Crafting

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While you can ignore crafting completely, it is something that adds to the game more depth and to your characters more personality.

Making a choice

Spend some time to carefully select your Vocation and its associated professions. While your Vocation has some influence on your gameplay, you are complete free in your choice as you can play through the game with every Vocation, and even without one.

Every Vocation consists of three Professions:

Vocations and their associated Professions
Vocation Professions
Armourer ProspectorMetalsmithTailor
Armsman ProspectorWeaponsmithWoodworker
Explorer ForesterProspectorTailor
Historian FarmerScholarWeaponsmith
Tinker ProspectorCookJeweller
Woodsman FarmerForesterWoodworker
Yeoman FarmerCookTailor
Profession availability by Vocation
Profession Vocation
Cook TinkerYeoman
Farmer HistorianWoodsmanYeoman
Forester ExplorerWoodsman
Jeweller Tinker
Metalsmith Armourer
Prospector ArmourerArmsmanExplorerTinker
Scholar Historian
Tailor ArmourerExplorerYeoman
Weaponsmith ArmsmanHistorian
Woodworker ArmsmanWoodsman

Note: A character may change vocations at any time; however, you will lose ALL progress and recipes memorized in any profession that is not available in your new vocation.

If you play a single Character in Solo Play, you can choose your Vocation to add to your personality. Some Classes have "natural" Vocations. An Elf-Lore-master is a born Historian, a Hobbit-Hunter a Woodsman, a Dwarf-Champion an Armourer or Armsman. But YMMV, and every combinations has it's appeal.

You may choose your Vocation for the produced items. Every class profits from Scrolls, Potions, Food and Jewellery, so a vocation containing a Scholar, Cook or Jeweller is no bad choice. The following tables show further dependencies:

Profession vs. Item Class

If i have a profession, then which Class profits from it by which item class?

Profession Armour Weapon Class-specific Items
Cook N/A N/A Lore-masterMinstrel
Jeweller N/A Rune-keeper ChampionLore-master
Metalsmith CaptainChampionGuardian • (Minstrel) N/A GuardianRune-keeper
Scholar N/A N/A CaptainChampionHunterLore-masterRune-keeperWarden
Tailor BeorningBurglarHunterLore-masterMinstrelRune-keeperWarden N/A BurglarCaptainRune-keeper
Weaponsmith N/A all except Lore-master and Rune-keeper BurglarGuardianWarden
Woodworker N/A all except Rune-keeper CaptainChampionMinstrelRune-keeperWarden

Class vs. Item Class

If I have a class, what profession is needed to produce which item class?

Class Armour Weapon Class-specific Items
Beorning Tailor N/A N/A
Burglar Tailor WeaponsmithWoodworker TailorWeaponsmith
Captain Metalsmith WeaponsmithWoodworker ScholarTailorWoodworker
Champion Metalsmith WeaponsmithWoodworker JewellerScholarWoodworker
Guardian Metalsmith WeaponsmithWoodworker MetalsmithWeaponsmith
Hunter Tailor WeaponsmithWoodworker Scholar
Lore-master Tailor WeaponsmithWoodworker CookJewellerScholar
Minstrel Tailor • (Metalsmith) WeaponsmithWoodworker Scholar
Rune-keeper Tailor Jeweller MetalsmithScholarWoodworker
Warden Tailor Woodworker ScholarWeaponsmithWoodworker

Profession vs. Class

I have a profession. Does a class profit from it's production?

Profession Beorning Burglar Captain Champion Guardian Hunter Lore-master Minstrel Rune-keeper Warden
Cook CSI
Farmer
Forester
Jeweller CSI CSI Weapon
Metalsmith Armour Armour Armour, CSI CSI
Prospector
Scholar CSI CSI CSI CSI CSI CSI CSI
Tailor Armour Armour, CSI CSI Armour Armour Armour Armour, CSI Armour
Weaponsmith Weapon Weapon, CSI Weapon Weapon Weapon, CSI Weapon Weapon, Shield Weapon, CSI
Woodworker Weapon Weapon Weapon, CSI Weapon, CSI Weapon Weapon Weapon Weapon, CSI CSI Weapon, CSI

CSI: Class-specific Item

If you play several Alts, or a single character in a Kinship, you should consider the Dependencies between Professions. If you want to be self-sufficient, you need four characters with the Vocations: Armourer, Historian, Tinker, Woodsman.

