Advanced scholar refining volume 11Follow

Unfortunately, that's the best answer you're likely to get.

It's my understanding that it's completely random - every monster (aside from Named monsters, which each have their own separate loot tables) has a small chance to drop a chest if it's still at least Green-con to you, and the chest can have any item on the loot table for that level. Some items are rarer than others, naturally.

I'm not saying that you're completely wrong... it's possible that you were getting all the books inside the keep in Forest Ruins - the monsters inside are generally a level or two higher than the monsters outside, and (as I understand it) higher level monsters on the same loot table have a slightly higher chance of dropping a chest - and linked groups have higher chances, as well. And, as most of us know by now, the monsters inside the Forest Ruins are mostly grouped encounters, and the ones outside are mostly single monsters.

Edited, Mon Oct 31 21:41:31 2005 by Nekojin

Thanks for your replies guys. Just one note though, I was focusing almost exclusively on the mobs in the courtyard and up the stairs as you enter the fort. These were single mob encounters.

It could just be luck but I'm still not convinced that loot tables are completely random. It could be that a chest is more likely to contain an item that corresponds to the level of the mob that dropped it. So a level 3 mob in Forest Ruins is a lot less likely to drop an Artisan Advanced Apothecary 8 than a level 8 mob would be. Since the mobs inside the fort are higher in level they would drop better items than the mobs outside the fort. I had a number of chests drop from low level mobs and usually they contained a crap item, such as a tin weapon.

Any way, level 19 now and still no luck in finding the Scholar Refining 11.

Postscript:

I finally broke down and paid 8 GP for the Advanced Scholar refining 11. I sold the Advanced Outfitter Refining 11 for 10 GP, so I actually came out ahead by a couple of gold.

And of course since I no longer needed it, an Advanced Scholar Refining 11 dropped for me last night . I got it off a random mob on Forbidden Island (the one with Varshoon's Tomb on it) in Antonica.