The Art of Underworld

5. THE LABYRINTH
Foes: Bladed Aatxe, Dying Nightmare, Grasping Darkness (Clear the Chamber), Terrorweb Dryder, Keeper of Souls (Unwanted Guests), Vengeful Aatxe (Unwanted Guests), Mindblade Spectre (Escort of Souls)
Quests: Clear the Chamber (Lost Soul), Unwanted Guests (Reaper of the Labyrinth), Escort of Souls (Reaper of the Labyrinth), Restoring the Monuments of Grenth (Reaper of the Labyrinth)



This is the area in which you spawn. Funnily enough, beginners find this area easy, whereas it is where experienced players will tend to die the most. This room has a big impact on your total run time, and one willing to go as fast as possible will tend to take riskier aggros. Savage Slash from Bladed Aatxes as well as Distracting Blow, “Fear Me!” and Skull Crack from Grasping Darknesses are notably dangerous, but can be countered with Sympathethic and Ancestor’s Visages or Mantra of Resolve. Still, you will have to be careful with the latter: a large amount of foes can drain your whole energy pool during a 1s cast, cancelling Resolve in the process and leaving you vulnerable to Skull Crack.

A solution for this, which will work whether the monk has resolve or not, would be for the necromancer to open his cast chain with Sympathetic Visage before casting two Spiteful Spirits and Reckless Haste, and follow up with Ancestor’s Visage a little later. It is a waste to chain Sympathethic and Ancestor’s Visage here as it will take a few seconds before the foes regenerate enough energy to interrupt again. The necromancer can safely leave a 5 seconds gap between them.

It is important that the necromancer chooses his targets for Spiteful Spirit, rather than picking whichever is closest and taking it down, because against larger aggros, some foes might not be adjacent to the whole group. Foes in the middle of the group should, however, be adjacent to the others and therefore make good candidates for Spiteful Spirit. If Aatxes and Graspings are present in a same group, the Aatxes should be targeted with SS since they have more health than Graspings and therefore should bring them down before dying themselves. Two Spiteful Spirits and Reckless Haste should be all that is needed to take a group down. Additionally, it is a good idea to scroll through all the foes and make sure they are all taking equal damage. If not, Insidious Parasite can be used to bring down a target quickly, but should never be used on a foe already hexed with Spiteful Spirit in a group. On the other hand, the monk should always ball up his foes as much as possible so that all targets are adjacent to each other.

Dying Nightmares also seem to be a big concern for some monks. In the Labyrinth, it is a good idea to cast Spellbreaker prior to aggroing (unless you have resolve, do not wait until they spawn to cast it, because the Aatxes can interrupt it) and switch to your wand and take them down as they spawn. If the necro casts Sympathetic Visage on you, they will tend to sacrifice themselves by using Blood is Power on its allies. You should not rely on that, but it can definitely help in the second room. They are invisible and spawn randomly in the first room, however, they are visible in the second and fourth room (meaning you do not have to worry about Spellbreaker if you see none). They do not spawn in the third room, and they are both invisible and visible in the fifth room, meaning that even if one is visible, another can pop up randomly. It should also be noted that invisible Nightmares trigger only when you walk somewhere, and will not respawn after they have been triggered and killed.

5.a. Clear the Chamber
This quest is required to open the rest of Underworld. It will spawn three groups of three to four Grasping Darknesses in the first room, which you will have to kill. It is pretty basic and I do not feel the necessity to talk about it much in this guide, you can use the information given above to help you out with it.

5.b. Unwanted Guests
Taking this quest will spawn six groups all over the Labyrinth (you can see the spawns on the map above), each composed of three Vengeful Aatxes, three Terrorweb Dryders patrolling over a certain path, and a Keeper of Souls. The tricky part of this quest is that Vengeful Aatxes are invincible, but will die once the associated Keeper of Souls does so and they have lost aggro. The Keeper of Souls is a weak creature which the necro should solo if possible as it uses Lingering Curse; it will die within a few seconds under the effects of Spiteful Spirit and Insidious Parasite.