Later in the Game, you can enter Crafting Guilds. For every producing Profession, there is a Guild. Every character can enter the Guild of one of his professions. Guild Crafters can produce better items, so if you are the "complete" type, you want to have one character in every guild and so you will need seven Alts.

If you play more Alts (e.g. one of every class), you can have some Alts with the same Vocation. You should consider:

  • Every Alt can use 7 pieces of Guild-Jewellery.
  • Many classes can use 7 pieces of Tailor-made Guild-Armour
  • Some classes can use 6 pieces of Metalsmith-made Guild-Armour

So make sure you have an extra Jeweller or two, an extra Tailor and perhaps an extra Metalsmith. Also make sure to have some more gatherers for those, i.e. Prospectors (everyone can produce Hides, an one single Forester is enough to convert the Hides to Leather. And you don’t need a second Guild Woodworker in normal circumstances. So no need here for more than one Forester. And you don’t need a second Guild Cook, neither. So no need for more than one Farmer. But your Metalsmith, Weaponsmith, and Jeweller(s) need Metals, so every Prospector is helping.) My recommendation is one additional Tinker and one additional Explorer at least.

Getting Started

To start crafting, you must first play through the initial series of quests and move out into the wider world. In various towns throughout Middle-earth, you will find a Master or Mistress of Apprentices who will help you select your vocation. Each vocation is made up of three professions, as shown below. At least one workplace of each type is near each Master or Mistress of Apprentices, so that you can immediately begin crafting. A Supplier is also nearby, to sell you tools and some of the necessary ingredients.

Craft Training

Near each Master or Mistress of Apprentices, there is a Supplier and Novice-level Crafting Vendors of all types. The Vendors are stationed at the assorted workplaces that are needed to engage in crafting tasks. Between the Supplier and the Crafting Vendors of your chosen professions, you can acquire most of the items you need to begin crafting. All crafts require the correct tools, raw materials, and a workplace to perform the task. For instance, woodworking requires a set of woodworking tools, a supply of wood (which can be found throughout your travels in Middle-earth), and a workbench. (You receive your initial tools when you choose a profession.) Workbenches are found in many locations in most towns.

The Craft

Craft requires:

  • a Recipe,
  • a Tool,
  • a Crafting Facility,
  • Crafting materials.

Recipes

The crafter must have learned the recipe for items he want to craft. Recipes are either given automatically when achieving a crafting tier, purchased, dropped from mobs, or obtained as treasure.

Type of Recipe Description
Basic Each tier has a number of basic recipes that are provided for you once that tier is available.
Vendor This recipe can be purchased from a Novice or Expert profession NPC. Example: Heavy Quilted Armour Recipe can be purchased from Tailor Vendors.
Guild This recipe can be purchased from the appropriate Guild Representative for Improved or Legendary Recipes.
Reputation This recipe can be purchased from the appropriate Faction Representative. Recipe access and use is normally controlled by Reputation Level.
Dropped Obtained as loot from various creatures or from treasure chest (or alike). These recipes are one of "vendor" or "single-use" type.
Single Use A recipe can only be crafted once and then it is removed from your recipe list. Note: Quest recipes are generally single-use and do not offer crafting XP.

There are hundreds of recipes per profession and to list them all is crazy, but we tried our best!

Icon Recipes Recipe Indexes
Cook Recipes Cook Recipe Index
Farmer Recipes Farmer Recipe Index
Forester Recipes Forester Recipe Index
Jeweller Recipes Jeweller Recipe Index
Metalsmith Recipes Metalsmith Recipe Index
Prospector Recipes Prospector Recipe Index
Scholar Recipes Scholar Recipe Index
Tailor Recipes Tailor Recipe Index
Weaponsmith Recipes Weaponsmith Recipe Index
Woodworker Recipes Woodworker Recipe Index

Crafting Changes in Update 17

With the release of update 17 in October of 2015, several significant changes were made to Tier 9 and Tier 10 crafting, and to crafting in general.
The details are found in the Tier 10 Crafting Developer Diary: https://www.lotro.com/en/game/articles/tier-10-crafting-developer-diary

Gathering

  • Three professions are considered “Gathering” professions: Scholar, Prospector, and Forester. The gathering professions have been consolidated to require fewer items. Each gathering profession now only needs one tier of refined material. For example: in tier 9, a Westemnet Prospector would harvest skarn and smelt it into low-grade ingots, which were turned into mid- or high-grade ingots in turn. An Anórien Prospector will gather Anórien skarn and process that into Anórien ingots, without having to upgrade those ingots to a higher grade before using them to make final products. This means fewer kinds of crafting material to keep in your inventory.

