Join The Club
Acquiring ore nuggets in the Gothic Remake can be a taxing process, quite literally as it happens, as warders squeeze you for protection money and you have to shell out for even the most basic gear to keep yourself alive. Protective armor, decent weaponry, and even magic are all luxuries in the Valley of the Mines and will cost you a pretty penny to gather.
Thankfully, there are some ways to make money, though many of them require a little investment to begin with, specifically in learning skills. You can even mine ore if you want a basic way to accrue currency early on, but it's worth investing in more lucrative methods as you progress further into the game.
Best ways to earn ore in Gothic Remake
It's advisable early on to grab basically everything you find in order to sell it, especially herbs and mushrooms, which can be surprisingly valuable. You'll need all the ore you can get to buy a map and equip yourself with gear that isn't total trash.
Thankfully, before long you should start to steamroll in ore terms, especially if you follow the main quest and clear the dungeons in it like the goblin cave and orc cemetery. All of these humanoid enemies have weapons that are valuable to sell, so it can be lucrative.
That said, there are some good ways to earn ore in Gothic.
1. Hunting
You'll find yourself killing lots of molerats, scavengers, wolves, lizards, and other monstrous beasties as you explore the colony. You can learn hunting skills from Drax, a bald hunter on the right side of the road after you descend from the mine into the central valley at the start of the game.
He asks you to get him a beer first, but you should've already found a few in the chests in the mine and at the goods exchange. If you acquire hunting skills, you can extract more materials from the monsters you kill, making it more lucrative.
You can also learn special hunting skills from Cavalorn in his house to the west of the Old Camp if you bring him the Beasts of Khorinis II book from the Old Mine, and then the Minecrawler Queen's gland. There are more Beasts of Khorinis books scattered about the map, so keep your eyes peeled if you want to earn more money hunting.
2. Thievery
You're a criminal, after all, so why not steal stuff? You can either lockpick or pickpocket (though I'd suggest acquiring some training first), but you can also just straight up mug people. If someone picks a fight with you, beat them up, steal everything—they would've done the same to you. If you see an opportunity to draw wild animals to attack someone so you can down them and steal their equipment, do it. That's how I got my first really good sword.
If you really want to mug others, then head to the lawless New Camp in the west of the map. The trader Mordrag will even escort you there—you can find him on the east side of the cloth-covered market area in the south of the Old Camp, sitting on a bench on the left side of the path outside a shack.
3. Smithing
Once you arrive in the Old Camp, provided you've got 10 learning points from gaining a level and 50 ore, you can learn one-handed smithing from Huno, whose forge is just to the south of the upper level of the arena, right by where your shack and bed are. Once you have this skill, you craft weapons with materials you either steal or find, and then sell said weapons.
If you're looking for an easy blueprint to acquire, you can find the Light Club (Mace) very close to the start of the game, if you climb up the rocks on the left side of the area above where the locked mine entrance is. Kill the goblin and enemies up there, then grab this blueprint from his den.
You can also get the Sword of Judgement blueprint from the mine in the northwest of the colony, specifically, on the desk by Ian at the bottom of the mine, where you have to go during Diego's Test of Faith quest, which is part of joining the Old Camp. This is handy, since the mine is also our next stop in terms of money-making methods.
You'll quickly realise when you start exploring goblin caves and orc areas later, that selling weapons is quite lucrative, so killing any large number of humanoid enemies in an area can earn you lots of ore as you loot and sell off all their weapons.
4. Mining
Now, this can be very slow, but if you're determined, you can make a lot of ore. Provided you have a pickaxe, you can mine the blue ore deposits in the mine in the northwest of the colony. Simply walk up to an ore node and interact with it. You'll get three ore for the first few animations, then only one as the deposit's lustre fades.
You can also grab wayward ore nuggets from around other miners or the big ore nugget piles in the lower areas of the mine. It's slow going and boring and hell, but it'll get you a little nest egg of ore you can use to invest in other money-making skills.
