Quick Answer: You're not doing anything wrong — Tempered Steel is bugged and cannot be crafted right now. The recipe unlocks normally once you reach Orc Base II and its Foundry, and it displays as available, but starting the crafting job does nothing. Multiple players confirmed it during launch week, one verified it in the save file itself, and no fix shipped in v1.0.1. There is no workaround — progress elsewhere and wait for a patch.
Hitting other launch-week issues? The bugs & fixes page tracks every known problem and what v1.0.1 already fixed.
Smelting runs through the furnace and Foundry at the bases — Tempered Steel is the one recipe that currently refuses to start. (Screenshot: Logan Games)
What Exactly Happens
The failure pattern is identical across reports:
- You reach Orc Base II and unlock the Foundry.
- The Tempered Steel recipe appears in the Foundry as available.
- You try to start the crafting job — and nothing happens. No error, no queue, no output.
Because the recipe looks unlocked, most players assume they've missed a material, a quest step, or a hidden requirement and go hunting for one. There isn't one.
How We Know It's a Bug (Not a Hidden Requirement)
Three independent players confirmed the same behavior on the Steam forums between July 14-16, and one went further — they opened their save file and checked the recipe state directly: the tempered_steel recipe is correctly flagged as unlocked, but no crafting job can be started. In their words, the issue is not progression-related but a bug in the current version.
That save-file check is the useful part: it rules out the "you're missing something" theory that keeps players grinding for an answer that doesn't exist.
Current Status (v1.0.1)
- Not fixed: Tempered Steel is absent from the v1.0.1 patch notes (July 16, 2026), and players report it still won't craft after the patch.
- No developer response yet in the bug thread — unusual for this developer, who has answered most launch-week bug reports within hours and shipped the first hotfix two days after release.
- No player-side workaround has been found. Save editing is not recommended — the recipe flag is already correct, so the failure is in the crafting logic itself.
We check the patch notes and forums daily and will update this page when the fix lands.
What to Do Meanwhile
Nothing hard-blocks on Tempered Steel that the community has found — no report so far describes being unable to finish the story because of it. Rock Bottom keeps every earlier biome open, so the practical answer is: keep descending and come back after a patch. If you're optimizing the wait:
- Follow the normal progression route — the beginner guide covers how freely you can backtrack between layers.
- Use the downtime for the deliberate-effort achievements: the hidden crab and the rest of the 100% route don't involve the Foundry at all.
- If you want to add weight to the report, post your confirmation in the Steam bug thread — the developer has explicitly asked for reproduction details on other launch bugs.
Sources: Steam community forum bug thread "Tempered Steel?" (reports July 14-16, 2026, including a save-file inspection), v1.0.1 patch notes (July 16, 2026). Page current as of July 20, 2026 (game version v1.0.1).