Smith Character Stats ??

So I've created a bs character. Got him to level 45 with level 42 (difficulty I think is the term). What is making less and less sense the more posts I read is how and why stats in dex str but and so on actually affect a Smith. From what I'm reading it seems to be either 1 of 2 things or both. Please help me to understand. Thanks.

1 - Putting stat points into the basic stats (str, dex, vit, and so on) defines how easy it is to create a proper unbroken item that corresponds with your basic stat.

2 - Putting stat points into the basic stats (str, dex, vit, and so on) affects how high the potential points can get when successfully creating the corresponding items for your basic stat.

3 - Both 1 and 3 apply

4 - Both 1 and 2 are wrong and I'm just clueless :/

 

(2) sounds right

Not sure what you mean by (1). But the basic stats such as str/vit/dex/etc don't exactly help the item creation success chances. That is more affected by tech point or the your current difficulty level. For example 191VIT smith will make armor with really good potential but might succeed only 20% of the time whereas a 191TECH smith will make armor with low potential but might succeed 90% of the time (percents are arbitrary.. just putting it in perspective... somebody did and experiment and have the actual # attempts.. but I don't remember which bs post that was from)

 

Thank you for the reply. that's exactly where I was getting confused. Many of the posts say that the base stat you have makes better armor but not much in the detail of how just that it does.