There are some significant enhancements in store for the crafting system in The Lord of the Rings Online: Mines of Moria Book 8.  More information about Book 8 Crit Items changes can be found on LotroLife.com

Improvements for Crafted Equipment, Levels 1-50

Background

For all crafted armour, shields, weapons, and jewellery, there are generally four groups of recipes per crafting tier (the Apprentice tier usually has just two). These are:

1. The auto-granted group of recipes. These are given to you automatically upon gaining access to a new tier of your profession.
2. The vendor group of recipes. These can be purchased from novice and expert profession trainers.
3. The normal treasure group of recipes. These are found as loot on various sentient creatures.
4. The one-shot treasure group of recipes. These are found as loot on various sentient creatures and can only be used once per recipe scroll.

Traditionally, items produced by the auto-granted and normal treasure recipe groups have had identical level requirements. The vendor and one-shot treasure recipe groups also produced items with identical levels. Players utilizing crafted gear could only reasonably expect to upgrade their equipment twice per crafting tier, and would typically have a prolonged gap in levels before they could look to wield an item produced by the next group of recipes. With Book 8, we are shifting some of these recipe groups a bit.

What’s New

We are adjusting the level requirements of the items produced by these recipe groups to smooth them throughout levels 1 – 50, and for some 50+ shields. The level requirements on some crafted items will increase, some will decrease, and some will remain the same. The stat bonuses on these crafted items will also be adjusted relative to the new level requirements.

As a crafter, you will have more opportunities to craft desirable equipment for yourself and for others!

Special Note

We are making special arrangements to ensure that the crafted equipment you are using right now does not become unusable!

In Book 8, equipped crafted armour, jewellery, shields, and weapons that will have a higher level requirement than your current level will be given a new minimum level equal to your current level when you initially log on, so you can continue to use your equipped items. Equipped crafted items that will have a lower level requirement than your current level will be given the correct new minimum level. All newly-crafted gear made during and beyond Book 8 will have the new minimum level requirements. At the end of this article, you’ll find tables containing the items that will change, their old levels, and their new levels.

New Optional Ingredients

Background

“I just found a Great Claw! Wait, what is that used for? The description says, ‘this item can be used in crafting.’ That’s not very helpful.”

“What kind of eyes do you need? Where do we have to go and what do we have to kill to get these eyes?”

In those two snippets of chat we are given a clear view into some of the issues with current optional ingredients: The items do not display information on which crafting professions can use them, and the items for some professions may only be retrieved from a relatively small group of creatures.

We are very pleased to say that in Book 8, a totally redesigned optional ingredients system awaits the entire crafting community!

What’s New

The rare creature trophies that were used as optional ingredients in many recipes to increase the chance of critical success will no longer be found in Book 8. The professions which have traditionally used these ingredients – Jeweller, Metalsmith, Scholar, Tailor, Weaponsmith, and Woodworker – will have brand new optional ingredients to add to their recipes!

Each new optional ingredient is unique to one specific crafting profession and tier of recipes. The tooltip description on each of these items will allow you to quickly identify the profession and tier it is used with.

All sentient creatures – orcs, goblins, trolls, and the like – will have a chance to drop optional ingredients as treasure. The level of a sentient creature determines which tier of optional ingredient has a chance to be produced. The following table may satisfy your thirst for knowledge.

Optional ingredient tier & sentient creature levels

In addition to sentient treasure, resource nodes will also be a source of optional ingredients! Ore deposits and wood branches will produce optional ingredients for multiple professions, while artifacts and crop fields will produce optional ingredients for just one profession each. Generally speaking, you can expect to find optional ingredients for any profession from the same types of resource nodes that you would find required ingredients for that same profession. This table might clear things up a bit.

Sources for new optional ingredients

Special Note

All existing optional ingredients – the rare tails, eyes, claws, and so on – will no longer be found as rare trophy treasure items in Book 8. Any optional ingredients you currently possess will become barter items, which can be traded to special Crafting Trophy Brokers located in Michel Delving and Esteldin. The brokers will accept all existing optional ingredients in exchange for new ingredients.

Tags: book 8, crafting, lotro