Recipe drops

  • There will be no tier 10 recipes dropped on landscape. All tier 10 recipes will be acquired automatically once you attain the tier. In future updates we will be adding more recipes to region reputation and guild barter, but not for U17.
  • Any new crafting guild recipes that are released in the future will only require Westemnet Master of the Guild reputation; we have no plans to add another tier of required crafting guild reputation.

General Crafting Changes

  • In all tiers, all crafting materials now stack to 500. This includes everything: farming crops, logs, ingots, vendor items, journals, etc.
(Tip - to stack items already in your vault or shared storage, move them to your inventory and back again.)
  • All landscape crafting nodes in all regions can be harvested from horseback.

Tools and Facilities

Professions Facility
Cook CampfireOvenSuperior Oven
Farmer FarmlandsWorkbench
Jeweller WorkbenchSuperior Workbench
Metalsmith ForgeSuperior Forge
Scholar StudySuperior Study
Tailor WorkbenchSuperior Workbench
Weaponsmith ForgeSuperior Forge
Woodworker WorkbenchSuperior Workbench

Once you have spoken to a Master or Mistress of Apprentices and chosen your vocation, they will give you a set set of appropriate inferior crafting tools and offer you a series of introductory quests. These quests include appropriate Ingredient Packs to begin your crafting career.

After completing this basic training, your next stop should be at the nearby Supplier.

You begin your profession with a basic set of inferior crafting tools. These are "brittle" and should immediately be upgraded to "normal" tools at the nearest Supplier or Crafting Vendor. As your character progresses in level (not crafting rank) additional tool types are available from a friendly Metalsmith. (They are player-crafted items.) Or are often found at the Auction House at prices ranging from the sublime to the ridiculous. For the gathering professions, these improved tools decrease the time necessary to gather a "resource node". Higher ranked tools also provide an increase in the "critical chance" associated with their use.

See: Crafting Tools for details on their availability and capabilities

In addition to the necessary tool that must be equipped on your character for use, every profession has an appropriate place to actually do the work. The gathering professions, Scholars, Prospector and Forester, primarily harvest "resource node," in the wild. Farmers also grow resources in Farmlands. However once harvested, these resources must then be "refined" in the same Crafting Facilities used to create crafted items.

The Cook and Scholar are the only two professions who can craft certain items anywhere.

See also Crafting Instances for more information about crafting instances in Moria, Hytbold, and the Entwood

Gathering Resources

Crafting materials are found throughout Middle-earth from Vendors, as loot drops or Resource Spawns, or in the assorted chests and crates around the world. Raw materials for crafting consist of Ores, woods, gems, seeds, cooking supplies, dye components, hides and lore items.

Crafting resources (Ingredient Packs) are also available for purchase from the LOTRO Store.

  • Ores and woods are most commonly found as ground spawns, and if you have the gathering skill to collect them, you will have a tracking skill that you can activate to give you an indicator when you are near that resource. Ore nodes can also produce gems for Jewellers, and minerals for Scholars.
  • Seeds and cooking components can be purchased from Suppliers or tradesmen.
  • Hides are found as loot drops from many creatures.
  • Lore items are found as loot drops on humanoid enemies or in and around ruins inside ancient Artifacts.
  • Rare items for high level crafting and single use recipes may be found in Farming fields as well as any appropriate level resource node. They may also drop from "Rare Elite" or "Rare Signature" creatures. See Crafting Rare Components
  • Rare Drop Effect: Some people have observed that rare items (ie. Emerald Shard) do not drop as easily if you are working on a field at higher level than your craft. For example, a Master Supreme Weaponsmith/ Master Supreme Scholar may find rare items for crafting up to the Farming level of Supreme, but less likely higher. This effect also seems to occur in other resource nodes, if for some reason, you gather ore/wood from nodes much higher level than you can craft reasonably. There is no factual confirmation of this effect, so your experience may vary.

All of these assorted materials can also be found in chests scattered throughout the landscape and in dungeons (Instances).

