Help finding Aged Scraps of Text

[ShadowKntSDS]

I'm trying to get my scholar alt up past apprentice so i can at least harvest nodes in the content I'm running. I saw ~6 tier 2 nodes before i even found a single tier 1 node (and i had to lotro-wiki it to find it). Aged Scraps of Text's seem to be my road block.


I've seen that some people have said to farm humanoids, or weights. But in my quick tests with my higher level main, i found 0 texts from dourhands, 2 from goblins, and 0 from weights. In all cases I completely obliterated at least 20 of each. I know thats a small sample size, so it might just be dumb luck.

The AH has ridiculous prices, but they may be justified, given this apparent drop rate.

Are there any easier ways? I seem to have plenty of the other materials, but no recipes that can be completed without the texts.

[geoboy]

Is your friend.

The only way you're going to level up your scholar is to farm resource nodes. For T1 head to chetwood and get the ones around the blackwold's headquarters. Then run past some ruins south through the swamp. Hit the midgewater fort. Go back and do it again. If the nodes haven't respawned, hit the ruins over by where the bears are just north of staddle before you return to the blackwold's place. Repeat until you've got enough. The ruins on the greenway south of bree west gate is a good place for T2 nodes. Ruins are the best place to find these, so just look for them on a map and concentrate there.

Always have the track nodes skill on, and watch your minimap for scholar node tracks.

[ShadowKntSDS]

Thanks for the info. I am aware of how the tracker works, but as I found out there are really no tier 1 nodes in Ered Luin near the dwarf starting area. I'll try the areas you mentioned.

[gildhur]

Thanks for the info. I am aware of how the tracker works, but as I found out there are really no tier 1 nodes in Ered Luin near the dwarf starting area. I'll try the areas you mentioned.

The only ones there are in Orodost, the goblin ruins in Vale of Thrain. There are two nodes that spawn at various places in the lower and upper sections of the fortress. If you turn on your tracker and park at the top of the steps leading to where the Dourhand Thief is, you should get both spots on your map wherever they show up.

[BIGeyedBUG]

I've seen that some people have said to farm humanoids, or weights. But in my quick tests with my higher level main, i found 0 texts from dourhands, 2 from goblins, and 0 from weights. In all cases I completely obliterated at least 20 of each. I know thats a small sample size, so it might just be dumb luck.

Mob drops are a very significant source of scholar mats, but I think farming for them would just become frustrating unless you've got other concurrent reasons to do so. Fortunately these mobs are often valuable for deed and quest completions, as well as being lucrative sources of silver.

[Gregoth]

I feel your pain when looking for aged scraps of text. They seem to be more rare than honest politicians. The higher tier mats of the same type seem to appear at a more sane rate but the tier one scholar mats are infuriatingly rare. My tips are to make friends with a prospector and deal with them for sienna. You can also use your farming to grow lillies. A rare find among the lilly fields can be used to make the pea-green paint. Potions are also a good way to level up through the first tier as the morale and energy pots only require 1 drop item each.

[Unique]

Thanks for the info. I am aware of how the tracker works, but as I found out there are really no tier 1 nodes in Ered Luin near the dwarf starting area. I'll try the areas you mentioned.

Look Here

[noradaddy]

You can also level your historian by making pea-green wall paint. You need to farm Lily-of-the-Valley flowers looking for the crit item Lily-of-the-Valley Leaf. That along with a bunch of vendor stuff will get you the ingredients. It's a lot of repetitive farming and a lot of in game cash for all the vendor items you need but it's another option to harvesting the scholar nodes.

Andy

[Lotri]

I was doing the exact same thing last night... farming for Aged Scraps of Texts. I found a nice cycle east of Bree if you're at that stage.

North Chetwood -> Midgewater Fort -> Goblin Ruins and just make a circle like that.. I could be getting the names wrong, but the link posted above by Unique is very helpful.

[Darmokk]

Don't go after tier 1 scholar nodes. Be a prospector and collect copper salts, then switch to historian when you have enough. Remember you get scholar materials from beating up anything 2-legged even if you are not a scholar.

[brrmont]

Another way to get some aged scraps could be to watch the AH, someone comes along once in a while who feels bad for the price gouging and undersells. Or just undersells. And then gouges. Either way, you can sometimes get it on the price dip.

As far as 2-legged drops, the drop rate is still quite bad, here in 2012.

[Patplays]

Spent almost 2 hours last night riding around the human and elf low level zones. I found 2 shattered pitcher nodes. I found several broken urn nodes though, why are these in the low level areas instead of the tier 1 nodes?
There are so few tier 1 nodes that if there are a couple other people running around gathering, your screwed. I pass by dozens of wood and ore nodes , there need to be some tier 1 nodes added methinks, it's very frustrating.