Prior to attempting this quest, however, the team should have spawned another Reaper in a different area. This way, if the monk has aggroed Vengeful Aatxes and the Keeper of Souls has been killed, the necromancer can run to the Reaper of the Labyrinth, teleport the team somewhere else and the Aatxes will be dead as aggro is lost. You can see this tactic in use in our videos.

5.c. Escort of Souls
This quest will spawn three groups of Mindblade Spectres in the Labyrinth. A group of 6 (which is optional) will appear in Room 1, another group of 6 will appear in Room 3, and three more Mindblades will pop up at the entrance of the Forgotten Vale, right before the bridge (they are invisible until you trigger them). Basically, you must bring New Souls, level 20 allies, to the Mayor in the Forgotten Vale. Hexes last half their duration on them, so it is hard for the Mindblades to kill them. However, if a New Soul dies, the run is over.

There are two ways to do this quest: you can either clear the Forgotten Vale and spawn the Reaper and begin it from the Forgotten Vale (which is safer, since you do not have to worry about New Souls following you), or start it from the Labyrinth, in which case the necro should stay far from the monk until all the Mindblades are attacking him. It should be noted that New Souls will follow whoever is moving, so the necro should move a bit while the monk is aggroing, and the Souls will stay with him. When the Mindblades start attacking the monk, the necro should come in range and cast SV, after which he should wait for one or two seconds for it to drain energy, then follow with arcane echo and two quick Spiteful Spirits, AV and then finally Reckless Haste.

If this is done correctly, the quest will be completed without much trouble, whereas if the necro makes the mistake of opening with Spiteful Spirit rather than SV, the Mindblades will keep him shut down with Migraine and Interrupts, and once the monk loses Spellbreaker, he will be shut down as well.

5.d. Restoring the Monuments of Grenth
Taking this quest will spawn a group of three Terrorweb Dryders in each area of the Underworld, upon the death of which a reaper of the corresponding area will spawn. Needless to say, you will need this quest to take those given by other reapers.





6. THE ICE WASTES
Foes: Smite Crawlers, Dying Nightmare, Coldfire Night, Terrorweb Dryder (Restoring the Monuments of Grenth)
Quests: Servants of Grenth (Reaper of the Ice Wastes)



The Ice Wastes should be the easiest area to clear. The monk is able to tank a lot of Smites with the builds provided. They do not interrupt, so it is a waste to pre-cast Spellbreaker in case Dying Nightmares pop up, and they are less common here than they were in the Labyrinth. It is a good idea to turn Sound Effects on in your sound settings so you hear them when they pop up. When aggroing, the monk should make frequent stops to recast his enchantments in case a Dying Nightmare spawns and you have to cast Spellbreaker. An example for this would be a monk aggroing many groups of Smites (therefore many Smites are running after him) and suddenly, a Dying Nightmare spawns . He has to stop to cast Spellbreaker, but if Shield of Absorption runs out, the gap before it can go up again (finish casting Spellbreaker, cast a new SoA) is enough to get him killed.

Coldfires can also become troublesome with their Maelstrom, although if you brought Resolve you can tank through it. You should cast Spellbreaker before aggroing them, not only for Maelstrom but also because they will slow you down with Shard Storm. If tanking Coldfires and Smites altogether, tuck the Smites into the Coldfires, so that Sympathethic Visage and Spiteful Spirit affects them as well. If the necro has to deal with such aggro, his Spiteful Spirits should target the Smites because they attack faster and therefore will output more damage.

The Smites have Smite Hex which they will use as soon as they get hexed, so the necro will first need to drain their energy with SV before casting SS. He should open with SV, follow up with Arcane Echo and two SS, AV, then Reckless Haste. Using such pattern, they should die before they regenerate enough energy to do cast anything.

If you plan to do Servants of Grenth, you will need to kill the groups that patrol near Ice King’s location, displayed in the map above by the red dot, otherwise they will kill him.

