Lockpicking

From WoW-Quest.NET

Template:Lockpicking The Pick Lock skill allows rogues to use [Thieves' Tools] to open locked doors, chests, and lockboxes. It is like a gathering skill, such as Fishing or Mining; the rogue must have it at or above a certain level to open certain types of locks. This skill typically doesn't advance quickly enough with casual use; rogues must occasionally go out on runs to improve their lockpicking. Fortunately, your rogue trainer can point you to areas which contain footlockers at your skill level. The basic formula for your maximum lockpicking skill at a particular level is (5 * level). Lockpicking can be learned from a rogue trainer at level 16.

Strategy

1 to 170

Early on you might get some Practice Lock from an engineer to increase your lockpicking up to skill level 80. The quest to obtain Lockpicking will point you toward plenty of practice chests.

The best way for Alliance Rogues to get their lockpicking skill up at level 16-20 (after getting the Pick Lock skill) is Alther's Mill in the Redridge Mountains region. The quest Image:UI-CharacterCreate-Classes Rogue.png [20] Alther's Mill requires lockpicking a chest in Alther's Mill for a quest item and is close to the practice lockboxes. These chests respawn quickly and may be practiced upon from 1-100 skill (though this is capped at 80 if the rogue goes there while still level 16). Horde Rogues can gain early levels from an equivalent quest on the ship off the Merchant Coast, south of Ratchet in the Barrens. Additionally, Blood Elf Rogues may take the quest, Quest:Greed in the Ghostlands at level 16 which takes them to the Amani Catacombs where they may practice lockpicking up to 100 (currently level * 5). In addition to training, these chests contain treasure.

The Rogue poisons quests for Horde and Alliance provide the next opportunity for solid skill gains. The quest is gained at level 20 although it may be too difficult for many players at level 20. The item required to complete this quest is contained inside a locked chest that can be picked repeatedly up to 170. (You are likely to hit your skill level cap first, if you are on the poison quest.) If you've already finished the quest, you can still use the chests to gain skill. The chests don't highlight when you mouse over them after the first time, when you obtain the quest item, so you have to activate your lockpicking skill first and then click the chest. The chest will be empty if you already have the quest item or have completed the quest. Be sure to close the empty loot window in order to speed along the chest respawning (it is very quick if the loot window is not left open.) The poison Touch of Zanzil is applied every time the chest is lockpicked. The poisons can be dispelled if you have the cure from the poison quest chain, Anti-Venom skill (and Anti-Venom in your pack) from the First Aid profession, or by the Dwarf racial Stoneform. The boss guarding the chest will probably respawn a couple of times while you are leveling your lockpicking skill on this chest. (It appears that either faction could use the opposite faction chest; not tested.)

Also, level 1 Battered Footlockers can be pick pocketed from the mobs around Durnholde Keep in the Hillsbrad Foothills. Continuously make routes around Durnholde Keep, and pickpocket mobs for Junkboxes. Note again that these are level 1, so if you've already leveled up using the lock box in the rogue poisons quest, these will be grey and therefore useless for leveling your skill.

170 to 300

Once you get to 150-170, you can go to Angor Fortress in Badlands. Go to the upper parts, and again pickpocketing for junkboxes will help. Once you get to 175 you can open all of the boxes in the fortress. Another very good place to go is Sar'theris Strand in northwest Desolace. Underwater, there are plenty of Waterlogged Footlocker, that will easy get you to 210. Highly recommended to bring an elixir of waterbreathing though.

Once at 205 or so, go to the Scarlet Monastery doors. Read below the doors section on what to do. Open each door, go into the instance and pickpocket 3 mobs. Come back out and open the doors and the timer will have reset for the skillups from the doors. Continuously do this until 225. At 225, go to Searing Gorge. Down in the slag pit are Dented Footlocker. You can open all of them, and again pickpocket for junkboxes. Additionally, you can travel to the Swamp of Sorrows. A water breathing potion makes circling the deep water around the Sunken Temple much easier, as Mossy Footlocker spawn throughout the area. Stay in either of these locations until 250-255.

The best place to raise your skill from 250 to 300 is in Blackrock Depths. Simply go in, turn to the left and unlock the Shadowforge Gate. Continue forward and take the first right, picking the next Shadowforge Gate. Pick the first door on the left, the East Garrison Door, and head forward staying on the bottom level. If you are level 60 or above, pick the large wooden object sticking out of the ground below the giant gear, The Shadowforge Lock; younger levels can agro the mobs around it. Then head out of the instance and reset it before doing all four again. Note that you can only reset the instance 5 times before it disables you from entering, saying "You have entered too many instances recently". This is valid for the whole account and resets roughly an hour after you entered the first time.

Another place for 250-300 is Tyr's Hand in Eastern Plaguelands. Pickpocket the mobs and find all of the Scarlet Footlocker. In the time it takes to take a full circle of Tyr's Hand, the starting point will be pickpocketable and have boxes respawned. Do this until 300.

After 300

The best place at 70 is in Feralfen Village in Zangarmarsh. This is located south of Coilfang Reservoir and Twin Spire Ruins, west of the Lagoon and east of Quagg Ridge. There are three areas of buildings clumped together with a handful of wicker chests in each. They typically spawn inside and around the huts. The tower in the western section of the village has wicker chests on the first floor and on the top floor. You can also pickpocket the mobs (levels 61-63) with an 11% chance of getting a Strong Junkbox (requires Lockpicking 300).

