Warcraft Lock Picking Guide

by Laenis

Q. How do I get the skill lockpicking?
A. You must buy the skill from your trainer at level 16. Then you can complete the quest that trainer gives you to get free thieves tools (or buy them at 15 silver (or so).

Q. Okay, I have the quest, but my skill is super low I can't complete the quest, what now?
A. In the same area as your lockpicking quest, there should be some chests you can level up on. These chests are orange at skill level 1 (see below for color explanation) and don't go grey until about 100. Also, see down below for a 1-300 skillup guide.

Q. What do these colors mean? Red? Orange? Grey? I'm colorblind!
A. Every lock you pick has a 'skill level'. Just like with tradeskill items, they are color coded.
Red = can't pick the lock at your skill level
Orange = guarenteed skill up
Yellow = good chance for skillup
Geeen = low chance for skillup
Grey = no chance for skillup
There is a list down below for commonly items and their skillup numbers in reference to lock difficulty.

Q. Do I have to visit a trainer to get journeyman/artisan/safecracker rank in Lockpicking?
A. You don't. Your skill scales with level: every level you gain as a rogue translates into 5 extra points to your lockpicking cap.

Lockpicking Guide from 1-300
1-100 - Keep picking the instant respawn chests near the lockpicking quest.

100-175 - You can pick the Polly quest chest (Horde LP Quest chest), OR you can use either of the chests in the Poison quests (Alliance OR Horde) you get at later levels. You will have to click on your lockpicking skill first, then click the chest. (If you have the reading and inference skills of a legaly 'mentally deficient' person: YOU HAVE TO READ BELOW IN THE TRIVIAL LIST.) (I have just insulted retarded people everywhere, I've seen mentally retarded people with more smarts than half the people in this board.)

For the Polly/Poison Tower chests: You NEED to activate (CLICK) your lockpicking skill icon first, then (CLICK) on the chest as your cursor will not change automatically like it did during the quest or before it.

175-225 - Pickpocket mobs for Sturdy Junkboxes. Several mobs drop them, check thottbot and pick the best location for you. I recomend mobs in instances, that way you can pick it clean, reset the instance, then go to town again. You can also pick doors in instances at this range. I personally picked the door in the Scarlet Monestary cathedral from 180-225 one day by repeatedly resetting the instance.

225-280 There is no real easy way that I've found to skill this range other than to keep doing junkboxes. You can use the gates in the NE corner of Searing Gorge, but there is no reliable way to reset them (see notes below for more information). Also opening lockboxes in your faction's major city will get you skillups.

280-300 There are 3 doors in Blackrock Depths that are very close to the zone in that you can use to skill up this.


Trival list
If your skill is lower than 'orange' number, you won't be able to pick the lock (It won't even let you try). If your skill is higher than the 'grey' number, you won't get a skillup from that item. A '?' marks information that might be wrong, multiple '???' mark missing information.

Pickpocketted stuff:

Battered Junkbox (Orange: 25? Grey: 100?)
Worn Junkbox (Orange: 100? Grey: 175)
Sturdy Junkbox (Orange: 175 Grey: 275?)
Heavy Junkbox (Orange: 250 Grey: never?)

Dropped Chest - These are extremely random, so don't try to camp them.

Please see note above

Heavy Bronze Lockbox
Ornate Bronze Lockbox
Iron Lockbox (Orange: 75? Grey:???)
Strong Iron Lockbox (Orange: 125 Grey:???)
Steel Lockbox (Orange: 175 Grey: ???)
Reinforced Steel Lockbox (Orange: 225 Grey: never)
Mithril Lockbox (Orange: 225 Grey: never)
Thorium Lockbox (Orange: 225 Grey: never)
Eternium Lockbox (Orange: 225 Grey: never)

