What is the best way to fix lace knitted items?

Hello, I am beginning my second lace project. It is a tote bag with weight 4 cotton yarn. From my experience with my first project, whenever I would mess up, I would have to rip everything. I know how to drop a stitch at the column of a messed up stitch and then use a crochet hook to get everything back on the needle but with lace patterns, I don't see how I can do this since the loops are much more complicated, i.e. yarn overs and knit 2 together. Am I correct in thinking that I need to rip it out instead of dropping the stitch at a column and working my way down?