I find it quite funny That people complained about the lack of hand placed loot then what did we get in Dragonborn DLC... a chest with 2 septims. I wont say where because it would spoil it even though most people probably know where it is.

Edit: I missed a bit out.

Who complained about hand-placed loot? Did I miss a thread on it?

I have seen posts with people complaining about it. I cant remember what threads the posts are in.

I was so steamed about those lousy two gold coins, my woeful Orc who dies so easy did that one first, and I thought I might have somehow stuffed it up and lost the loot. Second character did it, still the same lousy two gold, third had no better luck, although the effort he put into it he only deserved that reward. The first character had the fight of his not very long life.

I also did not get the bit about hand placed loot, was expecting yet another complaint about house decorating.

There have been comparisons between the value of dungeon diving and levelled loot in Skyrim with that of Morrowind

In Morrowind, you can come across especially high (fixed) level enemies guarding some very useful (fixed) loot.

I think a mix of the two is important.

I guess the 2 septims was the devs giving the players "their 2 cents" about the issue of hand placed loot.

And I found it absolutely hilarious.

Agreed.

In short lots of loot in Morrowind is hand placed, still use plenty of level scaling on chests, but its plenty of nice stuff if you know where to look.

Downside of this is that you can either return to the same place early in the next game or use an guild on the internet and get it on you first game.

And plenty of the high end stuff in Morrowind is easy to get, master alchemy equipment in an mage guild, an ebony sword in Balmora.

Skyrim has some fixed draugr deathlords with ebony weapons.

There should have been a mix. Morrowind handled artifacts and loot in general way better than the last couple games. Static loot is so much more interesting than finding some awesome piece of armour that by the level I finally come across it, I already have it.

I wouldn't call it a downside at all.

That's the issue I have with hand placed loot. It is great for your first playthrough, but on subsequent playthroughs, I often have to pretend stuff is not there or avoid going certain places because I don't want the character to become overpowered too quickly. So, then I am inventing roleplay reasosn why he might go somewhere at a certain point to get certain loot at the appropriate time. With random loot, you can just play and explore without having to worry about the secret knowledge of where the loot is stashed that you possess but your character doesn't.

Definately a downside for me. I'd rather they spent their energy on making the random loot system work better than hand placing loot.

Things like the Mentor's Ring are interesting the first time you find it, but it is not all that interesting the second, third or thirty-fourth playthrough.

Hand placed loot is definitely better than randomly set spawned loot. This is one of reasons why Morrowind is so awesome.

Hand-placed loot does make sense from a realistic standpoint.

Anyway, what many people forget is that the top end hand-placed loot wasn't exactly in plain sight. A Daedric Staff was guarded by a daedroth behind a locked door, a daedric mace was in a room accessible from an area guarded by two high level sorcerers, the Staff of Magnus was in the hands of a powerful mage, Chrysawhatsit was being wielded by a renegade knight, daedric loot in the same room as a golden saint and behind a cave with two high-level mages...

where is this 2 cent chest? I probably have found it and laughed about it as I've done everything on Solstheim, it just doesn't stand out in memory.

I had a better one with a random chest in a Dwemer ruin, I picked a locked gate which behind it was a locked chest (hate that) which was a master locked chest but was also empty. I thought that the "empty" must be a mistake or something so I had to pick it to be certain and a dozen lockpicks later, it was indeed empty which made me lol in angst

the 2 septim chest is

The one before he appears?

Yes but He always appears as I go to loot it.

oh ok, I vaguely remember now.

Hand placed loot makes dungeon delving worth the time and I like the way hand-placed loot allows you to acquire powerful equipment before you should, as long as you just manage to overcome the burden of getting it.

Anyone who has played Fallout 2 should know what I mean

There's also the hidden treasure. In the same place it was in Morrowind!