Hunting Together RPG Refining Guide: Upgrade Success Rates and Protection Stones

Refining at the Blacksmith: the short answer

Quick answer

Players without premium open the upgrade interaction by walking up to the Blacksmith and clicking to talk, then choose the piece and commit gold — plus refine ores when it is a weapon — for each attempt. Levels 1 to 4 always succeed; from level 5 the attempt can fail.

• Level 5 succeeds 60% of the time, and the level after that succeeds 40%.
• An unprotected failure drops the item's upgrade level — +9 falls back to +8 in the documented case; a Protection Stone keeps the level instead.
• Weapon refine ores come from monster drops.

The Blacksmith is not a weapon-only stop: the recorded sessions show both weapons and rings being upgraded through him.

The loop, step by step

1. Walk to the Blacksmith and click to talk. This opens the upgrade interaction — the route described for players who do not have premium.
2. Choose the item you want to push. The sources show weapons and rings being refined this way.
3. Check what the attempt draws on: gold for the upgrade, and refine ores when the piece is a weapon.
4. Put a Protection Stone in before an attempt whose failure would hurt. The documented case is the +9 to +10 step.
5. Confirm the upgrade and read the item's upgrade level. That number is your state: it went up, stayed put, or dropped.

The important thing to understand about this loop is that the risks are not spread evenly across the item's life. The early levels are free of failure, and the cost of a mistake grows sharply once you climb past them.

Success chance by upgrade level

Upgrade success chance at the Blacksmith

Upgrade success chance at the Blacksmith

Upgrade level	Success chance	What a failure means
Levels 1 to 4	100%	Cannot fail — always succeeds
Level 5	60%	A miss drops the level unless a Protection Stone is used
The level after 5	40%	Rarely landed in the creator's experience

Upgrading from levels 1 through 4 is guaranteed, so those four upgrades are not a decision at all — the creator's advice in the recording was to push straight through them at full 100% and save your attention for what follows. Nothing can go wrong there, which also means there is no reason to spend Protection Stones inside that band.

The tone changes at level 5, where the chance drops to 60%. From that point the attempt can fail, and the creator's own read on the following 40% level was that it does not hit often — "from my experience," as they put it. Treat that as one player's observation from a session rather than a guarantee about your run, but plan for the possibility that the last few levels take several tries. The percentages are per attempt, so a 40% step is not a single tap you either pass or fail overall; it is a roll you may make repeatedly.

What a failure actually does

A failed attempt is not merely wasted effort. When the upgrade fails and no Protection Stone is in play, the gear's upgrade level drops. In the recorded session, an attempt at the 40% level failed and the item ended up at +4 — a visible reminder that the level shown on the piece is the thing at stake.

The clearest documented case is the top of the ladder. When you upgrade gear from +9 to +10 and the attempt fails, the item is downgraded to +8. That is the moment Protection Stones exist for: with a stone in the attempt, the penalty is prevented and the item stays at +9 instead of slipping back.

That is why the level number is the state worth watching. A successful attempt raises it, a protected failure leaves it untouched, and an unprotected failure moves it backwards — and the higher you climb, the more that backwards step costs you in re-climbing it.

Protection Stones

On a failed attempt, a Protection Stone keeps the item protected instead of letting the upgrade level drop.

They are a consumable stock, and the creator treated them that way, counting out 1,700 stones before continuing a long upgrade run and calling that plenty. The moment worth remembering from the session is the regret: after pushing a ring from +9 toward +10, the creator realised they had forgotten to press the protection stone and described what followed as a long, costly run. If you are working on a high-level piece, checking that the stone is actually selected before you confirm is the difference between a single failed roll and a slide back down the levels.

What you can refine, and what it consumes

Weapons are upgraded through Blacksmith refining using refine ores obtained from monster drops, so the ore side of the cost is tied to ordinary farming — refine ores come from monster drops. See Hunting Together RPG monster drops for the drop side of that loop, and the equipment guide if you are still deciding which piece deserves the push in the first place.

Rings are upgradeable at the Blacksmith as well. The creator's ring push toward +10 is the clearest look at how a single item can soak up a long stretch of attempts, especially once a protection stone gets left out of the sequence. Weapons and rings therefore compete for the same gold and attention, which makes gear crafting and the equipment tiers worth reading before you sink a run into a piece you will replace.

Gold is the other steady drain. Upgrading gear consumes the player's gold currency, and in the creator's session the balance fell steadily through a long upgrade run to the point of worrying about running out. A refining session is not a fixed purchase; it is a series of attempts, and the money moves every time. If you are planning a long push, it helps to have a reserve behind you — the gold farming guide covers building one.

How to tell where you stand

The feedback is all in the upgrade level on the item. A rising number means the attempt landed. A number that stays the same after a failure means the Protection Stone did its work. A number that has fallen means the attempt failed unprotected, and you now know exactly how far back you are starting from — +8 after a missed +10 attempt, back down to +4 in the low-level example from the session.

Seen that way, refining is mostly a question of where you draw the line. The first four levels are free, level 5 and the level after it are the first real gambles, and everything above +9 is where the Protection Stone stops being optional bookkeeping and starts being the thing that keeps a night's progress from unravelling.