6.a. Servants of Grenth (Ice King)
This quest is all about timing. Once you’ve got that down, it can be done easily. The monk will position himself at the location where the Dryders spawn as indicated on the map, and as soon as the necromancer takes the quest, six Dryders will spawn. A second wave will spawn 30 seconds later, and a third, 1 minute after the second wave (or 1:30 after taking the quest). That can be tricky because if the monk waits until the first wave of Dryders spawns to cast Spellbreaker, it’s not going to be recharged by the time the second wave spawns, and he will have to dodge multiple meteor showers which can become very risky.

There is a simple solution to this problem, which I like to refer to as the 13 seconds rule. The monk will tell his partner he’s casting Spellbreaker, and the necro will count 13 seconds, after which he will take the quest. Doing so will let the monk have enough time with Spellbreaker up to prevent any Meteor Showers from the first wave, and it will be recharged before the second wave of Dryders can cast Meteor Shower. If the monk runs an infinite Spellbreaker build, it is not needed to follow that rule.

The necromancer should not try to go kill the Dryders right away, instead he should wait until the second wave has spawned and that the monk has balled up the Dryders together. This can be done without much problem by moving slowly out of aggro; the Dryders will follow the monk and ball up together. After the second wave has spawned, you will be told that the quest has been completed. There is still a third wave which you must take care of. Wait until that wave spawns to cast your third Spellbreaker. Once all eighteen Dryders have been killed, both players are free to collect the 10,000 experience reward.





7. THE FORGOTTEN VALE
Foes: Grasping Darkness, Dying Nightmare, Coldfire Night, Stalking Night, Terrorweb Dryder (Restoring the Monuments of Grenth), Tortured Spirit (Wrathful Spirits)
Quests: Wrathful Spirits

Like the Ice Wastes, this area is fairly easy. It is particularily popular for the “spider run”. In fact, everytime you complete a quest from a reaper other than in the Labyrinth, a chest and a black widow are spawned, and this area and quest can be completed much quicker than the Ice Wastes and Servants of Grenth, hence why people choose this area for these “spider runs”.

Before you aggro the monk aggros the first group of Grasping Darknesses in this area, he should cast Spellbreaker because there is always at least one invisible Dying Nightmare in this area, which should be triggered and killed before taking the quest.

There will be a group of Grasping Darknesses behind the Terrorweb Dryders, which the monk should aggro altogether, and tuck the Graspings into the Dryders. Alternatively he could cast SB, aggro both groups and run until the Dryders lose aggro. If fighting by the Dryders, eventually a Coldfires patrol will join the fight. Killing the Grasping Darknesses should be the first priority. If the monk has to move out of a Maelstrom, some foes might lose aggro and start attacking the necro, which should run until the monk got his aggro back.

7.a. Wrathful Spirits
Before taking this quest, the monk should be positioned near the first group of allied spirits. The necro will then take the quest, spawning hostile Tortured Spirits in the process. He can then come and cast Spiteful Spirits. As hexes only last half their duration on these spirits, they might be a little thougher to kill, and Reckless Haste should be avoided. They will also take a lot of damage from wand hits. On his side, the monk has to make sure at least one allied spirit lives, which is easily achieved by casting Healing Breeze and Shield of Absorption on them as they take damage. You can find a video of this quest in the videos section of this guide.

8. THE TWIN SERPENT MOUNTAINS
Foes: Obsidian Behemoth, Charged Blackness, Dying Nightmare, Terrorweb Dryder (Restoring the Monuments of Grenth), Slayer (Demon Assassin), Keeper of Souls (Demon Assassin)
Quests: Demon Assassin

This is the area everyone loves to hate. Everything has been pretty simple for both players so far, but things take a small turn here. First of all, players will have to deal with Nature’s Renewal. The monk has to drop an enchantment if he was maintaining three, preferably Essence Bond. The Behemoths also use Healing Spring, which will have to be interrupted by wand hits (although they will use Whirling Defense as much as they can).

An interesting fact about Behemoths is that they will stop attacking if a character wielding a melee weapon comes in their range. This can become troublesome if you are not aware of it, but can also be very helpful to know. Since they are stationary, annoying and do not drop anything particularily worthy of interest, you should skip as many groups as you can. They lay down a lot of traps, and the monk should always cast Protective Spirit, Healing Breeze and Shield of Absorption before triggering them.