Crafting levels

Tier Level Proficiency Points Needed Mastery Points Needed Resources**(***)
1 Apprentice 200 Master Apprentice 400 75(39)
2 Journeyman 280 Master Journeyman 560 105(54)
3 Expert * 360 Master Expert * 720 135(69)
4 Artisan 440 Master Artisan 880 165(84)
5 Master 520 Grand Master 1,040 195(99)
6 Supreme 600 Supreme Master 1,200 225(114)
7 Westfold 680 Westfold Master 1,360 255(129)
8 Eastemnet 760 Eastemnet Master 1,520 285(144)
9 Westemnet 840 Westemnet Master 1,680 315(159)
10 Anórien 840 Anórien Master 1,680 315(159)
* Once the Expert Proficiency is completed a crafting quest must be completed allowing further advancement towards Master Expert and opening the Artisan tier; find any vendor of the related profession. This hindrance does not apply to the gathering professions.

** Resources refer to prepared resources needed to achieve mastery in a tier. For example: this would be ingots, not ore, boards, not wood, and leathers, not hides. Double this number if you are starting with ore/wood/hides/etc. It takes into account that most players want some resources left over after they have completed a crafting tier, therefore, with crafting XP scrolls and speed potions, this number can be considerably reduced, especially if leftovers are not desired. You would process half of this number into shavings (for example), and then return them to their intact state to complete a tier. You should expect considerable loss of resources whenever you use Processing.
*** For Processing, (Processing is a popular way to gain crafting exp, and master the tiers.) I add the amount of experience needed to achieve mastery in a tier(proficiency and mastery together); I use the formula: [exp/16]+1. I.E: [600/16]+1 = 39.

Every time you complete a recipe, you gain Craft Experience Points (Craft XP) in the respective Profession. You advance in a Profession by collecting Craft XP.

Each profession is broken up into tiers, and each tier has two requirements furthering your progression towards the higher crafting tiers. See the table for requirement per tier. Each requirement you reach, you earn a new crafting title which provides new abilities (notice the footnote attached to the table).

Proficiency: Completing the Proficiency part of a tier (denoted with a bronze anvil) enables you to achieve critical successes while crafting items from that tier (see below), and, furthermore, it opens up the first part of next tier.

Mastery: Completing the Mastery part of a tier (denoted with a gold anvil) enables you to begin earning mastery points of the next tier. Until Mastery is completed you can just earn crafting points to complete Proficiency of the next tier, but not any further. Once Master of a tier you do not earn any more crafting points from crafting items of that tier. Critical success on a tier requires Mastery of all previous tiers.

The following explains the four levels of crafting progress per tier:

An empty bronze anvil: you are currently working towards Proficiency.
A bronze anvil: you have gained Proficiency.
A bronze anvil and an empty gold anvil: you are currently working towards Mastery.
Two filled-in anvils: you have also gained Mastery.


With Update 12, a new type of Recipes were introduced: Processing recipes. In a two-step-process, resources are transferred into an intermediate form and back to half the amount of the resource. The only result of processing is the production of Craft XP. This is the way to produce max Craft XP from min Resources.

Critical Successes

After gaining Proficiency in any tier of a crafting profession, each time you craft an item for that tier, you have the chance to receive a Critical success. This is commonly referred to as "to crit" or "critting"; the resulting product of such a success is often called a "crit item".

Types of Critical Success

There are two different outcomes when you critically succeed while crafting:

  • Producing a larger number of items. Example: Normally Bronze Ingots produces two ingots at a time, but a critical success yields four ingots.
  • Produce a better quality item with improved statistics. Example: A normal outcome is Leather Armour but a critical success gives Tough Leather Armour which has increased stats.

Notice that Weaponsmiths, Metalsmiths, Jewellers and Tailors also have a special feature attached to critical successes at Artisan level and above: they are given the option to Inscribe Item (allowing custom named items).

  • Certain Guild Recipes are referred to as "Auto-Crits." These recipes can only generate the Critical Success outcome. They normally require a "Guild pattern" of some sort associated with that profession, as well as the same materials as required by the "normal" recipe, and are typically on Cool-down timers. They typically require a certain Guild Reputation level to acquire and execute. No "critical success bonus" is associated with these as the success rate is always 100%. Example: Item:Cloak of Théodred Recipe

Achieving Critical Success

Critical Success is governed by the laws of probability.

If a crafter is proficient in the crafting tier being used, and if the recipe allows critical success, the base chance of attaining a critical success is 5%. This base chance can be increased by using player-crafted Crafting Tools, special "mastery components", and Scholar-made crafting lore scrolls.