Another location for leveling lockpicking between 300 and 350 is outside of Black Temple in Shadowmoon Valley (very east side, hunk of land sticking out). Stay near the blood elves that are paladins/warriors (not by name), not the demon hunters. Pickpocket these and kill them to have them respawn. As many know, there is an epic thrown weapon that can be taken out of the Strong Junkbox that come out of Outland, Spinesever, however it was recently nerfed.

Either way, from 350 you can open any door that can be picked, any box, and any chest. Good luck!

Gear

Dark Leather Gloves, created through Leatherworking, increase lockpicking skill by 5. They reduce the chance of a lockpicking attempt failing and also can be used to pick locks slightly out of your skill range.

Pickable Locks

Crafted Items

Crafted Items
Item Level	Item	Orange	Yellow	Green	Grey
20	[Practice Lock]	1	30	60	80

Locked Items

Junkbox/table Lockbox/table Locked Chest/table

Footlockers

Footlocker/table

Typically, unguarded footlockers have a lower skill range than guarded ones. When lockpicking, nearby mobs may also become hostile when they are otherwise outside your aggro range.

Locked Treasure Chests

Locked Chest/table2

Doors

Doors
Location	Door	Orange	Yellow	Green	Grey	Note
The Deadmines	Gate	1	?	?	?	Can also be opened with Defias Gunpowder
Gnomeregan	Workshop Door	150	175	?	?	Can also be opened with Workshop Key
Scarlet Monastery	Armory and Cathedral Doors	175	200	225	275	Can also be opened with Scarlet Key
Searing Gorge	Searing Gorge Gate	225	250	275	?	Can also be opened with Key to Searing Gorge
Blackrock Depths	East Garrison Door	250	275	300	?	Can also be opened with Shadowforge Key
Blackrock Depths	Prison Cells	?	250	300	?	Can also be opened with Prison Cell Key
Blackrock Depths	Shadowforge Gates	250	275	300	?	Can also be opened with Shadowforge Key
Blackrock Depths	Shadowforge Mechanism	250	275	300	?	Can also be opened with Shadowforge Key
Scholomance	Scholomance Door	280	323-336	341	?	Can also be opened with Skeleton Key
Stratholme	Stratholme Gates	300	?	?-334	?	Can also be opened with Key to the City
Dire Maul	Crescent Door	300	?	?-334	?	Can also be opened with Crescent Key
Shattered Halls	Shattered Halls Door	350	?	?	?	Can also be opened with Shattered Halls Key
Shadow Labyrinth	Shadow Labyrinth Gate	350	?	?	?	Can also be opened with Shadow Labyrinth Key
The Arcatraz	Arcatraz Door	350	?	?	?	Can also be opened with Key to the Arcatraz
Karazhan	Karazhan Door	350	?	?	?	Can also be opened with The Master's Key

Skill gains on doors not inside an instance are on a timer. They cannot be picked repeatedly for skill. A certain amount of time (about 5 min) must elapse before skill gains may be realized again. As of 8-5-08, doors within instances must also be given time to cool down before getting another skill point, even if you reset the instance

As of 12-16-07, there seems to be a 50/50 chance that picking a junkbox will reset the skill gain timer on either or both Scarlet Monastery doors. Zoning into any of the four instances and pickpocketing at least three mobs always resets the SM door timer on both doors.

Alternatives to Lockpicking

If a rogue is unavailable, there are several alternatives.

Locks can be opened by various Skeleton keys made by Blacksmiths. There are four types of skeleton key recipes, all of which can be learned from Blacksmithing trainers. Each recipe creates two keys, which are used up on a successful pick.

Additionally Engineers can use Seaforium Charges to open locked doors and chests.

Skeleton keys (from Blacksmithing)
Item Level	Item	Unlocks
20	[Silver Skeleton Key]	25
30	[Golden Skeleton Key]	125
40	[Truesilver Skeleton Key]	200
55	[Arcanite Skeleton Key]	300

Seaforium Charges (from Engineering)
Item Level	Item	Unlocks
20	[Small Seaforium Charge]	150
40	[Large Seaforium Charge]	250
55	[Powerful Seaforium Charge]	300
70	[Elemental Seaforium Charge]	350

Beta

In the early closed beta, mages had a spell called Khadgar's Unlocking which could unlock lockboxes and doors by consuming a reagent, but this spell was removed in Patch 0.9.

Lockpicking Etiquette

There is very little consensus on what standard policies for lockpicking are; Rogue expectations can vary wildly from server to server. Some expect a tip, and some gladly open locks for free. Common assumptions can be:

If the Rogue is not sending messages via Trade, General chat or by yelling, then it is never acceptable to open a trade with a Rogue without first asking him/her if he can open a certain box. Among other things, it can disrupt a mail composition, an auction house scan, or a profession crafting, and can be very irritating. Many Rogues will automatically ignore people who open trade windows unsolicited. HOWEVER, if the Rogue is clearly stating that he/she is opening lockboxes, it can be considered even more irritating to the Rogue who then has to deal with floods of PMs coming in, so simply open trade.
Rogues will generally offer their service for free, it is generally expected to offer a tip if you can afford it.
If a Rogue expects a fee for lockpicking, he should negotiate it ahead of time. Otherwise, gracious players often tip anywhere between 2 and 5 to the opening Rogue, based on the type of lockbox opened. Most locks under Thorium Lockboxes, are usually worth tipping the Rogue 50 and Thorium and above is worth about 1 based on most servers. A generally good guideline to follow would be one silver for every skill on the lockbox (ex. Thorium Lockboxes would be 2 50 .
If you ask a Rogue before opening, usually he/she will open it for free.