Dying Nightmares will spawn during the first portion of this area (they will not spawn past the first entrance to the Chaos Planes). It is not necessary for the monk to precast Spellbreaker before aggroing in case one spawn; instead, he should wear a melee weapon, to aggro, and if one spawns and rends him, he can recast PS for safety (although the Behemoths should not hit him) before running back to a safe spot and recast enchantments.

In order to be able to kill Behemoths, the monk should stay on his wand set and keep a list of his enemies in mind and when they used Healing Spring last. Usually they will cast it as soon as it is recharged. It is futile to try and kill the Behemoths with Spiteful Spirit if they have Healing Spring up. The monk should not try to keep SoA up, PS and Breeze will be enough and he needs to cast as little as possible in order not to miss any Healing Spring. The necro can help keep Healing Spring down as well if needed. I have uploaded a video of the Twin Serpent Mountains from the monk side where you can clearly see how to handle these.

You will find a few Charged Blacknesses in this area, but they are not particularily dangerous. Still, they have Shock which can knock you down even if you have Spellbreaker on. The monk should not try to aggro too many of these at once (he should take them group by group), and monitor their usage of Shock in order to know when to cast. It is not necessary to cast Spellbreaker prior to aggroing these, but it can help as it will force them to hit more frequently and therefore give more energy. They will come in melee range for Shock and Whirlwind, but the necro should not be fooled by that, they are not actually melee and will not trigger Sympathetic Visage.

There is only one part of this area which is very hard, and it is the pull at the top of the mountains, where the reaper spawn. First, the monk will have to lure the Dryders out of their place, while keeping aggro, then position himself in a way where he can hit all or most of the Behemoths. Because he will be taking so much damage, he will have need to keep SoA on as much as possible (or at least when Spellbreaker is not up), while interrupting the Behemoths. The necromancer cannot kill the Dryders at this point because that would make the reaper spawn in the middle of traps, killing him in the process. He should instead be waiting at the bottom of the hill, where he is not in range of the Dryders, and cast Spiteful Spirits, Reckless Haste and even Insidious Parasite if needed. As the Behemoths will most likely have to be taken down one by one here, the necromancer should give the monk his target so that he can interrupt its Healing Spring and its adjacent allies’. Once the Behemoths are down, the monk can trigger their traps, and it is only then that the necromancer can start killing the Dryders.

8.a. Demon Assassin
After taking down the group at the top of the hill where the reaper spawns, this quest will seem very easy. The monk should wait at the first intersection at the bottom of the hill (as shown in screenshots). The necromancer will take the quest, spawning Slayer and four Keeper of Souls. Slayer runs very fast and will reach the monk quickly. He has a lot of health, but is not particularily dangerous. After some time, the four Keeper of Souls will reach the monk as well, who will need to cast Spellbreaker. The necro should kill them before finishing off Slayer with Spiteful Spirit and Insidious Parasite.





9. The Chaos Planes
Foes: Banished Dream Rider, Mindblade Spectre, Wailing Lord, Terrorweb Dryder (Restoring the Monuments of Grenth, The Four Horsemen), The Dhuums (Four Horsemen)
Quests: The Four Horsemen



Although the Chaos Planes is the bane of all casters, it can be completed easily and safely if you know what to expect. At first sight, it is just a few Banished Dream Riders. However, whenever you kill one that is by itself (there are three groups of a Wailing Lord – with no skills – and 2 Dream Riders over the area, represented by purple dots on the map), a group of three Mindblades is spawned. When that group is killed, a group of 6 Mindblades will spawn, and then a group of 9. The spawns and relationship to Dream Riders is well represented on the map above. Additionally, there are three groups of Mindblades that will pop up when you walk by them, but they are also represented on the map.

Banished Dream Riders are easy to handle. The monk will need Spellbreaker as they have Shatter Enchantment and interrupts, but there is no need to echo it, providing he knows where the first group of Mindblades will spawn. If not, then it is safer keep it up.

