Rilohn Refuge (mission)

Mission Objectives and Rewards
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. You need not have finished Margrid's side of the storyline by completing the Pogahn Passage mission.

Objectives
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%. 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.

Tip: For parties that are having problems with her dying, note that 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%; therefore 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 is surrounded by Droughtlings, most of which can be killed off without aggroing the Drought. The Drought's spells, especially Sandstorm, inflict heavy AoE damage. Skills such as Broadhead Arrow, Concussion Shot, Spinal Shivers, and Maelstrom are very useful at interrupting the Drought's spells, while skills such as Shelter can be used to negate the damage. Instructing your team to spread out before the fight and move when Sandstorm hits help to keep your team alive and eases the healers in the party.

Note: Droughtlings do not leave exploitable corpses. A minion master in the group should bring some damage skills like Deathly Swarm or other utility skills for the fight against the Droughtlings. Bringing Animate Flesh Golem might be a good idea as well.

Tip: Although the objective of the mission is to defeat Drought, the final cutscene doesn't start before the accompanied Droughtlings have been killed as well. Therefore, if somebody in the party wants to capture the elite spell Sandstorm, it is possible to do so by killing Drought first.

Bonus
If you are attempting to complete the Mission Bonus, it is very helpful if you equip yourself or one of your heroes with the Winter skill, which will turn Earth damage into Cold damage, to negate the Thirst of the Drought environmental effect. In addition to Winter, it can be helpful to equip Mantra of Frost, possibly to the extent of changing all your Heroes secondary professions to Mesmer. But with Winter, competent Monks, and interruption skills, you should not have any trouble at all taking down any group.

Tip: In the final fight, none of the enemies can remove enchantments. Shield of Absorption, Life Barrier, and Life Bond can all be used on the tank, who can then maintain aggro.


 * It should be noted again that shutting off the water pumps is NOT required to complete the mission. The number of pumps shut off only determines the party's master rank (the more pumps shut, the less rank); the only requirement to complete the mission is killing the Drought.


 * Another tactic that has been used successfully is using Ebon-modded weapons (or uniques with earth damage, such as Chor's Axe) to do this mission, without using a spell such as winter to change the elemental damage. This allows party members to do considerable damage, even against the Droughtlings and the Drought itself (since the damage bonus overcomes the elemental resistance of fighting the elementals with the same element). While highly unconventional, this is also a viable tactic, and helps considerably to fight your way through the mission itself (since your weapons do an amazing 50% damage bonus against everything). Consider using a Mesmer secondary for Mantra of Earth as well. Another strategy is to use a Dervish equipped with the Elite Form Avatar of Melandru which increases your hp 100 points, disables the possibility of being affected by a condition, and converts all of your physical damage into earth damage to substitute for an Ebon-modded weapon.


 * Bringing someone with a skill that causes Dazed, like a Ranger with Broad Head Arrow and use it on the Drought. This will stop all spell casting on him if the whole party focuses on him.


 * Another solution is to bring a water elementalist with Maelstrom. It does the stated damage against The Drought, and also prevents him from casting, allowing the players to easily finish The Drought in under ten seconds.


 * Another effective way of completing the bonus is to bring a well-equipped Minion Master. There are plenty of bodies to generate minions before getting to The Droughts room. Several Droughtlings and the Drought itself are no match for 10 minions if The Droughts sandstorm is kept interrupted. (Sandstorm does enough AoE damage to effectively destroy all of the minions in very little time)


 * If Winter is being used, a Curses Necromancer with Spinal Shivers or Shivers of Dread can be useful for shutting down the Drought, as all elemental damage will trigger the interrupt effect. This will likely drain the Necromancer's energy pool quickly,but the Drought can be brought down quickly before that ever becomes an issue.


 * Primary or secondary Domination Magic Mesmers can use Power Block on the Drought. The Drought uses many long casting Earth Magic spells, that can easily be interrupted with Power Block. After successful use of Power Block, all the Droughts Earth Magic based skills are disabled for a period of time, depending on the Mesmers level in Domination Magic.

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.