Crystal Caverns  

MACNAIR'S GUIDE TO CRYSTAL CAVERNS


IN BRIEF. This is a great zone for about level 30 to 45. It rewards patience and solid teamwork with money, experience, and items that are exceptional for this level. It also rewards impatience with brief exciting battles followed by corpse runs.

BIND POINTS. No one can bind in Crystal Caverns. Melees need to bind at Thurgadin. Casters may want to bind there as well, although there are selected places that they could safely bind in Eastern Wastes. Sometimes people bind just outside the portal to CC, inside the RyGorr fort. This is almost safe, since the RyGorr Orcs do not patrol this spot. Unfortunately, however, they do get trained here fairly often, when players camping the fort need to zone in order to escape. It is quite distressing to die in CC, pop at your bind point, and realize that a couple of RyGorr elites have already slashed you down to half health. All you need to do to zone safely to CC is turn around and click the portal: but if you get stunned or if there is just a bit of lag, you could be dead twice. Following which you will, of course, pop once again at that very same bind point, with those angry RyGorrs possibly still there to kill you a third time.

ENTERING CRYSTAL CAVERNS. With SoW and invis, enter the main gate on the north side of the RyGorr fort in Eastern Wastes (-3300, 400). Inside the fort, in back of the main building, there is a small outbuilding with an iron gate. Click on the iron gate to open it. Inside there is a large snowball on a stone pedestal. Click on the snowball to enter Crystal Caverns. Inside, cast levitation and re-invis. Run forward down the curving tunnel to about 380, 480. Turn right and jump down into The Well. You don't have to have levitation to do this, but it is a significant fall, generally about 500 hp in damage. At the bottom, run straight ahead, out the exit corridor at the north end of The Well, and then immediately turn right. Follow that path quite some distance: it will emerge from the stone tunnel onto an ice shelf that will lead you to the town where the Froststone dwarves live.

MOBs. There are four groups of mobs here, plus the Froststone dwarves in their town. Each group stays in their own area, except when trained. In addition, there are Velium Crawlers, ugly lizard-looking beasts, living in the river. They are not worth hunting, but they will aggro on you when you jump in the water to loot that mob that tried to get away from your group and died in the river.

1. RYGORR ORCS. Although they are the easiest mobs in the zone, they hit hard and fast, in the 50s and 60s, and they are often in groups that mean you have to fight several at once. Their section of Crystal Caverns is a three-dimensional maze of tunnels and ice bridges. It is not too hard to learn your way around in it, but until you do, you can quickly get confused and lost. If you are going to Crystal Caverns for the first time, I'd advise you to check out the maps available at http://www.eqatlas.com/velious/crystalcaverns.html. When you enter CC from Eastern Wastes, you arrive at the top of their area. The miners are the easiest of the RyGorrs: some pop in set places, others wander. Oracles and herbalists are shaman-like casters, casting healing on their friends and DoTs on their enemies. The watchmen, the inspector, and the two named orcs, Foreman Rixact and Foreman Smason, are the toughest fighters. Cold-based nukes are often partially resisted, but other spells land normally.

1A. PULLING RYGORRS. The most common pulling spot is the corridor, either at the right angle turn (650, 200) or just outside the well (530, 450). The first location is slightly safer for a lower level group (2 to 4 low 30s). A stronger group (4 to 6 mid 30s) will move into the bottom of the well itself, clear the room, and pull orcs as they pop. A good soloer (mid 30s) or small group can also pull at the top of the well, near the (two-way) zone in from Eastern Wastes. A careful low 30s soloer can set up on the ice ledge just outside the RyGorr tunnels (200, -50) and pull the watchman who guards that entrance, plus wandering miners, and if you're lucky, a wandering herbalist.

1B. RYGORR FACTION. Everyone appears to start out KOS to these orcs, but you will take faction hits until you get the message 'your faction with RyGorr could not possibly get worse.'

1C. RYGORR LOOT. Miscellaneous minor loot, small pieces and bricks of velium (sell them to players who are working on specialized Velious tailoring, sooner or later they will come through asking to buy them), velium weapons, frozen swords, Foreman's Cap, Crystalline Belt, Crystal Covered Shroud, Herbalist's Pack, Blackened Crystal Robe. Oh, and also thousands of mining picks.

2. SPIDERS. These live in a tunnel running from -350, 150 to -600, -850. They are very aggro, hit in the 60s and 70s, and inject velium poison. They seem quite resistant to cold, but other spells stick most of the time.

2A. PULLING SPIDERS. A group of 4 (high 30s low 40s) can easily take and hold the hall. Two players working together, high 30s low 40s, can probably clear the hall, but they will die when they pull spiders from the bridge area and then get aggroed by spiders repopping behind them. The Queen's Room requires a good puller and a strong group (4 low 40s, 6 high 30s).

2B. SPIDER FACTION. Spiders seem to hate everyone, but you receive no faction message.