To see possible outcomes from critical successes, open a recipe in the crafting panel (at the page Critical success an example is included that illustrates this section). The lower area of the screen is commonly called the Mastery Component area. The special name of a critical success is displayed in this area, if one is possible. Hovering over the icon will display the improved stats and bonuses. Notice that if you have not yet attained proficiency for the tier of the recipe, the content of this area will be disabled.

The Mastery Component area of most recipes also displays a special ingredient slot for what is commonly called a "Mastery Component". If the crafter has the special ingredient available, he may select the "use" box and that way increase the likelihood for critical successes. In the example to the right Chunk of Crude Brimstone may be used. Single-use recipes usually require "crafting journals" crafted by scholars, e.g. Artisan Metalsmith's Journal rather than standard mastery components.

  • One mastery components is used per craft attempt.
  • Mastery components are optional; also crafting without them may yield a critical success.
  • Standard Mastery components are random loot but Farmers may buy them from vendors.
  • Not all recipes have an option for mastery components.
  • The base chance stack with crit chance from crafting tool, mastery components, and scholar's lore.
  • A critical success is never guaranteed as you may never reach 100% likelihood (except for Farmer fields).
  • The percentage outcome of critical successes is generated per crafting attempt, not over a series of attempts, thus the mileage of a shorter crafting session may differ considerably. The average of longer sessions should be close to the expected likelihood. If a crafter, as in the example crafts 20 Items, that is 20 individual attempts!

At the page Critical success a hands-on example illustrates how the different improvements interact to a better likelihood for critical successes.

Crafting Guilds

Crafting Guilds provide additional paths of advancement for many professions.

Every Character can join exactly one Guild of one of his professions. While the join is possible as soon as a Vocation is selected, the lowest level of Guild Recipes is Expert (Tier 3). Improved Guild Recipes produce slightly better items than Single-Use-Recipes with Critical Success. While leveling, this is the best Armour, Weapon, and Jewellery available. Later on, better gear can be found.

In particular, after level 45, most players begin to find legendary items in the game, these take the form of third age, second age or first age (see more information on this under legendary items). Crafters can also make legendary items, but each craft is limited to making them for two classes. Jewellers, for example, make legendary items for Rune-keepers and Champions. Legendary items are also made stronger with relics which may be found or "made" by crafters. What happens is, a crafter will make an item which has a cooldown of 18 hours; this item may be bartered for the relic. Some relics will bind to the crafter on acquire, some may be sold or traded freely.

Returning to the jeweller example, Jewellers may trade in Relics that provide a +10, +30 or +40 to will on a legendary item. Your choice of craft is not dictated by which Crafting guild provides which benefits to your class, because it is impossible to completely provide all you need in legendary items for yourself. In another example, a Lore-master may provide well for himself as a Scholar, but he will need a Woodsman to make his staff for him anyway. Both the Lore-master/Scholar and the Woodsman will have to be members in good standing in their Crafting Guilds to provide what the Lore-master needs. Therefore, cooperation is needed.

Membership in a crafting guild is exclusive - you may only be a member of one crafting guild at a time.

You may choose to join a different crafting guild, but bear in mind that you must abandon all guild recipes and progress gained from your current guild in order to join a new one.

Note that there is no guild for Farmers, Prospectors, or Foresters.

Locations

Crafting Guild Halls can be found in the following locations around Middle-earth:

Guild Name Location Region
Cook's Guild Michel Delving's Craft-fair The Shire
Weaponsmith's Guild Thorin's Hall - The Forging Hall Ered Luin
Metalsmith's Guild Thorin's Hall - The Forging Hall Ered Luin
Scholar's Guild The Last Homely House in Rivendell Trollshaws
Tailor's Guild Craft-hall of Esteldín North Downs
Jeweller's Guild Craft-hall of Esteldín North Downs
Woodworker's Guild Craft-hall of Esteldín North Downs
All crafting guilds Galtrev Dunland
All crafting guilds Snowbourn Sutcrofts
All crafting guilds Aldburg West Rohan
All crafting guilds Dol Amroth Western Gondor
All crafting guilds Minas Tirith Old Anórien
All crafting guilds Minas Tirith (After-battle) Anórien (After Battle)
All crafting guilds Minas Tirith (Midsummer) Anórien (After Battle)
All crafting guilds Dale Eryn Lasgalen and the Dale-lands
All crafting guilds Estolad Lân Morgul Vale
All crafting guilds Dol Amroth King's Gondor
All crafting guilds Umbar Baharbêl Cape of Umbar

See also

External Links

Draznar's Crafting Guide