The Underdark

It is a vast realm, where darkness pervades and danger lunks (sic)'' at every unseen corner. It is home to the Drow, amongst other things...''



The Underdark is a level 22 wilderness adventure area, allowing characters from levels 20 to 26 to get full experience. It is located in the Forgotten Realms.

Access and overview
There are two ways to access this area. These are two different entrances, and get you to different starting points in the map.
 * From within The King's Forest
 * The most direct method is to use the Underdark entrance in the extreme south of the King's Forest, which initially requires simply running through the length of the Forest. If you tag the Purple Dragon Knight's Forward Outpost (located in the southeast of the forest), you can then teleport to that directly and make the run from there to the southern portal much shorter*. Speak with Milus Sherton, Transport Officer, once you are at the camp, then again at the entry to King's Forest whenever you wish to use his services.
 * * Take the smaller path that leads southwest from the Outpost. When the path ends, continue southwest to the portal.


 * From the portal in the Eveningstar Cavern
 * Access to this portal requires completion of the quest "The Battle for Eveningstar", which is the end-quest to the Menace of the Underdark chain, and then finding the Sschindylryn portal entrance in the Underdark. Until it is unlocked, the portal is not visible to the character (except on the map).

The King's Forest entrance is very close to the Sschindylryn portal entrance. The easiest way to find the portal is to enter from the King's Forest, follow the path, staying left. When the path ends, approach the edge of the cliff on your right, and look below. You should see a drow bridge. Jump off the cliff with feather fall and cross the bridge, fighting up the path to the left, past spell wards, to the portal. (Taking the path right leads back to the King's Forest exit.)

Once the Sschindylryn central portal has been unlocked, you can enter the city from the Eveningstar cavern and then exit the Sschindylryn zone to the Underdark, in the south-center of the map, southwest from the King's Forest entrance. This is the default destination from Eveningstar Cavern.

There is another portal in the Underdark at the ruins of Riz Malag explorer option, west side of the game map (shown as a blue dot on Wiki map, above). Once this has been found (and the Sschindylryn portal unlocked, as above), it is available as an optional entrance point to the Underdark from the Eveningstar Cavern.
 * This portal is very close to the quest entrance for the quest In the Belly of the Beast. Just follow the right hand path upwards to the "secret cave".

Similarly, one must travel to the northeast corner of the map to use the "Trader's Camp" as a destination from the Eveningstar Cavern portal.

Malchor's Undersun Goggles
Although the Underdark is true to its name (it's dark!), amplify the Underdark radiation to give you better sight and reveal hidden enemies by making them glow red. These goggles will not help in most other low-light quests (such as Rainbow in the Dark), but will work in Don't Drink the Water.

It is provided free to players from a NPC Beli Bragason (Optics Merchant) upon reaching the Underdark. This NPC is located just east of Master Scout Atrezt Dun'Robar's spawn location, in an open area next to a large pillar. Once this has been unlocked (by traveling to it from a different entry), this can be easily accessed from the Eveningstar Cavern portal. Choose "the Trader's Camp", and, after entering, look to the southwest for the glow of a campfire.

Navigating the Underdark
True to its pen-and-paper namesake, getting disoriented in the Underdark is easy. Take advantage of the maps provided in this article. The Underdark is arguably the second largest wilderness area in terms of sheer height (The King's Forest is probably larger in area but The Storm Horns trumps in both categories), with many levels and few access points to reach explorer points and rare enemies. Dead-ends often have powerful and deadly rares. Feather fall is important here to reach some ledges. Monks and Favored Souls have advantage here with their long-jump abilities.

Most parties will be prepared to fight anything they encounter—and there is much that will find you there. A stealthy approach allows casual exploration without attracting attention.

Traps
Unlike most explorer zones, the Underdark have scattered around their zones some bear traps and spell wards. They can be disabled as any normal traps.


 * Bear traps (CR:22) Disable DC:
 * Spell Wards (CR:22) Disable DC: 20:Fail; 55:Success; (Suspected: 47-55)

Quests
In addition to the Rare Encounter / Slayer / Explorer missions typical to all wilderness adventure areas, the following quests can be found in this zone:


 * In the Belly of the Beast - side quest

Sschindylryn
Main article - Sschindylryn

The Drow city of Sschindylryn is another adventure area, accessible from this zone. The four quests required to advance the raid flagging arc (the entire second quest chain series) are located in Sschindylryn, not in this area. So you must gain initial access here through the Underdark.

The easiest way to get to Sschindylryn via the Underdark is by going to the very southern part of The King's Forest and using the cave there. Once you enter the cave you may fight your way along the path and will discover the portal to Eveningstar/Sschindylryn. Then use that portal which takes you back to the Eveningstar Cavern and from that point on you may use the Eveningstar Cavern portal to get to the city, by way of a portal that rests on the southern outskirts of the city, and the quests within.

Should you use the portal located in the heart of the city to take you to other locations, any future uses of portals to get to the city will take you to that inner city portal and not the southern outskirts portal that leads to the city via the main bridge. Enemies that may normally patrol around this portal will not be present if you zone in before others in party enter into the city's main entrance, which triggers enemies to spawn.

