Pretty much self explanatory, does spamming daggers work or is there a better way?

Not that I know of. You can still pump out Iron daggers, it just takes alot more time... and iron.

Getting transmute and making gold or silver jewelry seems to be the best way nowadays.

Oh I just remembered reading on here not too long ago that people have been creating a bunch of jewelry and apparently that's been doing the trick. You need alot of gold, silver and gems.


Edit: Yeah what he said^^

I just made lots of high end bows as the supplies are easy to come by, and not much is required for a bow. Elven and Ebony bows do great for boosting you up when lower grade items no longer get you there.