Footlockers:
Hillsbrad Foothills - Durnholde Keep (Orange: ?? Green: 145)
Redridge Mountains - Lake Everstill (Orange: ?? Green: ??)
Ashenvale Forest - Zoram Strand
Stonetalon Mountains - Windshear Crag and Associated Mines
Wetlands - Murloc Camps
Desolace - Sar'theris Strand (Loc 34,25) (Orange: 160? Yellow: 175 Green: 200)
Badlands - Angor Fortress
Upstairs (Orange: 175 Green:??)
Downstairs (Orange: <200? Green: ??)
Swamp of Sorrows - Pool of Tears (Orange: <200? Green 225)
Searing Gorge - The Slag Pit (Orange: 200 Green: 275)
Tanaris Desert - Lost Rigger Cove (Orange: 225 Green: 285)
Azshara - Bay of Storms (Orange: 275? Green:??)
Eastern Plaguelands - Tyr's Hand (elite) (Orange: <275? Green: ??)

Doors:

Doors in the normal world (aka not in instances) are usually on some sort of timer. In other words, you can't repeatedly pick the same door over and over again for skillups. The mechanism of the timers are not well known. Some people say if you pick something else (anything else) inbetween attempts that it will reset some timers. Others say that if you pickpocket a mob, or kill a mob, or so something else, that this will reset the timers. It may be different for every door. Suffice to say that reset an instance always (to my knowledge) resets any doors inside, so use that method when you can. I am leaning towards the pickpocketting theory for now.

Gnomeregan (Orange: 150? Green: 200)
Scarlet Monastery (Orange: 175 Green: 226 Grey: 275?)
Searing Gorge Gate (Orange: 225 Grey: never)
BRD Shadowforge Gates (Orange: 280 Grey: never )
BRD Prison Cells (Orange: 250 Grey: never )
Scholomance (Orange: 280 Grey: never )

From Fishing:
Battered Chest
Small Locked Chest
Reinforced Locked Chest
Sturdy Locked Chest
Ironbound Locked Chest (Orange: 175 Grey: 250?)

Other Stuff:

Most of these are chests used in quests that you can pick after you complete the quest. Note that you will probably need to activate your picking skill first, then click on the item as your cursor will not change automatically like it did during the quest or before it.

Insta-chests from respective lockpicking quests (Orange: 1 Grey: 105)
Main chest in lockpicking quest (Orange: 75 Grey: 175)
Poison quest chest (Orange: 90 Grey: 175)
Polly chest (Orange: 90 Grey: 175) (See note 5 below)
Engineered Practice Locks (Green: 1 Grey: 90?) (You can only pick these ONCE, so they are WORTHLESS)
Cozzle's Lockbox (house by the Venture Co. STV, it's on a ~20m timer) (Orange: 150? Grey: 250?)

Links for lockpicking quests with respective insta-chests:
Alliance: http://thottbot.com/?q=1165
Horde: http://thottbot.com/?q=799

List of things that increase Lockpicking:
Dark Leather Gloves (+5 LP) (http://www.thottbot.com/?i=5538)

Various notes and other information:

1. Alliance rogues using the Klaven tower (Posion quest) chest: I just did this at 39, go to Westfall to where the poison quest is at, top floor, Klaven can take me down to half health at 39 if I don't dual-ambush so he kinda hurts. Hopefully you can also be outside his aggro range to practice. To do this just go behind his table (after he spawns he walks around the top of the tower, wait until he is done and ends up a bit away from you), there should be two chairs, jump over the chair closest to the chest and from behind the chair pick the lock. Don't worry about Touch of Zanzil: a death or Jungle Remedy from STV or cure poison from a high enough player should make it all good. Note that you need to activate your picking skill first, then click on the item as your cursor will not change automatically like it did during the quest or before it.
You must be of a high enough level not to aggro Klaven!

2.You can skill up 8 times on the doors to SM, there are 4 doors, 2 inside instances and 2 outside. They are on timers which can be reset.
(See confirmed information 1, above)
Only about half the chests are pickable and are trivial at 175.

Library: Chest in a cubby before the Gallery of Treasures, guarded by 3 mobs. Another chest that spawns in one of the hallways close to Doan himself, guarded by typically 2 mobs + one roamer.