Denizens of the Underdark

 * Slay Ha'arlax the Hunter
 * Slay the Wander(sic) Demon Lord, Ihlazur
 * Slay Chorzan the Demagogue
 * Slay the Wayfaring Drider (Jorenthar Sparskrael)
 * Slay the Drider Rogue, Hastruun
 * Slay Uxyndar the Magister (Durnibas Uxyndar)
 * Slay Arch-Necromancer Phinrae Szind
 * Slay the last priestess of House Jegg'Dralnoc (Galfriel Jegg'Dralnoc)
 * Slay Taskmaster Uthimez
 * Slay Slavemaster Banister of House Avithoul (Slavemaster Banister Avithoul)
 * Slay under-priestess Dimaya
 * Slay Master Scout Atrezt Dun'Robar
 * Slay Nessaleesa, She Who Hunts Among Stones
 * Slay the Illithid Ygglyshek
 * Slay the Evil Arcanist, Qlogru
 * Slay the Prophet, Massrak
 * Slay Kressp the Fangblade
 * Slay the great red dragon, Micahrastir
 * Slay the Agathea

XP per encounter: 3,750 Bonus XP for solving all encounters: 35,625

Tips for the red dragon fight
The red dragon Micahrastir doesn't always spawn on the instance. In fact, when he is absent the "Dragon's Roost" doesn't look like a dragon's nest at all (no gold pile, no nothing). When he is there, two chests and gold pile appears. By backspacing these from below the nest, around the salamanders' area, you can check if he is there or not without running all the way up the "Grand Waterfall" side way. For this reason it is recommended to enter the Underdark area from eastern entrance (Merchant Camp), if you are going for the dragon fight.

The bridge to the nest gets destroyed shortly after starting the fight. So all the party members must be together on the platform in order to participate on the fight and get loot after. And yes, Micahrastir can wing-buffet you off the platform. Once you fall, there will be no way to reach the platform/chests again. It is recommended to rely solely on ranged/caster nuke and not to melee for this fight.

Note that active blocking will negate the wing buffet. If you have no choice but to melee, blocking continuously while taking shots immediately after each of Micahrastir's attacks may help. The wing buffet seems to be telegraphed by Micahrastir rearing up on his hind legs, which may give you time to block if you have a low-latency network connection and your character isn't stuck doing something else (like casting a spell) at the time.

If you do get wing-buffeted off the platform, it is actually possible to defeat Micahrastir with ranged weapons (it is too far for spells), if you return to the end of the broken bridge then jump down onto the dark, rounded pillar a few meters away from the edge.

Liberator
During some encounters, you might fight some enslaved people. If you can find and kill all Slavemasters nearby, they will stop attacking, and you can remove their collar and free them.

Once freed, they will help you against any other enemy that is still nearby, but will not follow you.

Usually, the slaves are near the entrance from King's Forest, near the broken cart, and around the portal of Riz-Malag.

Captives of the Drow

 * Uncollar 3 slaves: 2,448 XP
 * Uncollar 5 slaves: 3,072 XP
 * Uncollar 10 slaves: 3,909 XP
 * Uncollar 15 slaves: 4,590 XP
 * Uncollar 25 slaves: 5,601 XP
 * Uncollar 40 slaves: 6,654 XP
 * Uncollar 70 slaves: 8,502 XP
 * Uncollar 100 slaves: 9,300 XP

The Underdark
Each Explorer is worth 1,875 XP, the bonus for finding all of them is 6,093 XP.


 * Find the portal gate to Sschindylryn
 * Find the Boneyard
 * Find the Daycrystals
 * The bridge to the Daycrystals is initially blocked by two Deepstone Elementals. Jumping over them is tricky, but killing all other Deepstone Elementals in the area will activate the two on the bridge, allowing them to be slain.
 * Find the Cave of the Elements
 * Find the Dragon's Roost
 * Find the Spider Hatchery
 * Find Tranquility Grove
 * Find the Riz Malag portal
 * Find Nessaleesa's Garden
 * Find the Overlook
 * Find the Grand Waterfall
 * Find the source of the Demon infestation
 * Find Agathea's Hut

Monsters
Monsters in the zone not found on the rare encounters list.

Monster Information

Native Fauna
Killing native fauna here adds to your slayer count.
 * Frogs
 * Bats

Common Monsters

 * Acolytes
 * Acolytes of Lolth
 * Air Elementals
 * Animated Armor
 * Arch-Necromancers
 * Avithoul Sentries
 * Bandit Archers
 * Bandit Bards
 * Bats
 * Bloodrock Medusae
 * Collared Slaves
 * Collared Villagers
 * Deathjump Spiders
 * Deepstone Elementals
 * Draegloths
 * Driders
 * Drow Zombies
 * Dun'Robar Warriors
 * Guards
 * Harrowers
 * Illithids
 * Master Wizards
 * Necromancers
 * Necrophytes
 * Night Hags
 * Quickblades
 * Raised Dragon Knights
 * Raised War Wizards
 * Salamander Firebrands
 * Skeletal Puppets
 * Slain Villagers
 * Slaves
 * Slavemasters
 * Steadfast Armor
 * Swarmhorde Spiders
 * Szind Sentries
 * Szind Warriors
 * Tempered Armor
 * Undead Necromancers
 * Underdark Assassins
 * Water Elementals
 * Werewolves
 * Will-o'-Wisps
 * Yuan-ti Abominations
 * Yuan-ti Disciples of Zehir
 * Yuan-ti Incanters
 * Yuan-ti Malisons
 * Yuan-ti Sharp-Eyes

Named Monsters

 * Avithoul Blademasters - Orange-named drow swordsmen
 * Blademasters - Orange-named drow swordsmen
 * Collared Cormyr War Wizards - Orange-named humans
 * Collared Purple Dragon Knights - Orange-named humans
 * Dire Bears - Orange-named bears
 * Dun'Robar Blademasters - Orange-named drow swordsmen
 * Elder Purple Worms - Red-named purple worms
 * Elder Purple Worm Tails - Red-named purple worms tails
 * Priestesses of Lolth - Orange-named drow priestesses
 * Purple Worms - Orange-named
 * Purple Worm Tails - Orange-named