Identity
Smith of Kitava is Warrior's crafting Ascendancy: you're restricted to a single, unmodified Normal Body Armour, but in exchange you unlock a menu of fire-infused enchantments you apply directly to that one piece, plus skills that manifest and empower weapons with fire. It's the most build-defining Ascendancy of the three Warrior options — almost everything Smith of Kitava does routes through the choices you make in its crafting menu, rather than through the passive tree.
Keystone
Smith's Masterwork — You can only use a Normal (unmodified) Body Armour, and gain +200 Armour for each connected notable passive you've allocated. This is the gate that makes the whole Ascendancy work: giving up rare/magic Body Armour affixes in exchange for the crafting menu below and a large scaling Armour bonus.
Notables
- Fire Damage — 20% increased Fire Damage.
- Melee Damage — 20% increased Melee Damage.
- Strength — 5% increased Strength.
- Fire Resistance — +8% to Fire Resistance.
- Minion Damage — Minions deal 20% increased Damage. (This one is still only single-sourced — treat it as approximate until a second source confirms it; it's also a slightly unusual inclusion for a class with no minion focus, so don't build around it.)
- Heat of the Forge — Grants the skill Fire Spell on Hit.
- Against the Anvil — Grants the skill Temper Weapon.
- Living Weapon — Grants the skill Manifest Weapon, which summons a temporary animated copy of your equipped weapon to fight alongside you.
- Coal Stoker — Modifiers to Fire Resistance also grant Cold and Lightning Resistance at 50% of their value.
- Forged in Flame — Modifiers to maximum Fire Resistance also grant maximum Cold and Lightning Resistance (1:1).
The Smith's Masterwork crafting menu
Once you have Smith's Masterwork, you choose enchantments for your single Body Armour from a 12-option menu. This is the current (patch 0.5.4) set:
- Tantalum Alloy — +75% Fire Resistance.
- Kitavan Imprint — 60% increased Glory Generation.
- Spiked Plates — 100% increased Thorns Damage.
- Support Straps — 20% increased Strength.
- Kitavan Engraving — 15% increased maximum Life.
- Tribute to Utula — 30% increased Spirit.
- Leather Bindings — Regenerate 3% of maximum Life per second.
- Flowing Metal — 50% of Armour applies to Elemental Damage from Hits.
- Molten Symbol — 25% of Physical Damage taken as Fire Damage.
- Internal Layer — 100% reduced Critical Damage taken.
- Dedication to Kitava — Armour also applies to Chaos Damage taken from Hits.
- Heatproofing — Unaffected by Bleeding, Ignite, and Poison.
Three other node names (Lead Lining, Padded Plates, Heavy Bracing) show up on some older guides — those were real but were removed in patch 0.4.0, replaced by Kitavan Imprint, Spiked Plates, and Tribute to Utula respectively. If you see those three names elsewhere, that guide is describing a pre-0.4.0 version of this Ascendancy.
Practical notes
- Because Smith's Masterwork locks you to a Normal Body Armour, all of your Armour scaling for this Ascendancy comes from the +200-per-notable bonus, not from item affixes — allocate connected notables deliberately, since each one is also a flat Armour tick.
- Heatproofing is a strong defensive pick against Bleed/Ignite/Poison-heavy content, but it's a single crafting slot competing against pure offense options like Molten Symbol or Flowing Metal — you can't take all 12.
- The Minion Damage notable is a genuine outlier for a build with no minions in its kit — don't plan a build around it; it's most likely there for cross-Ascendancy flexibility rather than a Smith of Kitava-specific payoff.
