alpha quillback spine

This is only necessary if you want to be an Artificer rogue, otherwise you can ignore it (although it will remain as an outstanding requisition).Remember that you can only choose one specialization, so you only need to fulfill the requisition for the one you are trying to complete.

Assuming that is what you are going for, I found my Alpha quillbacks roaming around with 2 normal quillbacks between the 2 camps south of Griffon Wing Keep (these are the Nazaire Pass Camp(Southernmost) and Craggy Ridge Camp). The Alpha quillback are about twice as big as the normal quillbacks. But perhaps I'm not rembering it well because I wasn't really trying to get them.

Some others said the quest is bugged for them, and the spines don't drop:

http://answers.ea.com/t5/Dragon-Age-Inquisition/Alpha-Quillback-Spines/td-p/4051659

From your 3 locations quote, I assume you mean the locations from the wiki:

http://dragonage3.wiki.fextralife.com/Artificer

I believe you can get them from anywhere in those locations, not one from each. I know I killed at least 2 Alphas in the location I stated.

One more reddit tip thread:

http://www.reddit.com/r/dragonage/comments/2nqxhf/are_alpha_quillbacks_even_real_or_were_the_first/

Hope those help!

+1

As i play as an archer, the other two specilizations are really useless to me as they require daggers, i have been running back and forward between those two camps now for 2 hours, ive killed a few normalt quillbacks that have finally dropped 2 of the alpha spines however, since then the only things that have spawned have been hyenes. I left the area and came back and a few more quillbacks spawned but are not actually dropping anything, not even leather

Assassin doesn't actually require daggers. You can throw the hidden blades from a distance (although apparently it is closer than max archery range) and damage is based on weapon damage, so daggers or bow. Mark of Death is very helpful for a damage dealing rogue. You can throw it, deal all your damage, then trigger it for double or more damage (MoD can hit for critical damage, so it stores all critical damage then crits on top of that). The knockout bomb is actually more helpful for an archer since it can be used at distance, so it is a bit of crowd control.

And for tempest, I actually use Tempest with Sera and it is very effective. You get fire flask which when upgraded allows you to use abilities without stamina or cooldown. You can get off 2 full draws and a longshot. I believe if you combine that with Dorians haste it draws out the effect so you can have a long period of time under fire flask's effects. Haven't tried it though, but MoD is affected by Dorian's haste ability in that way. The whole left side of the tempest tree is not great for archers but lightning flask is actually pretty nice. Oh, and flaskmaster doesn't actually apply to flasks, only to the tonics, grenades and potions. Rather pointless but possibly just a bug.

So take another look at the trees. Unless it specifically says "Requires Daggers" or mentions a dagger requirement then it applies or can be used with a bow. For instance with archer, you can take the first 3 abilities/passives in the dagger tree and it improves you effectiveness. Twin Fangs is of course useless, but the next passive Dance of Death gives you 50 stamina for any kill (with a bow, or even the rift mark, etc) and Sneak Attack gives you double you crit chance if you are flanking an enemy, so if your base crit is 35%, then you will get 70% when flanking. I have this set up on Sera and it definitely applies when I look up her attributes. Also Shadow Strike is another big hit ability that is weapon neutral.

So don't limit yourself with the assumption that one ability applies only to daggers and not to bows. One suggestion I would make is if you can get a large crit chance to take "Looked like it hurt" from the sabotage tree. You get 10 stamina back for every critical hit. So abilities that have more hits than the cost to use them (like hidden blades or Leaping Shot) are basically stamina cost free if the hits all crit. You can help this by being in stealth before firing them off and having the proper upgrades. Stealth is integral to making sure MoD criticals, as you stealth right beofre triggering it.

Also you can use masterwork crafting items for non class abilities, like walking fortress on a rogue. But I like to add the hidden blades, and Sera fires off so many arrows when using lightning flask that she triggers it quite often.

But i do understand that artificer works quite well with archer due to its focus ability, just don't discount the others so fast, especially if the quest is broken for you.

Edit: Also one "bug" with Tempest-flask of fire also gives you unlimited focus, from what I've read. Haven't tried that one yet.

For the sake of answering this question even though it is a year old, you can buy infinite quills from the Dalish merchant in the Exalted Plains as long as you have The Short List inquisition perk.

Thanks so much!