Staff Writer Paul "LockeColeMA" Cleveland explores the Guardian zones of Silverwood and Gloamwood as a Defiant intent on earning achievements and some platinum. Read on for his tips!

Gloamwood

Once Silverwood is done, a Defiant will head east to Gloamwood. This zone is a step up in difficulty, both in finding artifacts and in dealing with higher level enemies. I have not finished this zone quite yet, as I am about four artifacts from completion and I've only managed to find a single rare spawn. However, everything else is done, and I've mapped out a decent route for artifacts, so here goes nothing (again, all credit to Ailurion for the map)!

Shiny...

First of all, the “easy” achievements. In Dark Places involves exploring several caves throughout the zone. Two things to keep in mind – it's easy to drown while exploring the Millrush Pond cave (as it is entirely under water and you need to go to the very back of it for credit), and the Shadefall Keep cave at times has an elite at the bottom. This elite drops a random blue item, so it can be worth taking out if you can deal with it! The zone's puzzle is “Shield Wall,” with the plaque located at 4539, 2380. It can be difficult to solve, but there are various tutorials online – using one of them I managed to solve it fairly quickly (it's like a Rubik’s cube). The last easy one is “Wanton Destruction”; similar to the Aelfwar in Silverwood, this involves slaughtering goblins, most of which are found in the Northeastern part of the zone, near the Darkening Deeps instance.

Another achievement, presumably easy, is the Graveyard Shift. At Solemn Outlook (5455, 2837), there are many Restless Spirits. Normally these enemies are neutral, but at times there will be a zonewide message that Gloamwood is getting darker. When this happens, the Restless Spirits turn hostile. During this time, a player needs to kill 40 spirits (note that the kills don't need to be during only a single “dark” period, but they do not count unless the Spirits are hostile). This achievement also grants the title “the Undertaker,” which is pretty sweet.

Another achievement that seems to be available for Defiant characters is “Silent Vigil.” In truth, this is a mistake. Defiant characters cannot receive credit for praying at the shrine — go figure, the Vigil doesn't care a lick about us! However, “Are you Nuts!?” is available, although it is ambiguously worded. The “tree” is located smack in the middle of the Guardian town Gloamwood Pines, at 5244, 3098. Defiants will need to avoid the guards on the outlying areas, fight their way through, or go on a suicide run. Luckily, all the Guardian NPCs on the tree itself are neutral. There is a small deck/balcony at the top, and by mounting up and running off, I completed this achievement by hitting the water below without taking damage.

Curse you Trion! Remove this achievement or let me complete it! ARGH!!!

In the same vein as Silverwood, the final achievements for most players will be artifact or rare spawn related. As of right now I have encountered only two rare spawns. Dozer is located behind the Mathosian Mill; and Xaksha was found in Shadefall Towers (unfortunately being killed by a Guardian). I saw the giant tick on the ground level outside the towers, but rumor has it that it can spawn on top of the towers as well.

Artifacts are an interesting feature in Gloamwood. I felt they were more spread out than Silverwood – however, there were also more “sweet spots.” Similar to Overwatch Keep, Shadefallen Keep hosts several artifact locations of good value. The towers have several spawns that seem to have a higher chance of being green or blue; and one location on top of a tent in the area has yielded two blue artifacts to me. Another sweet spot is in the mountains to the south, starting around a lake at 5166, 3491 and working to the east. I have found several blue items here as well, and the spawns are close together and enemy-free.

The last sweet spot is around the Darkening Deeps instance. There is a large waterfall outside the instance, and dozens of spawns around the area. Some of the best have been in the rocks near the top of the water, and the “goblin village” embedded in the mountains. By taking some fall damage and doing some creative exploring, I managed to find another blue artifact in a cave up in the mountains.

Goblin mountainside village pictures above. Not pictured: the terrifying fall to get there.

Also unlike Silverwood, there are several sure-fire green or blue artifacts. Several of these are found in the “spider cave” outside the Darkening Deeps. There are fantastical tutorials on YouTube to getting the toughest artifacts, but they still require some practice. I have received three blues from these so far... but most of the time they end up being Scotty's Research Paper, Page X (darn you, BoP artifact set!). There is another guaranteed green or blue on a tree branch around 4073, 2946. Hint for this one—climb the branch next to the one with the artifact! Took me 30 minutes to figure that out!

As said, I still have several artifacts and six (ugh...) rare spawns left to kill, so I'm not out of the woods yet (pun intended!). But I've enjoyed being “behind enemy lines” so far, and the best part about artifact hunting has been my profits: I've made about 90 platinum from selling off my spare artifacts. Blue Guardian artifacts easily sell for 5-10 platinum on my server; and even common artifacts sell for 20-30 gold. Another faction disadvantage is that there's no zone meta-achievement for Defiants in these zones — no nifty pet for us! Still, there are 90 achievements in both zones perfectly available to Defiant characters that are willing to risk life and limb!