Rilohn Refuge (mission)

Objectives
Master of Whispers must be in your party.

If your character chose to follow Margrid the Sly (after the primary quest Mysterious Message) and has not yet gained Master of Whispers, you can still enter this mission by partying with another player who can bring him. Although you need not have finished Margrid's side of the storyline by completing the Pogahn Passage mission, you need to complete No Me, No Kormir quest before you can access this mission.

Destroy the Drought.


 * ADDED Protect Dehjah until she opens the entrance to the Mahnkelon Waterworks.
 * ADDED Make your way to the central reservoir.
 * ADDED Weaken the Drought by shutting off the water pumps. X of 5 remain active.
 * BONUS Defeat the Drought without shutting down water pumps.

Primary
The party will be affected by the environmental effect Thirst of the Drought throughout this mission, which increases all received Earth damage by 50%. Other than Kournan Scribes occasionally using Aftershock, the only mobs that deal earth damage are The Drought and its Droughtlings at the very end of the mission. Regardless, use of the ranger spirit Winter will negate this effect by turning all earth damage to cold damage.

When the mission starts, Dehjah will lead you through a few groups of Steelfang Drakes and Kournan troops to the entrance of the waterworks. She will run ahead of your group and eventually stop at point close to the drakes but clear of the aggro. She will then wait for your arrival to that point and then continue. She will engage with the enemies whether you are following or not. She will run ahead to the next group of enemies after fighting the previous group, again regardless of your following. This means if you decide to take a detour Dehjah will most likely perish. Upon arrival at the waterworks she will not enter with your party.

While it is not difficult to keep up with Dehjah, it is possible to avoid her at the start. Run to the far right and clear the area up to the waterworks before coming back for her. It will take much longer to complete the mission though.

Inside the waterworks, there are five water pumps that you can turn off to weaken the Thirst of the Drought (see the bonus below). Each pump that is shut down will provide a 2% Morale Boost and decrease the environmental effect by 10%; shutting down all five will eliminate the effect altogether.

The gate in the center of the second wall is guarded by a neutral Agent of Whispers, who will open it as you approach. There is another Agent at the center of the third wall, who will lead you to the northwest where he opens a gate into The Drought's chamber.

The Drought's room is populated with many droughtlings. Three groups of 2-3 droughtlings each can be cleared without aggroing The Drought. It is best to clear these groups before attacking The Drought.

The Drought and its droughtlings are all earth elementalists. The Drought in particular does very heavy area damage with Sandstorm. The easiest way to kill The Drought is with Broad Head Arrow. Fire it before entering combat, and wait for it to hit before otherwise attacking, so that The Drought will not move out of the way. Refire it as necessary to keep The Drought permanently dazed until dead, and then turn your attention to the droughtlings.

If you don't have broad head arrow, Power Block also works pretty well. Other skills that can keep The Drought dazed are effective, too, though if The Drought casts Sandstorm before you can daze it, you'd better move your party out of the way, and fast. Other interrupts can likewise work to at least interrupt sandstorm, though Stoning and Stone Daggers will probably cast too fast to interrupt apart from dumb luck.

Bonus
The bonus is to refrain from turning off the water pumps, thus keeping the environmental effect active. Apart from The Drought's room, the main effect of doing the bonus is to shorten the mission by skipping various groups of Kournans guarding pumps.

Thirst of the Drought can be disabled with Winter if so desired. Even without this, the tactics used to clear The Drought's room aren't meaningfully changed.

Hard Mode
If you can incapacitate The Drought by keeping it perpetually dazed, being in hard mode won't make much of a difference to either the tactics or the difficulty of the mission.

NPCs

 * 20 Agent of Whispers
 * 20 Kournan Engineer

Allies

 * 20 Dehjah

Monsters
Drakes Elementals Insects Kournan army
 * 20 Steelfang Drake
 * 24 Droughtling
 * 20 Bladed Veldt Termite
 * 20 Veldt Beetle Queen
 * 20 Veldt Beetle Lance
 * 20 Kournan Guard
 * 20 Kournan Priest
 * 20 Kournan Seer
 * 20 Kournan Scribe
 * 20 Kournan Phalanx
 * 20 Kournan Zealot

Bosses

 * 28 The Drought: Sandstorm

Follow-up

 * Upon completion of the mission players will find themselves in: Moddok Crevice
 * To continue the storyline, enter the Moddok Crevice mission.