Mindblade Spectres are easy to take care of providing the group is ready to take them on. The necro should make sure he is far from them when they spawn. The monk will then proceed to take them on. It is only once the whole group is in melee range with him that the necro can start his casting pattern. He must open with a Visage on the monk, then proceed to echo Spiteful Spirit, before using the second Visage and adding Reckless Haste. Should his pattern fail, such as if he casts Spiteful Spirit first, the Mindblades will have him “registered” and therefore will interrupt anything he will try to cast the next time he comes into aggro. Against groups of 3, he will want to move out of a range a bit before casting echo, otherwise it might get interrupted since they do not lose energy as quickly as if it was a group of 6 or 9.

The team should not kill the Dryders until the Banished Dream Riders and Mindblades have spawned, otherwise they will kill the reaper. If aggroed, the monk can just run back and they will lose aggro easily.

If the team used a N/Mo instead of a N/Me, the monk will need to bring Spell Shield. The Banished Dream Riders will be taken on with Spellbreaker on the monk, and the Mindblades will be taken on with Spell Shield on the monk and Spellbreaker on the Necro. That being said, running a N/Me is much more efficient.

9.a. The Four Horsemen
Without a doubt the hardest quest in the Underworld, this quest is not that hard by itself, it is rather the NPC AI which makes it tough. Taking this quest will spawn four groups consisting of a high level mesmer boss with Shatter and Drain Enchantment and three Dryders, all of which will converge on the Reaper of the Chaos Planes, attacking from two different sides.

It is impossible to aggro both sides without drawing attention the reaper. The next most logical choice is to have the monk save the reaper while the necro deals the damage.

Before taking the quest, the monk will want to change armor to his high energy set, but keep his Divine Favor scalp. He should also stop maintaining Balthazar’s Spirit and Essence Bond, Blessed Aura being the only enchantment still needed. The Dhuums and Dryders will not trigger Essence Bond, so while it might’ve sounded like a good idea to keep it on the reaper, it will have no effect. The necro will want to take his Tormentor’s armor set.

As shown on the screenshots, there is a spot where players can initially stay without drawing aggro. The monk will get just in range of the reaper, and keep Spellbreaker and Shield of Absorption on him. It is very important not to waste energy, and this is going to be all you will need. The necromancer should keep Blood Ritual on the monk.

Once all dryders and bosses are attacking the reaper, the necromancer must check which group the reaper is attacking, and start killing the Dryders on the same side. He must be very careful, and arcane echo should be avoided, he should just cast Spiteful Spirit on the first dryder from the very edge of his aggro circle before backing off. If they switch target and come towards the group, he should focus all his energy on them, and use Insidious Parasite as needed. If he has a weapon set with a shield that gives additional armor against fire damage, he should switch to that as well. On the other hand, the monk will need to use Protective Spirit on himself, and must not forget about the reaper. If Spellbreaker is missed while Dryders are still alive, the reaper will die for sure.

Once the Dryders on the first side are down, proceed to killing the ones on the other side. When all are dead, the party will have to wait for a few minutes until the reaper manages to get a boss low in health. If the monk misses Spellbreaker, he should cast PS on the reaper, and cover it up with Healing Breeze then SoA. It will take a few seconds for the Dhuums to remove these enchantments, and once the reaper is no longer enchanted, the monk should avoid re-enchanting him until Spellbreaker is ready again. It might become energy intensive and there might be a need for the 15/-1 focus.

When the reaper’s target, whichever it is, has about the two thirds of his health left, the necro should start attacking him, avoiding getting in range of any other boss. He will have to be very careful, only keeping his target at the very edge of his aggro circle, and run back after each cast. If the boss starts attacking the necromancer, he can run, and the boss will lose aggro quickly enough. He must avoid bringing the boss in range of the monk at all costs.

At this point, the monk should not need Blood Ritual anymore. While he has to keep Spellbreaker on the reaper, he can reduce the frequency of his SoA casts. The necro can now go on his own pick on the same targets as the reaper, and the team is free to move as needed, as long as the monk is safe. If the necro takes a lot of damage from a boss, the monk must avoid enchanting him until he is in a safe area, because Shatter Enchantment can easily kill him.

