, enchanting, and speech (selling) --also, conjuration from soul capping, of course.
I think I had 2 or 3 perks into speech at the time (don't do that), and you can generally get ~100g for each enchanted gold ring. That's a huge profit.
It's probably best to just get fortify barter enchanted items (Mask or Clavicus Vile, for example)