2C. SPIDER LOOT. Crystal Crawlers and Spiders drop lots of crystalline silks for tailors, plus minor gems. The Webmaster, Retainer, and Queen drop crystalline blades, crystal nets, Messenger of the Queen, Sceptre of Coldain Ancients, Crystal Glass Slippers, Crystal Webshield, Spider Fang Choker.

3. GEONIDS. These are humanoid rock creatures. They pop at various corners in the right-angle zigzag tunnel that runs uphill from -400, 150 to the exit at -500, 100. They hit in the 70s and 80s. Their cold resistance seems to be less than that of spiders and orcs, but still above average.

3A. PULLING GEONIDS. The standard tactic of a puller bringing a mob to a waiting group is not what most people do here. Instead, the whole group moves together from spot to spot, attacking each geonid in turn. With a group of 6 high 30s or 4 low to mid 40s it is very fast. When they are near death geonids run downhill, hoping to get help from another geonid aggroing onto your group. Therefore it is best to start at the bottom of the ramp. Kill the one stalag terror that spawns there, and then work your way up the ramp: fleeing geonids will run downhill to the area behind you that you have already cleared. Note that all the turns on the geonid ramp are right angled, until you get to the top: there it appears to be a dogleg left, but it is actually the (one-way) exit to Eastern Wastes. When you see that turn, stop, run back to the bottom, and med until the next round.

3B. GEONID FACTION. Your faction with Geonid Collective will steadily decline. WARNING! Intelligence-based casters should consider the quest (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/quest.html?quest=931) with the geonids in Wakening Land for the Phenocryst Focus (AC5 dex+3 int+10 cha+3 svMagic+5 svCold+3 svDisease+3 svFire+3 svPoison+3 mana+40). Lowering your faction with Geonid Collective will make this quest much more difficult to fulfill.

3C. GEONID LOOT. Wow. Ordinary geonids drop miscellaneous loot and decent gems, but the Gem Collector and Focus Gem also drop chipped gems, complete with stats. No one I have spoken with has found a jewelry-making recipe to use these. But that’s ok, because these gems sell to merchants for high prices. A solid group will usually get splits of 100 to 200 plat per hour. Expect 600-800 plat per person, sometimes as much as 1000 plat, for a full evening of hunting.

4. STALAG TERRORS. Tough mobs, the terrors give the best exp in the zone. Normal terrors double hit for 65 or so; the boss terrors (Life Leech, Terror Carver, and Hollow Crystal) hit in the 80s and 90s. Unlike the other mobs here, they do not seem to be highly cold resistant.

4A. PULLING TERRORS. A good soloer (40ish) or small group (mid 30s) can take the 4 terrors at the broken bridge (-300, 700). A good soloer (high 30s) or small group (low 30s) can handle the 2 terrors in the Great Hall (-350, 300). A good team (low 40s) can camp the terror hallway (-150, -100). A good team (4-6 mid 40s) can take and hold the Terror Room (-200, -250).

4B. STALAG TERROR FACTION. Again, everyone seems to start out KOS to Stalag Terrors, and you receive no further faction message.

4C. STALAG TERROR LOOT. Ordinary terrors drop minor money and items, plus decent gems. The big ones drop Crystal Fiber, Velium Amulet, Stalagterror Spine Spear, Crystal Covered Shroud, Blackened Crystal Robe.

BANKING, BUYING, SELLING. There is a bank, usable by all (-180, 280). Most everyone's base faction starts off dubious with the Froststone Coldain. That means you cannot buy and sell from the merchants unless (1) you are a dwarf, and therefore accepted, (2) you can hide or sneak (invis does not work), (3) you can cast Alliance on the merchants, or (4) you raise your faction.

Contrary to much rumor, you cannot raise your Froststone faction by killing Frost Giants or Drakkel Wolves: that raises your faction in Thurgadin, but not in Crystal Caverns. There are many intriguing 'quest-teasers' given when you hail various dwarfs, but none of these appears to accomplish anything: either these are just dialog and not quests, the quests have not been implemented, the quests are broken, or there is some key word or factor that no one has yet discovered. Players have attempted to give varying numbers of mining picks and RyGorr scalps to talkative guards or to the Captain, but I have not heard of anyone who has succeeded with this.

There is one quest you can do, starting in Thurgadin, that will raise faction here (you must have indifferent or better faction in Thurgadin to succeed). This is actually part of a much larger quest, based in Skyshrine: for full description go to http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/quest.html?quest=1277. Shortcut is as follows. Find Loremaster Sarl in the park in Thurgadin, hail him, say 'black,' he will despawn and respawn in the library, give him 50plat there and he will give you a book, bring the book to Historian Baenek in CC, your faction with Froststone improves. I kept careful track: it took me exactly 20 times of doing this quest to raise my faction from dubious to apprehensive, allowing me to buy and sell in CC. (Yes, that's 1000 plat. I wanted to find out how many times it would take, I hunted nearly continuously in CC for about 10 levels, and I hoped - so far in vain, as it appears - that raising my faction would lead to the discovery of further quests in CC.)


Edited, Tue Feb 19 11:47:28 2002