If the monk brought Life Bond instead of Essence Bond, this quest will be much easier. He can bond the reaper, keep Balthazar’s Spirit on himself, and will not need Blood Ritual at all. It is then possible to keep Protective Spirit and Breeze on both himself and his partner as the Dryders come towards them. Additionally, it allows for a much earlier split between the necro and the monk, and the necro can get on the reaper’s target much earlier.

Alternatively, the monk can bring Auspicious Incantation. In terms of usefulness, it is located between Essence Bond and Life Bond. The latter is the best option for the Four Horsemen quest, but is useless for every other quest and area. On the other hand, Essence Bond excels in the Chaos Planes and in the Bone Pits, but is useless during the Four Horsemen. Auspicious Incantation is not an optimal choice for either, but is definately far from useless in both cases. It is up to the monk’s personal preference.





10. THE BONE PITS
Foes: Dead Collector, Dead Tresher, Chained Soul, Terrorweb Dryder (Restoring the Monuments of Grenth, Imprisoned Spirits)
Quests: Imprisoned Spirits

While the Twin Serpent Mountains was an area one would love to hate, everything about this area is to hate. Luckily, it can be completed quickly enough.

Before anything, the monk must be aware that Chained Souls will appear anywhere at any time, doing nothing but casting Rend Enchantments. He should try moving from group to group without wasting time, and keep Spellbreaker up constantly.

The necro will want to stay far from the monk while he is aggroing, who should try to tuck the Dead Collectors (melee) into the Dead Treshers (ranged). The necro can then cast SV, preventing the foes from hexing him. He should move out of range as soon as he casted his Spiteful Spirits and Reckless Haste, since the Treshers can take him down quickly with Feast of Corruption.

Nothing about this area is particularily hard; the necromancer just needs to play very carefully and the monk must keep Spellbreaker up at all times.

10.a. Imprisoned Spirits
This quest looks pretty much like Ice King, except that the monk has to keep Spellbreaker up constantly since Chained Souls keep spawning. He will wait right under the bridge, and then the necromancer will take the quest. Three dryders will spawn next to the monk, and two more waves will follow. The necro can wait until all nine dryders have spawned and been balled up by the monk before moving in to kill them.





11. THE SPAWNING POOLS
Foes: Terrorweb Dryder, Charged Blackness, Terrorweb Queen (Terrorweb Queen), Obsidian Guardian (Terrorweb Queen)
Quests: Terrorweb Queen

The Spawning Pools is definitely easier than the Bone Pits or the Chaos Planes, as most of it is déjà-vu. The area consists of groups of Terrorweb Dryders and Charged Blacknesses. The monk will not need to worry about keeping up Spellbreaker here. It should be used when aggroing, but once it expires, there is no need to recast it.

The monk should be avoid aggroing too many Charged Blacknesses and should limit his aggros to one or two groups if these are involved. If Spellbreaker goes down and SoA is interrupted (by knock down) and the monk is affected by burning, things quickly become dangerous. Safety is the key here.

11.b. Terrorweb Queen
This quest is not much harder than Demon Assassin, however this time you must defeat the Queen of Dryders and she has much more health than Slayer. Four Obsidian Guardians also spawn next to her, but you will ignore them.

The monk will need to pull the Queen out of her wards, after which the necro can come in and starts chaining Spiteful Spirit and Insidious Parasite. The monk should wand her, keeping Protective Spirit and Healing Breeze up, and cast Spellbreaker only if the queen starts casting Meteor Shower. Players will need to be patient; the Queen has a lot of health, and therefore will take some time to kill.





12. TIPSWhen you teleport the team by talking to a reaper, corpses are teleported as well. You can take advantage of this functionality if either player dies where resurrection would be dangerous or impossible. The necromancer should avoid casting Reckless Haste against small groups of foes: failed hits do not trigger Balthazar’s Spirit, and the monk might run into energy problems. Against small groups of Bladed Aatxes, the monk can attack with a melee weapon to trigger ripostes and gain energy from doing so. In the Twin Serpent Mountains, players should wield a melee weapon if they want to run past groups. The Obsidian Behemoths will only not attack if someone in their range wields a melee weapon. If foes start chasing the necromancer, he can start running around a stationary monk, and they will start attacking him. You can use this technique to aggro additional Smites on the monk.

