Guide to Scholar

From Lotro-Wiki.com

The scholar uses their Scholar's Glass to harvest crafting materials and craft scholar items. This makes it a very important part of the scholar's equipment. It is one of the few dual use crafting tools in the game.

When you gain the scholar profession you will be given the Inferior Scholar's Glass. It is inexpensive to repair so it is economical to use for your earliest efforts as a scholar. Since it reduces your chance for a critical success by 5% you do not want to keep using it for very long. You should definitely replace it before you have become a Master Apprentice Scholar.

You can purchase a Scholar's Glass from a supplier or Novice Scholar NPC for 2 silver. This is an economical upgrade that does not have the penalty to critical success. Since you can also get critical successes while gathering you might wish to purchase this immediately upon becoming a scholar.

A metalsmith can craft more capable tools. The Bronze Scholar's Glass has no level restriction so you can purchase one immediately upon learning the scholar profession if you wish. If you cannot find one on the auction house then you can ask in the trade chat for a metalsmith to craft one for you. It is slightly more expensive to repair than the Scholar's Glass. Since it adds 1% to your chance for a critical success it is a vast improvement over the Inferior Scholar's Glass.

Improvements to your Scholar's Glass mainly add more chance for a critical success. This is important in both gathering and crafting since critical successes can give you better results in both aspects the scholar craft. Each successive upgrade has a level requirement and will cost more to repair. The additional chance for critical successes can easily offset this additional cost once you have gained mastery level recipes that are in demand on the auction house. If you can find a very skilled metalsmith they can craft a mastery level Scholar's Glass that will provide an additional chance for critical success over the standard item. The mastery level tools will always be a superior version in the title.