Armory: Chest either in the Training Grounds (guarded by 2 mobs + 1 roamer) or inside the first part of the armory (guarded by 2 mobs + 1 roamer.) Can't remember location of other chest off the top of my head.

Cathedral: Chest on either the left or right side of the fountain. Another chest that spawns either by the monk guarding Fairbanks' hiding spot, or spawns on the other side of the cathedral (guarded by 3 mobs + 2 that roam close but may or may not aggro.)

5.South of Ratchet along the coast a short way is a beached pirate ship. No pirates around ship, they are camped south of it. Bit tricky getting the jump up onto the prow of the ship so you can get onboard, but can try repeatedly with no hassles. The chest is by itself downstairs in the back. Just keep opening it til you hit 175. No fuss, no muss and NO FIGHTS! (This is the location of the Horde lock picking quest and is in Horde controlled territory. Not recomended for Alliance characters on a PvP server).

Thanks to: Too many people to list so I thank: The Rogue Board!

You should thank Tyknee because he has like 10x more patience to deal with you guys than I do and reworked the whole post so that it's really idiot proof.

Thanks for the sticky Blizzard

Thanks to whoever put together the footlocker list

For the Polly/Poison Tower chests: You NEED to activate (CLICK) your lockpicking skill icon first, then (CLICK) on the chest as your cursor will not change automatically like it did during the quest or before it.

Lockpicking Skill Up Through Mail

Basically, since the Burning Crusade Exp. Ive been able to send locked boxes between people throught the mail, you can unlock them, send it to a friend. When they get it it will be locked agian, so you can send them back and forth in large quantities and get some decent skill whenever you log in.

Note: I've had them Relock if I log out and back in again.

Rogue Pick Locks

As a rogue, you're expected to be able to open the locked chests in instances. It is nice to be able to open virtually anything that is presented to you. Scattered throughout the game world are assorted locked chests, which can increase your skill. At some levels, these are relatively easy to get to; but at other levels, on your own they are a pain in the ass. Occasionally I have found some where I can solo access only one of two chests, each on a 10 minute respawn, which would mean spending literally hours in a location for 20 or 30 skill ups.

At the same time, a lot of my toons find chests which they then need opening. I mail these to the rogue who then unlocks them. If the chest is still a green skill up for lockpicking (or yellow/orange), I mail the chest back without opening it. For whatever reason, when it arrives it has managed to relock itself through the mail system. Clicking return, immediately sends them back to my rogue... Once they are no longer a skill up, have the rogue unlock and open them, and decide where to send the item to.

Basically I log the rogue on, open the eight chests that are still skill ups (that I have acquired both as a rogue and as other toons), the mail them to my priest. The mail system seems to take about 45 minutes to deliver. Next time I get a break from whatever I'm doing, log the priest on and return them, then log the rogue on, unlock the chests, then mail them to the priest. Log on whatever toon I was using and resume my journey.

Chest Farming Guide

First off, this guide is meant for rogues or druids, since both have stealth, and lock picking is a must.

To begin, you have to designate one rogue or the druid to be the 'Meat Shield'. Start off by wall jumping up the wall to your immediate right as you enter (the exit after the final boss of ramparts).

From there, make sure you and the partner are both in stealth, and watch out for the circular patrol that can spot invisible units. Rogues and druids will know this by the light blue circle that appears above the NPC's heads when you are stealthed. Next, distract the circular patrol when they are far away from the chest, and here's where the meat shield and a bit of hope comes in. Have the other rogue sprint and evasion towards the chest, then off that area you wall climbed up (for a druid, use whatever speed boost you can). This will cause the NPC's to leave the chest and follow your partner, and they cannot follow all the way down, making them evade glitch to my knowledge. While they are trying to go after your partner, you should be free to pick the lock on the chest (if the locked one is currently in that position) and grab the loot. Congratulations, that's chest one.

