Crafting: Tiers and Experience

In our previous post we have already discussed all the options regarding available professions. Another concept which must be clear for everyone are the crafting Tiers. The first available Tier upon which all professions start is the Apprentice level (or Tier 1).

The crafting Tiers are:

Apprentice (Tier 1)
Journeyman (Tier 2)
Expert (Tier 3)
Artisan (Tier 4)
Master (Tier 5)
Supreme (Tier 6)

Each Tier will give you the ability to gather ingredients and craft items which will always be level appropriate, i.e.:

Apprentice (Tier 1): Level 7 up to 13
Journeyman (Tier 2): Level 14 up to 21
Expert (Tier 3): Level 22 up to 31
Artisan (Tier 4): Level 32 up to 41
Master (Tier 5): Level 42 up to 51
Supreme (Tier 6): Level 52 up to 65

What does it mean? In order to prospect Copper and Tin (Tier 1 ores) you must be an Apprentice Propector. To craft a Bronze Blade (Tier 1 ingredient) you must be an Apprentice Weaponsmith. To forage for Yew Wood (Tier 3 wood) you must be an Expert Forager, and so on.

Once you have gathered the raw materials (ore, wood, etc) with a Gathering Profession, go to the nearest crafting hall available. In there you will find specific areas to work the materials you have found (Forges, Workbenches, owens and Studies). Each profession requires a different working area (e.g., prospectors, weaponsmiths and metalsmiths must use Forges, foragers, tailors and jewellers must use workbenches, and so on). With the crafting panel open, all items available for work are highlighted in green. If they remain in white, it means at least one ingredient or raw material is missing, or the minimum required quantity of them hasn't been met.

Now, the more the merrier. Every time you craft something, you will receive crafting experience in that given profession. The crafting experience is variable according to the ingredient or item crafted and it is represented in the red anvil bar, as shown in the image below:

Once you progress to completely fill the red anvil bar, it means you've achieved Proficiency with that Tier. The first thing to do is search around the crafting hall for a new quest, which will unlock your next profession Tier! If you don't complete this crafting quest, you will not be able to progress with higher crafting tiers or achieve Mastery on your current tier, which is a problem, because you will not gain any further experience in that level. If you complete the crafting quest, a yellow anvil bar will appear next to your current crafting bar, allowing you to gain further experience towards the next level:

One point that is quite important is that you also cannot achieve mastery on a given Tier unless you have already completed the Mastery of the previous Tier! Is it confusing? Please see the image below:

This is an example of someone with full Proficiency in, let's call it, Tier 1 (Apprentice) and incomplete Tier 1 Mastery. Getting the yellow anvil bar open for business on Tier 1 allowed him to start gaining proficiency on Tier 2 (Journeyman). Once he gets that Tier 1 yellow anvil bar and the Tier 2 red anvil bar full, he's be eligible to complete a crafting quest to open the Tier 2 yellow anvil bar towards Mastery (which will also open the Tier 3 red anvil bar towards Proficiency).

And well, regarding crafting quests... They might give you some trouble. The crafting quests for Gathering Professions are all basically just talking to someone near the crafting hall of work area, reading a book and ergo, you got the next Tier open. For Crafting Professions, it is quite different. Usually those quests will force you to cover great distances just to talk to someone or having to kill someone/something to receive a drop which will allow you to complete the quest. This will go on until you reach the Supreme Tier, where for some reason the crafting quests do not exist. So get ready for at least 5 level appropriate (according to the crafting Tier, not your own level) quests. In the now timeless words of AC/DC: it's a long way to the top if you wanna rock'n'roll.

It's basically a chain of progress, one step leads to another one. It is very important, if you really want to craft items either for your personal use or stockpiling gold pieces, to pay attention to the ingredients and raw materials you gather. As your character levels up you will be lead to higher level areas of the game, where the lower Tier ingredients will not be available, which means you will have the get back to places far away from your objectives in order to fill in your crafting bars.

Crafting is basically a matter of being organized. Keep your crafting goals close to your character's quests. Trade often and try to make money at the Auction House, so that you can afford many of the ingredients which sometimes aren't readily available in the wild and in the dungeons. And sure, one can try to become a Supreme Craftsman of Craftswoman without properly adventuring throughout Middle-Earth, but you know what people say: the tastiest fish you'll ever eat is one you've caught yourself.

