Harvester Orbs are a type of enemy in MW3 Zombies mode. Players will find these on their travels fairly randomly, with their glowy balls of blue light floating around the airspace, exciting players as if they are in Congress for a UAP hearing. For the most part, these are little chase objectives you can do that award a nice amount of Aether. But, for those deep into the missions, you will need to find Harvester Orbs. Here is everything you need to know about Harvester Orbs in MW3.

Harvester Orb Locations in MW3 Zombies Mode¶

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Here is a guide on everything you need about Harvester Orbs in MW3 Zombies.

Players must get lucky with their adventures to find Harvester Orb locations in MW3 Zombies mode. However, there are a few themes and consistencies among their spawns.

1. They tend to spawn on the outskirts of Low Threat Zones
2. Can spawn next to chopper landing spots
3. Harvester Orbs can appear over lower-tier contracts and objectives in progress.
4. They like spawning over empty spaces in medium and high-threat areas.

For the most part, the rule of them spawning in largely open areas is the main thing to consider and look for. It’s because their mechanic requires them to fly around easy-to-navigate spaces and let you go on a goose chase with them. So, you can expect that to be a recurring pattern when you see them.

It’s partly why you can easily identify them in low-threat areas, particularly around the farmland areas, hilly areas, and the chopper spawns. These areas are all largely consistent with open spaces. However, you can find them in threat level two areas, and we even found on in the High Threat area of Old Town on the north side since there are open spaces around there.

If you have the challenges of hunting Harvester Orbs, we recommend following the paths around the train lines and highways around the Low Threat Zone. Other good spaces include the Hadiqa Farms and the Orlov Military Base. These areas are very flat, and you can easily see a Harvester Orb appear in the nearby skyline when you get into render distance, and spawn ranges for enemies to appear. You can even find their icons on the tac map when they have spawned and in your detection range. It looks something like this
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Harvester Orbs: Risk and Rewards¶

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You can get lots of Aether, rarity upgrades, and challenge completions for defeating Harvester Orbs in MW3 Zombies.

Typically, you want to shoot these Harvester Orbs around 10-15 times. The amount of times you need to shoot them seems to depend on the strength of the gun. A Marksman Rifle took around 10 rounds, while another weapon we tried it on took around 13. So, a ballpark of 10-15 is acceptable.

They’ll drop either 500 or 1000 Aether Essence each time you shoot them. The value probably depends on how much damage you do to the Orb to get a consistent amount of Aether per Harvester Orb. When you defeat an Orb, too, it will drop even more Aether for someone to pick up. You also typically get a rarity increase item to upgrade the quality of your weapon, which seems dependent on where you are on the map at the time. So, they are well worth doing for some juicy bit of aether and rarity upgrades to your weapon if needed.

The final thing to note is that the Harvester Orbs when attacked, create lightning strikes. If you, or anything, are caught under it, they will get shocked and fire their weapon like a stun stick. If you’re very close and below the creature, watch out for that, especially if you have a few zombies around you. Th either final condition is the creature’s attempt to escape. Static clouds begin to form above the creature when it enters combat and goes stationary. If the creature can complete its tasks, it will dip, and you’ll lose out on the full rewards of the Harvester Orbs.

Read More: MW3 Zombies Easter Eggs Map.