Ice Caves of Sorrow (mission)

Objectives
Rescue Evennia
 * Find a way into the holding area.
 * Break Evennia out of her cell.
 * Escape with Evennia to the awaiting ice ship.
 * BONUS Return news of Rornak Stonesledge to Hamdor Grandaxe.

Walkthrough
The truth about the White Mantle has been revealed. They are a cult worshipping strange beings known as the Mursaat. Having achieved Ascension, you are now (supposedly) ready to return to save the Shining Blade and stop the White Mantle. While you were away, the White Mantle have cornered the Shining Blade into the Shiverpeak Mountains and have captured both Evennia and Saidra, and now plan to sacrifice them on the Shiverpeak Bloodstone.

Spectral Agony
This mission has many Mursaat and Jade, which have the monster skill Spectral Agony. If you have no countermeasures to the skill, it will drain 600 HP off of the target character over the course of five seconds, typically resulting in death. As such, it is recommended that a party avoid fighting these mobs unless necessary.

The standard defense against Spectral Agony is Infusion, which reduces the 600 HP over five seconds to a mere 75 HP over five seconds, which is small enough to mostly ignore it. Chances to infuse armor do not come until later in the campaign, however. Heroes and Pets are automatically infused, while Henchmen, Minions, and Spirits are not. Minions and spirits can provide some defense against spectral agony, by getting mobs to waste it on them, even if it does almost instantly kill them.

Jade can only use Spectral Agony by hitting with attacks. As such, if you can prevent them from hitting you, you can avoid being killed by the skill. Blindness is especially effective for this, and blocking skills can help, too. Alternatively, skills such as Protective Spirit, Shelter, Spirit Bond, or "There's Nothing to Fear!" that dampen very heavy damage can blunt the damage enough to avoid death. Even a potent single-target heal such as Word of Healing or Heal Other cast at an appropriate time can save a character afflicted by Spectral Agony, though it will still leave him near death.

Primary
It is unnecessary to kill any Mursaat to complete the mission. While there are a number of groups of them, you can take alternate routes to avoid them, or else wait for them to get out of your way.

To start the mission, sneak around the Mursaat and head left. You will come across an area being pounded by siege weapons and several groups of Stone Summit. Kill them and pass the siege area. You will see a bridge and a way down onto an icy path (where the Stone Summit have set up their siege weapons). Go onto the ice and destroy the group protecting the first siege weapon and then the second. Fire the second weapon (point A) and you will see a cutscene where a herd of Yaks rampages through the White Mantle encampment and helps destroy the siege weapons and forces for you.

Now, go back up and cross the bridge into the White Mantle camp. Immediately up the hill will be a gate guarded by Jade Armors. Avoid them. If you continue to the left of that gate, you will find a path around to another door guarded by the less imposing White Mantle. Kill the patrols, grab a keg from the nearby powder station (point B) and blow the door away.

You will enter an ice cave. If you keep to the left side of the cave, you will be able to go around all the Mursaat groups (facing a few White Mantle groups) and out into an area that has a circular path with a pit in the middle. Evennia and Saidra are opposite to you on this circle (point C). You can go either left or right around the pit, but there is one patrol of Mursaat to avoid, which is easier if you go left. Then there is a patrol of White Mantle Savants and Sycophants, which you can take out. There you will find a cave that will take you around the left side of the circle to very near the cell. There is another patrol of Mursaat to dodge here. Get a keg from the nearby powder station (point D) and blow the cell door.

A cutscene will show you that Saidra sacrificed herself for you. Now you will need to blow a gate, then run Evennia to the ship. Alternatively, you can destroy the other gate before triggering the cut scene, to avoid the danger to Evennia. Despite her assertion that you should stop for nothing, Evennia will stop and engage any enemy that crosses her path. If you wish to run, keep an eye on her; if she attacks a group of enemies, you will have to attack too because otherwise she will die and you will fail the mission.

You can either run ahead of the gang of twelve Mursaat Elementalists that slowly follows and clear the way to the exit yourself, or else get onto the their path to start their movement, then run back west to get out of the way. If you do the latter and then follow the Mursaat, they will mostly clear the path for you, and then get themselves killed by catapults. (NOTE: as of around June 2008, there has been a glitch where the Mursaat's do not get themselves killed by catapults.)

Be warned that occasionally the twelve Mursaat do not all get killed by catapults. If they do not, they will stop on the path shortly beyond the target of the second catapult. If only a couple survive, your group can probably finish them off, even if not infused.

When you're near the ship (point E) there will be some Stone Summit (with a boss) engaging the dwarves that run the ship. They usually wipe out the crew if you move too slowly, so as soon as you can, engage and destroy them.