Either vanish and go for the next chest, which is by the first boss, or leave and reset the instance. If you are going for the second chest (which when you actually do the instance, is the first chest), you'll have to wall jump back up towards that circular area. Distract the NPC's that patrol that rim far enough away that you can walk through the middle of that ring, into the hallway, and down the spiral ramp. You'll be in the room with the first boss and his two healers. Make your way through that area until you get to the next chest, again with more stealth detectors. Use the same plan as before, one person leads them away, the other grabs the chest. Congratulations, that's chest two.

I cannot stress enough, though, how much patience you need to have around those stealth detecting units. If you watch their path and time their path, you'll save yourself a hefty repair bill, and wasted time. One more thing that can compromise your chest nabbing is if your partner gets dazed and killed before you can open the chest. My rogue friend and I both were able to farm these chests with minimal problems, even with dazed effects (wasn't dazed too often). The only thing about farming this method, you have to/should split the profits 50/50 with your partner.

1-300 Lockpicking

I thought I would post this since I get asked as a rogue all the time what the easiest way to level up your lockpicking is. I have tips for both horde and alliance to get your lockpicking from 1-300 pretty easy. Having it at 300 is the best thing because you don't need to worry about keys for doors, there are exceptions though. Since the keyring was added keys don't take up space, but you could still pick a lock before you get the key, like the searing gorge key.

In addition to the steps below, make sure you pickpocket any humanoids that you can, hopefully they'll drop chests. If you can't open it up then save it for when you are at that skill so you have a fast boost. There is also footlockers in various locations that you can use for skill ups.

You can also sit in town and open boxes for people. You don't get much business this way but it does help you level for free.

Step 1 : (About 1-75) Do the Inital Rogue lockpicking quest

Horde:
This entails feeding a parrot a cracker close to ratchet, then unlocking the chests on the boat. You want to do this until the chests are grey to you, and ya, its going to take a while.

Alliance:
You're going to go to the tower in Lakeshire and open them up until they're grey to you as well.

Step 2 : (About 75-175) Poison Quest

Horde:
Little known trick, while doing this quest in the NW barrens in the Venture Co. area is a chest at the top of a tower... Repeat what you did in Step 1. Open that chest until it goes grey... That'll help get you passed or up to 175

Alliance:
Similar to Horde. While in the tower at Westfall keep opening the chest at the top until you reach about 175. May be hard if the boss aggro's you so bring a friend or level up. The chest will curse you everytime you open it so if you do this after the initial quest you have to get a cleanse.

Step 3 : (About 175-250) Scarlet Monestary (see step 4 if to hard)

Horde and Alliance:
You can first start with unlocking the door into the instances but this can only be done about every 10 minutes per door. If you don't wait then it doesn't count as skill up. So just pick them then run into the Cathedral. Jump into the left locked door and into the cathedral instance. Sneak up, or run if you can avoid being aggro'd, and pick the cathedral door then run out and reset. If you find you are too low to start on the door because you are too lazy, jump into the first instance and pickpocket everything in there. This is of course, making sure you have your stealth maxed to avoid detection. You can repeat that as many times as needed, but if you followed step 1 and 2, the cathedral door will get you to 250. This step can take longer than when I originally did it since you can only reset an instance 5 times an hour.

Step 4 : (About 250-280) Pickpocketed Boxes or Various Footlockers

Horde and Alliance:
Like mentioned at the top, when you pickpocket mobs and they drop boxes you can't open yet, save them and when you can open them you'll get a big fast boost. Once I opened up the SM doors to 250 I had heavy lockboxes I used and got 20 free points. Pickpocket and lockpick them until your heart is content. Although SM is more effective cause of the respawn, it is better then getting pummled by elite's. You also want to go around to zones that are within your level range and find footlockers.

Step 5 : (About 280-300) Black Rock Depths

Horde and Alliance:
All you have to do now is lockpick inside BRD until 300. What you do is go into BRD and turn left and open up the 3 doors. Rinse and Repeat until 300. You get a max of 3 skill ups per run.

There you go and congrats 300 Lockpicking!