Questing for the Fire Shard and the Ice Queen’s Tower – A Cleric’s perspective.

Why is it that seemingly simple things turn into such long and at times unpleasant adventures? This is one of those stories and the short answer to the questions is: be warry of books written by Brokk

I had been going to the Deep Thought University to visit the library venturing to the Fire tutorial in the hopes of acquiring fire hints to make Rothe Jerky, which is a different story all together, when I happened to stumble into the Focused Studies building of the campus. Here I found that I could be sent by the Professor to the Church of Light, hopefully for a quest that would further my Clerical studies. Sadly, I was not yet in possession of the needed item (Planer boots it seemed) but vowed to return once I had them (yet another long story).

Deciding I needed more information about what this quest might be I decided to head to the Library in The City with a Name and do some research on the matter and after some time found a small, innocent seeming book on something called the Fire Shard, written by the afore mentioned Brokk.

This sounded both interesting and useful in that I had been somewhat frustrated by the ineffectiveness of my divine spells that utilized fire. Reading Brokk’s book, this seemed like an item that would be both useful and more importantly, easy to obtain. How wrong I was!

First, I needed to complete my quest for the planer boots, and those silly Drow seemed to have run out of supple leather, with a new shipment over a week away, eighteen ensuing trips to the temple to be exact, just for a bit of supple leather.
I needed the help of my friend Arathorn to deal with the Drow Priestess and her sword wilding friend, but thought no problem, between trips to the Drow temple I’ll finish gathering the needed soul gems and something called the Ice Shard that Father Robert requested, which was referenced in Brokk’s book. I looked for a book in the Library on the Ice Shard, but was unable to find one, not until after my quest did, I think to look at the book authored by Gniht on the Ice Ring, which would have been helpful, though it was written from a Mage’s perspective. The book on the Ice Ring is suggested reading if you are in any way interested in obtaining the Ice Shard or simply wishing to visit the Ice Queen for a friendly chat.

The following are my notes from the perspective of a divine caster on journeying to find and face the Ice Queen as well as some additional notes on later conversations with Father Robet in the Church of light. In the hopes that it may help future seekers of these items and quests.

To Begin the Journey to the Ice Queen’s castle head east out of the city with a name, through the east lands, taking the road to the Giant Hills, (you could also have the Mar Vel Scholar send you to the Giant cave), continue east until you come to a bridge with a gate and a sign reading Frost Giants ahead). Cross the bridge, dispatching any frost giants you see, turn towards the North (left) and look for a cave, with a small fire pit just outside of it. Go into the cave, which will now place you in the Frozen North Lands, explore the area, a bit of an ice maze, for a way to get to the upper most level of the surrounding cliffs, you will find some less than welcoming winter wolves as well as some rather foul tempered Barbarians, who will gift you with some throwing axes and a Great axe, should you be into those types of weapons. . The area you are seeking is the Northeast Corner of the map, which will lead you to the “Dreaded Climb” to quote Brokk’s words from his book, which is where all this madness truly begins.

Please do not take this Climb area lightly, more so the things that dwell there, least you make a quick return visit to the Temple in the city with a name, as I did. More on how to deal with the locals in my notes below, the creatures you will deal with on the climb are Frost Bites, Ice Masses and Crater Monkeys

Once you make it up the climb. You will be ready to take a path to an area known as the Frozen Lake. Best to wear whatever cold protection you can muster here as the very air will be painful otherwise (see notes below). I encountered two types of creatures on the frozen lake, some little floating mages called Snowballs and some white Slaad looking creatures called Show Lizards. The Snowballs cast that Bigby grasping hand spell which holds you in place as well as Greater Thunderclap, which seems to do sonic damage (see notes below for more detail).

Make your way to the Northeast corner of the map, where you will find a path leading to the Tower of the Ice Quen. Nothing patrolling the outside of the tower, so make your way to the door, which is usually locked and requires more than a little skill to unlock (see my notes below). If you are not highly skilled with locks, remember to bring lock picks and perhaps a ring of the rogue and other means to improve your skill and dexterity.

Once inside, stop and look around, the tower has three levels, two above the one you have entered, the stairs up are directly ahead, with skeleton archers and floating skulls that cast magic on either side. Greater Sanctuary works here if you chose to simply pass by these abominations, but why would a proper Cleric do such a thing? Both are easily dispatched with Melee weapons or archery, I use a Mithril Heavy Cross Bow with highly enchanted bolts myself which works great (see Brokk’s book on this weapon), but so did Sunbeam as well as Storm of Vengeance, you will just need to figure out which works best for you and be ready to heal yourself often, especially should you attract the attention of all the guardians at once. I found it best to try to deal with them individually or in small groups of two to three.

Once you have made it to the second floor, either by avoiding the guardians on the first floor, sending them to their final rest or something in between, stop and look around, you will notice you are in some sort of research laboratory. There are several mages occupying this floor, they are again easily delt with using ranged or melee weapons or the ever-trusty Sunbeam spells. There were a few roaming the large central area and one to two in each of the rooms.

The room to the immediate right of where you enter this floor has a locked bookcase. If your skill with locks is exceptionally good, you will find inside a bunch of what seem to be crafting or enchanting items as well as a book, which tells you what to do with the Ice Shard, should you be a mage.  I have made a note of the items in the bookcase, just in case they are needed in the future for something, I suggest you do the same.