14. VIDEOS
All the videos we have recorded can be found here. You can download them and/or stream them.



15. CREDITS
Writing this guide has taken a lot of work and motivation, and without the help of certain people, I would have never been able to do this. I wish to take some time to thank these people:
Jay (Hideous Jay) : C’est avec toi que j’ai réussi Four Horsemen à deux pour la première fois et j’étais vraiment fier! Après ça, on a passé des après-midi entières a essayer d’autres builds et on continuait d’essayer même si ça marchait jamais et que t’haissait les bébés mammouth :P Si on n’avait pas râté toutes ces runs-là, j’aurais rien apprit! Avarre (Nimruzir Dharos) : Hi, Mister My-Time-Is-Yours-Plus-Thirteen-Hours! You know, even though we couldn't play that much together, it was still with you that I managed to clear the UW for the first time. However, that does not mean you are pro! Here's a quick fact about Avarre for those who will read this: he once tried to impersonate me by playing with my monk in one of the videos but he kept dying! After spending all gold on my monk to enter UW, he finally told me he would record himself as necro instead! Qam (Help My Pelle) : Hey Niel! I’d like to thank you for all the time you spent running in Underworld with me and of course for helping me out very much in the Bone Pits and Spawning Pools. It’s been funny to talking to you in the morning (my time) on MSN when you were at work and planning what we would try in the Underworld later in the day! Pee V Pee (Madame Deathbane) : I don’t know if you will ever read this since you moved away from Guild Wars to play WoW but it has always been great to play with you. You hated PvE, but you were always willing to go for a UW run! Even if we didn’t have much successful runs, I learned a lot from them!
Additionally, I would like to thank kicks66 (Mending Heal Sig) from Guild Wars Guru. He was the only person to answer my call for help on recording a part of a run, and even if I didn’t use the video we recorded together in my guide, I am still very thankful to him.



16. LAST WORDS
Writing this guide has been a nice experience, but it took much more time than I could have imagined. We must've failed at least 50 runs of Four Horsemen before finally finding a build that worked, and funnily enough, the build we ended up with was very simple. I have uploaded the original video of the first successful Four Horsemen run, which is entitled Original 4 Horsemen (Nec View).

I sure hope I have succeeded in transmitting my interest for the Underworld to other players! I will try to keep this up-to-date with skill changes and possibly add more stuff in the Tips section, as well as and more info in the bestiary.

Hopefully you will appreciate my guide as much as I appreciated writing it!

Cerb






17. APPENDIX (16/11/08)

I have received a PM asking for the HM builds. It's not the first, and I used to tell people to search my old posts, but I will post it here once and for all for the sake of keeping all things UW in the same thread.

Read this thread for info and builds on how to clear UW in HM: http://guildwarsguru.com/forum/showt...php?t=10279505

Differences between HM and NM

Bladed Aatxes & Grasping Darknesses
I cannot hide the fact that they are much harder now than they were in NM. The necro goes N/Mo and therefore does not have access to SV or AV, leaving the monk unprotected against interrupts. Fortunately, he can bring Rebirth.

Forgotten Vale - The last group
This one is much harder as well. No access to Arcane Echo means these guys will have to die one SS at a time. It is possible though, for the necro to wildcard one or two skills (Mark of Pain and Rebirth - if he can afford scrolls) with the sole idea of adding helpful skills to fight these guys.

Tortured Spirits (from Wrathful Spirits quest)
Funnily enough, these seemingly innocent guys can become very troublesome in HM. They do not hit hard enough to trigger Spirit Bond nor often enough to make SoA worth using (even if you use it you'll find yourself spamming 10e skills to heal yourself from the DF bonus). I have heard (although I have never had the chance to try) that it's possible to leave one group of Grasping Darknesses alive (I believe it's the one group which appears near the Mayor), and when you do that, you can stop worrying about ghosts dying. Still, my suggestion is to switch to 55hp (or 105hp) armor and keep yourself alive with PS and SoA.