[Qwyxzl]

I was extremely frustrated when I was collecting tier one materials. Particularly as I had completely ignored those on 2 characters and just vendored them The best place that I found for tier 1 scholar mats was the goblin encampment that sits outside the entrance to Sarnur. There are 2 or 3 scholar nodes, plus 1 or 2 chests/corpses that contain scholar materials as well and all the 2 legged sources. Just start at the bottom and kill your way up to the top. Then run back down and repeat. should not take too long to get what you need.

[Susuwatari]

Just thought I'd share some results from a recent search for Tier 1 scholar mats that I ran. If you're not having any luck with nodes (my server seems to have a lot of competition for them), I'd suggest trying for mat drops from the elite goblins in Rath Teraig (Ered Luin). Regular goblins are all over that place and the scholar mat drop rate from them isn't wonderful - the lvl. 11-12 elites found in the higher-up areas seem to drop mats more often (some of them were dropping 2 Aged Scraps at a time!). In about 30-40 minutes I was able to get:

23 Aged Scraps of Text
14 Third Age Relics
A handful of Worn Tablet Fragments
Several T1/T2 crit candles
plus assorted crit materials for other crafts as well as some gear I put up on the AH

Killing the elites was a piece of cake for my level 22 Hunter, so this is probably doable for characters even lower than that. I also finished up my goblin slayer deeds as well as my first two "Enmity of the Goblins" deeds, so it was a good time all around. :-)

[Cybermage1000]

I was recently having the exact same problem with no Aged Scraps of Text to be found... I even had 2 alts and a couple of friends helping me gather them. In the end, I came up with a little cycle that helped me get leveled up though... and it had nothing to do with the scraps.

After a bit of exploring, I found a decent number of yarrow root and some friends gave me some sienna. Using those to make the dyes, I was able to sell just 5 dyes in the AH for a pretty good price. Then I turned around and used that money to fund a mass production of Lesser Athelas potions.

Since I used my money from my auction, it didn't really set me back any money-wise, and I got Mastery in apprentice level in no time. I have to agree though, those Aged Scraps are a headache to find in the numbers you really need them.

[Spare_the_Rod]

If anyone in this thread is still having trouble finding Teir 1 Nodes (Shattered Pitchers). Here is the Teir 1 run I do for Apprentice Scholar. Doesn't matter where you start just know the spots. Chetwood South (Blackwold ruins), Midge water marshes has 2 locations to check The main ruins where the queen is and some ruins NW of there. Chetwood North (Blackwold HQ) Each spot here should grant about 2 nodes. Just simply ride up and down this route with your tracker on. Hope this helps.

PS Had a picture detailing the run but can't figure out how to attach

[Susuwatari]

If anyone in this thread is still having trouble finding Teir 1 Nodes (Shattered Pitchers). Here is the Teir 1 run I do for Apprentice Scholar. Doesn't matter where you start just know the spots. Chetwood South (Blackwold ruins), Midge water marshes has 2 locations to check The main ruins where the queen is and some ruins NW of there. Chetwood North (Blackwold HQ) Each spot here should grant about 2 nodes. Just simply ride up and down this route with your tracker on. Hope this helps.

PS Had a picture detailing the run but can't figure out how to attach

This is indeed a good route! You stand to encounter up to 6 Shattered Pitchers per lap if there are no other Scholars around In any case, it's more efficient than going between the ruins in southern Ered Luin, for sure.

A nice little bonus is that the southernmost spider ruins (Midgewater Fort, IIRC) and the Blackwold areas generally have a few Supply Crate spawns as well, and these often contain crafting mats and sometimes Scholar mats. Worth checking as long as you are passing through. The Blackwolds themselves also drop Scholar mats from time to time, and this is a nice place to work on your brigand-slayer deeds as none of them are above level 8, IIRC.

[Scruffynerf]

Personally, I just either look for them on the AH. There seems to be a few people dropping them either just before, or just after a weekend.

I, like many others, made the mistake when I only had the one toon of not collecting them, and then later on rolled a Historian, so it is a slow process.

Thanks to those in the thread who have mentioned particular runs - useful information to know.

[Manhara]

All i did was activitated the artifact tracker and i went to the ruins in midgewater marsh and if you don't have artifact tracker in your skill panel,go to character panel and go to skills it will be there.

[Lorenzio]

Good thread. I also stupidly sold all the Aged Scraps my alts collected before I had a Scholar and really wanted them. THEN they seemed to get really scarce. Heading in to try the tips listed here now.

Update: Got nothing mining lots of nodes throughout Midgewater. Got 2 Aged Texts after whacking lots of goblins however.

[Jeb682]

I THINK that's the level you can get a lot of in the fortress south of Bree. If your character is high enough level to handle the mobs there, there are about 8 nodes which respawn fairly quickly. Just keep making the rounds. The next level has the same sort of setup in Iorvinas (sp?) southwest of Ost Guruth.