Search the bookcase in the room to the immediate left as you enter this level for a useful book called the Prayer to the Overgod, which grants the holder three Prayer spells per day, which I have found to be quite helpful. Other than the mages, I didn’t find anything useful in any of the other rooms. Once you have explored and cleared this level find the staircase and make your way up to the top floor of the tower, which is the Ice Quen’s throne room.  She is at the far end of the room, which is also guarded by the same minions you encountered on the first floor. She is far enough away that you can draw her guards to you to deal with first, before facing her. I strongly suggest you do this.

Once her helpers were delt with, I thought it would be an easy enough fight one on one with her, but she has another surprise summons, which I will leave you to discover. But one which you will discover you are quite familiar with.

Once the ice Queen is dispatched, you can look under the throne for the room to perform the Ice Shard ritual described in Gniht’s book. If you are seeking the Fire Sard, you will want to keep the Ice Sard to give to Father Robert back at the Church of Light. For my part, I was happy to port away from this dreadful place with the item I had sought and enough memories of the trip to the Ice Queen’s tower to convince me never to want to return (which I did anyway), mainly because other than the needed artifact, the time and effort to complete the quest, I felt, could be better spent on quests which are more profitable for the time spent. I found myself making far more trips to the Speakers Haven than I had anticipated to renew my spells or simply rest. Full use of Greater Sanctuary would have shortened the trip. But I, for some reason, wanted the full experience.

Additional notes, written in archaic adventures language which may prove useful (OOC)

At the Climb:

You will most likely take environmental cold damage, not a lot, but it can add up if you are in a long melee, protection from cold or significant regeneration will help

The frost bites do decent physical damage. I found it fastest to use my cross bow against these. Spells work, but they have very good reflex saves (45 base), so your sunbeam spells will often b doing only half damage. Strangely they do take cold damage.

Ice Masses are very susceptible to implosion (fortitude save is base 36), so you ill likely only need one to two spells to make them implode, otherwise, back to your trusty bow or melee weapon of choice. They do hit hard and seem to have some kind or death attack.

The Crater Monkey’s will cast Horrid Wiling if you engage them, but you can simply avoid them, I just used my cross bow again from distance.

As you move up the climb you can also shoot down at any of these creatures on the level below you, of course make sure there are no creatures around you on the level you are on before doing this.
As you climb the wall about to thirds of the way up if you see a cave, you can enter to fight some huge horrific spider, which I’m told have a very strong poison tat may be useful to those inclined to use poison

The Frozen Lake:

Again, Greater Sanctuary works fine ere if you wish to avoid all of the creatures and simply speed your way to the tower of the Ice Queen.

Snowballs have a reflex save of 58 base, so will likely only take half damage from your sunbeam spell. On my first trip there, Fire Strom did little. I noticed the difference having the Fire Sard made, when using Fire Storm against these in a second visit to record these notes. The Fortitude save against the Greater Thunder Clap is DC 52.

Ice Lizards have a reflex save of only 41 base, so you may be able to do more damage to these wit sunbeam. The Ice Lizards av an Ab of 70, so be ready to heal from time to time. They do, however, only seem to have 2 attacks per round. If you have some sort of acid fog ability or item, it should reduce this to one attack per round.

Implosion was not worth the time to cast on either the snowballs or the Ice Lizards though I did Implode an Ice Lizard. They have base Fortitude save of 41, so you should implode them about 50% of the time.

I am told you can fall through the ice on the frozen lake, but I did not experience this. I’m told that should tis happen, you simply exit the cave and work your way back to the Ice Lake.

There is another exit from the Ice Lake, not in the Northeast corner of the map that took me to met some Judge, he was not hostile. I suspect further conversations with him will lead you on yet another quest or challenge for some useful item.

Tower of the Ice Queen:

First floor:

The DC of the Tower’s front door vs open locks is 70
Neither the skeleton looking archers called floating skull Ice Guardians were affected by my turn undead.
I found that my Cross bow worked best vs. the Guardians mainly because they have some sort of silence ability, and it was easier to shoot and heal vs looking to see if Silence was preventing my spell. I was able to cast through the silence with silent spell.
The Floating Frozen Skulls take damage from sunbeam and are easily delt with using sunbeam, mele or ranged weapons.

Second Floor:

DC of the bookshelf in the room to the right is 90, ask a rogue friend to help if you can’t find a way to raise your skill to this level.

The bookcase in the room to the left is not locked.

The mages (Alchemists) on the second floor cast Isiac’s Greater Missile Storm for the most part and are not much of a treat. They can be easily delt with via sunbeam, mele or ranged weapons. They have a base reflex save of 54

The Ice Queen, will heal and hits hard, it was a long fight and I used my grinning skulls, sunbeams and cross bow. I had to leave the fight several times to renew my spells.

She will summon a clone of your character. I did not have banishment available as a spell but may go back to test it, but have not seen this used in other instances where clones have appeared so it may not work.

Returning to see Father Robert:

I had gathered all of the soul gems over the course of several visits. Som were in bags, some in my inventory, some I had in the bank. When I went to visit Father Robert, he kept telling me I did not have the required number of soul gems, which I most certainly did. Tue finally suggested that I put all of the soul gems into bags then take them all out, presumably to reset the script. This worked. Hopefully you wont encounter this glitch but nice to know there was a work around (Thank you Tue).

Janica

Good book, it was a good read..

Publish contract has been received:DONE

L0BSTER