my latest addictionFollow

I've found a new addiction... I admit it... I can't keep myself from going after ground spawns... They're just so rewarding and so darn much fun!

Now I'm not talking about the various food items you find lying about in the fields like strawberries, cabbages and taters. Oh, those are nice too but I'm talking about treasure spawns. Let me explain...

During closed beta, I had gotten in the habit of going into every spider lair I could find. You see, in the spider lairs there are cocoons (ground spawns) and inside these cocoons there is always some interesting treasure.

Also, sometimes in a ruin or in a camp you'll find a chest or a strongbox... not the quest related ones, I'm talking about the random ground spawn ones that anyone can open and plunder! Problem with them is they seem to be very rare... In fact, I can't say I've seen more than one or two since open beta started!

Well, anyway... I figured that until sometime after launch, I wouldn't be doing any spider lairs because the only ones I know of are lvl 20+, so out of practicality, I had put my ground spawn jones on hold.

Then last night while I was tooling around in the Southern Fields of Bree, Smackin bear and pig and anything on two legs, I came across a backpack. It was just lying there in front of one of the bear dens in Hillshire Ruins (between the South Bree Fields and The Brandy Hills) screaming "PICK ME UP"!!!

So I pulled the bears that were clustered in front of the den (one at a time) and after dropping the last one, ran up and claimed my prize.

The backpacks seem to only spawn one at a time but tend to be filled with goodies... usually some coin, a food item and a nice armor or weapon drop. I've collected about a dozen in the last two nights and some have had as many as 6 items inside. WooHoo!

Gotta go... I think I hear a backpack callin' my name!

I also like looting treasure chests and the sort. It's fun to go jumping off a ridge or cliff and open the chest unbeknownst to monsters guarding it.

There are cocoons in the easier parts of the Old Forest, along the path from Buckland and I've seen them in Chetwoods as well. I've seen several chests in the bandit camps, could be they spawn more around certain MoB types. I've never seen a backpack.

I was traipsing around the Shire last night and noticed those Hobbits have a lot more food items lying around on the ground than we do in Bree-Land. I'm a cook, but not a farmer, so hopefully I can use them.

I actually got my first purple weapon from one of those backpacks. Seems like most people just ignore them though.

Hey now, those are my troll fragments!

My addiction is crafting. I love it.

There's a strongbox spawn in the Midgewater marsh by the larger goblin camp. Not inside the camp, outside it near the ruins and small pond.

I think there are treasure chests inside the goblin camps sometimes as well. But its pretty hard to get to them at level 15.


Also, there is a nice chest spawn up where the wights mounds are, north east of Gondamon in Erud Luin. Its in a stone structure in the northwest corner of the area where the wight mounds are, in Haud Lin(sp?). BTW, the wights drop decent loot and are good for grinding from 13 to 15 if you are a Dwarf or Elf and tired of quests. Theres a couple quests tied to the wights, so you'll find them sooner or later.

Yeah! They have a drawf corpse in a couple places in Erud Luin that is actually lootable like a treasure chest. Kinda creepy, but cool. When playing a dwarf, I felt a bit guilty looting the dead body of my kinsman.

So I hunted bears last night at the bear nests north of Adso's Camp. There are 2 different backpack spawns, and each spawn has 2 or 3 location choices (there might even be 3 spawns, its hard to tell). Usually the backpacks are in the little rock caves that the bears stand in. Sometimes they are out in the middle of the ruins. I think there must be some anti-exploit code on these backpacks because I kept getting less loot each time I looted one. But I still got a few recipes, some good weapons, a bit of armor, some crafting resources (ore, wood or gems), food items, and copper coins. I spent about 3 hours farming the place and probably looted 15-20 backpacks total. Also there are 3 or 4 copper/tin spawns and rowan wood spawns in the bear dens area, and of course the bears drop light hides. So from a crafting perspective, this place a gold mine (ok.. a copper mine). And the provisioner at Adso's camp is convenient selling the junk loot from farming, and for repairs. Dieing puts you at the west bree entrance, so thats a good time to run to your bank vault and drop off your good loot, or sell it at the AH. The drops are not quite as good as farming goblins or orcs, but you can't get light hides from orcs.

Edited, Apr 17th 2007 4:31pm by kbuegel