Forrester Craftsmanship
A lot is made of the superior Forrester craftsmanship, but as far as I can tell, it isn't very well explained. Is there some special Forrester family secret to growing, cutting, and shaping the ironwood that all artisans are sworn to protect? Otherwise, what is to stop Ludd from saying: "Hey, why don't you come live on my land and work for me? I'll pay you twice what the Forresters pay you."?
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This is from my grandpa's views on it, as he has worked with wood all his life. i.e. Saw Mill, Pulp Mill, Forresting, etc.
Ironwood has no grain that you can see (but it's there) and true to it's name, it's almost impossible to shape into anything useful. The one small log he has (read: 1 foot long by 3 inches thick/5 inches across) weighs 42lbs. It's a heavy piece of wood.
So the fact the Forresters can actually make use of it is amazing in it's own right.
I think its just really hard to craft and Foresters naturally have a gift. It was also mentioned several times in the game that the Whitehills suck at crafting and ruin ironwood, so i guess there own inability to craft is what stops them from saying that.
But the game treats it as though the Forresters are shaping the ironwood themselves, when really it would be their craftsmen. What makes their craftsmen superior? Do the Forresters provide them with special knowledge, or are they just lucky to have better craftsmen? If the latter, what's to stop Ludd from luring them over to Whitehill land with promises of better money and more luxuries, unless the feudal system is like Russia's, where a peasant was stuck on the land he/she was born to.
So ironwood really exists? Interesting.
Its more of a general term for especially hard wood in the real world than any specific kind of wood:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ironwood
They must have some kind of reputation with it, I imagine that's how they got their name - the 'Forresters'.
Whitehills are more interesting though - it probably refers to their barren hills that lack ironwood trees, meaning they once too were ironwood craftsman like the Forresters, maybe they even have the same bloodline.
Im not sure, but i don't think it has anything to do with a "secret". I just think the craftsmen are trained in a specific way and so they all just grew up handling ironwood and know how to do it.
Yes, the Forrester Smallfolk are probably the ones who do it rather than the Forresters themselves but in feudal terms, the two are synonymous anyway.