I suggest we should get a bit higher amalgamate skill. Mining enough materials
is job in its own but failing to amalgamate those n+200 small bits is just
stupid. Now making runestones from self mined materials is beyond stupid
compared to buying mats
straight from exhange.
In my opinion amalgamate is just a "material handling" skill. Refining makes
you lose material and its ok, but amalgamate should work a bit more often.
For the record, I use it to combine two pieces at a time. Adding more pieces
makes it fail every time.

Just my two cents of ranting.