[JeauxLOTR]

Don't go after tier 1 scholar nodes. Be a prospector and collect copper salts, then switch to historian when you have enough. Remember you get scholar materials from beating up anything 2-legged even if you are not a scholar.

This is the best way to do it thru tier 3. Collect Dye materials and horde ore. Switch to Historian and you have enough dye mats & ingots to level both scholar and weaponsmith.

[Lorenzio]

Following another suggestion I went to the gobln infested ruins of Orodost, turned on my relic tracker, and kept going up and down the stairs finding pottery. Got 24 Aged Scraps and other goodies in a short time. My level was high enough so the goblins were no bother. Some pottery finds have up to 4 Scraps of Text. Cool. One more quick visit and I should be able to open the Journeyman Scholar tier.

[Toddlepip]

With the good buff to the drop rate of Farming rare items with RoR Update 8, I found it a lot less hassle to simply level Scholar up to Supreme level via Dye and Wall-Paint recipes rather than try to farm scholar nodes or mob drops. Especially as, being an Historian, you are also a Farmer and it can be done with just one character.

To get over the Scholar Apprentice hurdle (which really is the most painful in many ways given the hard time gathering 'Aged Scrap of Text') I suggest the following;

You should already have Farmer at Apprentice level as an Historian.

You can use the dye recipes you learn from the Trainer but the 'Gold Dye' requires 'Yarrow' which is hard to obtain unless you have access to higher level Farmer (high enough level to obtain the Wildflower recipes in Galtrev) or time to gather the Yarrow (will take a lot of time!).

Likewise, the 'Sienna Dye' requires 'Piece of Sienna' which is more reliable to gather, dropping from 'Tin Deposit' nodes (these have also been buffed actually so easier but still takes time to gather enough) This leaves the easiest route to craft to the one wall paint recipe available.

Go and check the auctions for;

Pea-green Wall Paint Recipe. This is the only drop from the 'Apprentice Scholar Scroll Case', so there are often plenty to be had and at a cheap price. The reason why I recommend this method. Details are;

Pea-green Wall Paint Recipe

details: http://lotro-wiki.com/index.php/Item...l_Paint_Recipe

XP gained per craft= 6

Points Needed this Craft Level: 200 Proficiency (400 Mastery)

200 / 6 = 34 crafts requires;

34 Lily-of-the-Valley Leaf (rare Farming crop)
34 Piece of Chalk
34 Bottle of Water
34 Small Glass Phial

You buy all the items except the leaves from the trainer/supplier.

Next Farming the rare leaves requires the following recipe you buy from the trainer;

Lily-of-the-Valley Field Recipe

details: http://lotro-wiki.com/index.php/Item...y_Field_Recipe

Per crop;
1 Apprentice Flower Seed
1 Bucket of Water
1 Handful of Fertilizer
1 Pile of Rivendell Soil*

* Produces Well-tended Lily-of-the-Valley Field. The most efficient way to gather the leaves is to use the crit soil to crit each crop as a 'Well-tended' one, as it produces more rare items per gather and is really recommended; though you can do it without but it just takes more time/effort for little savings.

The cost is negligible for Apprentice level items even the crit soil.

The drop rate for rare items is not fixed so hard to give an exact amount of crops needed for the 34 required but I was getting around 5-7 rare items for each 10 crops sown, so around 60 crops.

You end up with the required Lily-of-the-Valley Leaf items, the crops to further level Farming (requires the additional 'Lily-of-the-Valley Crop Recipe' to process these) and also cooking rare items to use or sell. And all for little cost.

It really doesn't take long to do this especially as they have shortened the sowing time along with buffing the rare item drop rates. Also, you can sow up to 12 fields before gathering though I suggest sow 10 at a time is safer, it still makes it faster.

All in all you are probably looking at around 30 minutes max. to buy materials from the Supplier, sow the crops, gather then and make the wall paints to level the Apprentice stage (double if you want to reach mastery but it's not essential)

Hope this at least gives a more viable method to get over this initial hurdle to being a Scholar. And thanks to Turbine for bumping rare item drop rates and speeding up Farming, though adding more Scholar nodes in starter areas and/or buff the drop rate really seems to better long term answer.

[Rumfigger]

Is your friend.

The only way you're going to level up your scholar is to farm resource nodes. For T1 head to Chetwood and get the ones around the Blackwold's headquarters. Then run past some ruins south through the swamp. Hit the Midgewater fort. Go back and do it again. If the nodes haven't re-spawned, hit the ruins over by where the bears are just north of Staddle before you return to the Blackwold's place. Repeat until you've got enough. The ruins on the Greenway south of Bree west gate is a good place for T2 nodes. Ruins are the best place to find these, so just look for them on a map and concentrate there.

Always have the track nodes skill on, and watch your mini-map for scholar node tracks.

Also stop at Ost Baranor just south of the Yellow Tree as there are a couple of scholar nodes in there. At all places also loot any supply chests for additional T1 scraps.