Bonus
The bonus is to rescue an imprisoned dwarf. There are two parts to this:


 * 1) The prisoner, Rornak Stonesledge, is located in a cell that is inside the ice cave you took to get to the circular path. Before exiting the cave, you will see a path in the cave to the right (green path on map). This path is guarded by Jade Armors. Fight them, and then fight the Mursaat spell-casters after them. You will then get to a locked door (point 2); blow it open with a powder keg (powder stations at point B and point D). This door leads to a snowy path guarded by White Mantle; at the end you will find a small cell with Rornak inside.  You will need another powder keg to blow open the cell door.
 * 2) There is a second dwarf, Hamdor Grandaxe, who is looking for the prisoner. He can be found after rescuing Evennia. After you blow the gate to flee, you will enter a short ice cave. After you come out, you will see a path and a large number of Mursaat coming from your right. Evennia will ask you to run; ignore her advice and wait at the exit from the caves. The group of Mursaat will pass from the right to the left. Now go where they came from and you should see Hamdor there (point 3).

Now you can actually go about doing this bonus in either order:
 * Free Rornak and he'll ask you to speak to Hamdor.
 * Speak to Hamdor; he'll ask you to look for Rornak. Go back and free Rornak and he'll thank you and you'll get the bonus.

In order to reach Rornak, you will have to clear a group of three Jade Armors and a group of three Mursaat Elementalists. If you have no defensive measures against their Spectral Agony beyond those that henchmen bring, you can probably clear them by the naive approach of charging in and attacking, but expect to take a few deaths in each battle. Your death toll can be reduced from this by means detailed in the section on Spectral Agony above. You may wish to leave the eastward facing Stone Summit Engineer to the south of point A alone earlier in the mission, so that you can recharge the Resurrection Signets that will be expended in fighting Mursaat.

Warning: It's possible the White Mantle Zealots who patrol near Rornak's cell get too close to him. He will sometimes leave the cell (even though the door is closed) and start firing his bow at the enemies. This allows them to possibly kill him, thereby failing the bonus. Try to take out the Mantle close to the locked door to avoid this bug.

Hard mode
Once you get past the branch off to go do the bonus, avoid fighting the White Mantle Savants and Sycophants. The groups along the normal route wander clockwise in circles, and will get out of your way if you wait for them. Two groups with identical routes usually patrol on top of each other by the powder keg station, and fighting both at once can be very dangerous.

At the end, the Mursaat Elementalists move faster, and thus usually don't all get killed by the catapults before they reach the end of their route. If you attack them before they reach the end of their route, they come in linked groups of six, which can be rough even if your entire party is infused, as Evennia isn't. Once they reach the end of their scripted route, they wander randomly. If you wait long enough, they will wander into range of the final catapult and die, but this can take quite a long time. You can also wait until enough die for you to be able to handle the rest. They are hostile to most Stone Summit along their route, but not the boss group at the end of their scripted route.

NPCs

 * Dwarf
 * 10 Dwarven Soldier
 * 10 Hamdor Grandaxe
 * 10 Dwarven Scout
 * 10 Rornak Stonesledge
 * 20 Dwarven Ice Ship Mate
 * 20 Dwarven Ice Ship Captain
 * Human
 * 20 Saidra
 * 20 Evennia

Monsters

 * Dwarf
 * 24 Stone Summit Engineer
 * 13 Summit Beastmaster
 * 24 Stone Summit Carver
 * 24 Stone Summit Ranger
 * 24 Dolyak Master
 * 24 Stone Summit Heretic
 * Human
 * 20 White Mantle Engineer
 * 20 White Mantle Zealot
 * 16 White Mantle Seeker
 * 18 White Mantle Abbot
 * 20 White Mantle Priest
 * 16 White Mantle Sycophant
 * 16 White Mantle Savant
 * Imp
 * 22 Ice Imp
 * Jade
 * 24 Jade Armor
 * Mursaat
 * 24 Mursaat Monk
 * 24 Mursaat Necromancer
 * 24 Mursaat Elementalist
 * Plant
 * 24 Pinesoul

Bosses (Elite Skill Captures)

 * Dwarf
 * 28 Arlak Stoneleaf &rarr; Cleave
 * 28 Virag Bladestone &rarr; Cleave
 * 28 Hormak Ironcurse &rarr; Offering of Blood
 * 28 Darda Goldenchief &rarr; Mark of Protection
 * 28 Jonar Stonebender &rarr; Crippling Anguish
 * Golem
 * 28 Berg Frozenfist &rarr; Water Trident

Dialogues
Briefing from Blade Scout Shelby.

Follow-up

 * Upon completion of the mission players will find themselves in: Iron Mines of Moladune.
 * To continue the story line players must complete: Iron Mines of Moladune: Mission