Crafting: A Beginner's Guide

in Arnediad od Arnor is a kinship extremely focused on crafting. Since most of our members are already Supreme (Tier 6) crafters and with kindred guild reputation, we just share ingredients, recipes and do our best to support each other by providing everyone with good items. But if you're a beginner craftsman or craftswoman, you might be asking yourself: "what the heck?!" Let's talk basics first then.

Before reaching character level 10, it is extremely likely that you would bump into a NPC called "Master of Apprentices" (all starting locations have one) which asks you to join a crafting Vocation. Each vocation includes a setting of 3 professions (at least one gathering profession and one crafting profession).

Gathering Professions will allow a character to mine for metal, lumber wood, find ancient texts hidden in deep dungeons and so on. All gathering professions will also provide you with the ability to process the items you harvest into proper ingredients for crafting.

Crafting Professions will allow a character to turn raw items and ingredients into those beautiful things that keep us pumped up, like weapons, jewels, armor, food, potions and so on.

Be careful choosing your vocation! If you choose a vocation, progress with it and wish to change to another, you will lose all progress in the previous one. Also, most vocations will include one gathering profession that will directly support one crafting profession. For an example, the Armsman vocation includes 3 professions: Prospector (gathering), Weaponsmith (crafting) and Woodworker (crafting). With the Propector Pro, you'll be able to mine metal ore and even refine it into steel, which will be usable for crafting weapons with the Weaponsmith Pro. But if you would like to be a Woodworker and craft Bows and Javelins, you might try the Woodsman vocation, which includes the Forester Pro to lumber wood and refine it properly.

Armourer: includes Prospector, Metalsmith & Tailor.
Armsman: includes Prospector, Weaponsmith & Woodworker.
Explorer: includes Forester, Prospector & Tailor.
Historian: includes Farmer, Scholar & Weaponsmith.
Tinker: includes Prospector, Jeweller & Cook.
Woodsman: includes Forester, Farmer & Woodworker.
Yeoman: includes Farmer, Tailor & Cook.

Most professions are interlocked with at least other profession. For an example, in order to craft the best weapons with the Weaponsmith Pro, you have to use Polished Gems, which are processed by a Tinker with the Jeweller Pro. This generates a great synergy between players, specially if you're in a collaborative kinship like ours, because in the end, trading ingredients and experiences will make you progress faster.

Below is a brief description of all professions (source: Wikipedia):

Cooks create food items consumed to recover morale and power when not in combat and give temporary bonuses to stats. They also make lute strings that reduce minstrels' threat. Materials for this skill are harvested by farmers, or by the new hobby skill, fishing.

Farmers grow crops used by cooks. This skill differs from the other harvesting professions in that it requires seeds to grow items. Farmers also provide scholars with rare harvests used to make dyes and straw to make traps for hunters.

Foresters gather and work randomly scattered wood. They are also able to treat leather from hides that drop from animals for use by a tailor.

Jewellers create various pieces of jewelry, which confer benefits on the wearer, such as additional stats. They also craft hope tokens, runes for champions and rune stones for runekeepers. Jewellers get gems and metal from prospectors.

Metalsmiths create heavy armour and shields made of metal and tools for all the crafting professions. They get materials from prospectors, tailors and jewellers.

Prospectors mine randomly scattered ores, gems and salts. They smelt ore into metal ingots, which are used by jewellers, weaponsmiths, and metalsmiths.

Scholar combines both harvesting and crafting. Scholars decipher lore usually found near ruins. Scholar uses lore items and other ingredients to make potions, bow chants, scrolls which serve as buffs for battle, and scrolls that give other crafters a higher critical chance to make a better - 'critted' - item. They also make dyes from plants, animal organs and mineral salts, and scribe books for hunters, loremasters, and minstrels.

Tailors make light and medium armour, cosmetic clothing, burglar signals, captain standards and runekeeper satchels. Light armour requires cloth from vendors, and medium armour requires leather from foresters.

Weaponsmiths craft weapons such as swords, axes, and maces. They also produce tricks for burglars, traps for hunters, and shield spikes for guardians.

Woodworkers make wooden weapons (bows, clubs, hammers and spears), minstrel instruments, warden carvings and other crafting components needed by other professions. Woodworkers require treated wood from foresters.

That's it for this post, it's already too long. Stay tuned for more to come. Next: how to actually progress in a profession!