Four Horsemen
This quest is actually easier in HM than it was in NM. The monk casts Life Bond on the ghost, and the necro casts Balt's Spirit on you (he should never use HW or Retrib here because it would take extremely long to kill them - probably would be a matter of hours). The monk just keeps perma-SB and perma-SoA on the reaper as usual. His energy should be very high all the time (due to LB + Balt's) and when the terrorwebs come attack him, he casts PS/SB on both himself and the necro (just in case), while the latter uses SS and Insidious Parasite on the terrorwebs attacking them to kill them ASAP. When the terrorwebs are all down, pick the reaper's horseman target as usual, but this time the necro has to be extremely not to draw too much attention from the horsemen. That means, cast SS, run back, come back 3s or so later, cast IP, run away again... etc. And by all means, if you aggro a Horseman, never ever draw him to the monk.


Thoughts on HM UW

A lot has changed since I have last went into the UW. I have a few ideas, which are still untested, and which you are free to try out. Please report here if they happen to work out well for you.

Using the necro to tank Mindblades
Since Mindblades have become ranged, I think that the players could now inverse roles, making the monk only a support and having the necro cast Retrib/HW on himself, Balt's Spirit on the monk, and tank. The monk would cast Life Bond on him and keep him alive with SoA and whatever is needed. The monk could also cast Spellbreaker on him, and the necro could kill the Mindblades with SS rather than HW/Retrib. Of course he would need to bring a spare set of 15 armor. Using the necro in such way would make it a lot less risky since the monk does not have to worry about interrupts and staying alive anymore.

N/Me revisited
At first it seemed that a N/Me in HM was impossible. But it's been proved in many threads that if you "block" foes against a wall, they will not run from Spiteful Spirit. If you are good at that, then you can start wondering if it wouldn't be better to go back to N/Me instead. The monk would have to tweak his skills quite a bit though. Give it some thought!

Against Behemoths
I mentioned above that the last spawn of Behemoths on the top of the mountain can be quite troublesome. Browsing through Guild Wiki, I have noticed a skill I hadn't given much thought earlier (since it's PvE and Avarre did not own EotN): Snow Storm. It seems perfectly fit for that purpose. Try it!

You're my new UW God.

omg! this is a awesome guide, didnt read it all. but at some point i might. very impressed.

Holy mother of Jeebuz!

Thanks, Cerb & companions.. outstanding job!

feed me ectos! nice guide

Not bad, not bad at all :P

Gonna try some new stuff in uw

Wow. Just wow. Very nice

Just a note, for anyone interested, the Unwanted Guests quest can be done with 600/smite to . Somehow the Keeper won't cast Lingering Curse when his health is low (about 33% from what I can tell). Think it has something to do with the sacrifice, not sure.

Very impressive, nice one!

very impressive
deserves to be sticky too

Where is the RT farm?

Welcome back!

That a very very very good guide, worth the time

I Love You Man :d

nicely done,veeery impressive.Thanks for taking the time to SS this and lay it out for the community...to bad I never get invited to duo anymore..looks like fun!

Tip of the hat.

Even I don't have monk or necro, I'm impressed. Haven't seen better guide for a long time. Writing that and getting information and whatever else must have taken A LOT TIME. You have my respect.

edit: I have one suggestion to that wonderful creation: Change Resurrection signet to Sunspear rebirth signet. No drawbacks and 55hp is teleported to safe place if he happens to die in a middle of mob.

omfg, that's a loooot of guide, respect.

Someone sticky this...epic much...

that is an impressive piece of work.
I applaud you!

Amazing guide. Thank you so much.

Wow. Nice guide mate. Pity i don't pay attention to any of my non ele characters anymore... I don't suppose you can add a little for the obsidian flesh 55 tank.

really impressive

thanks for sharing it!!

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Nice work Cerb. Someone likes playing with Photoshop

*out of words*

impressive^^

amazing, elegantly simple build, and great guide

Took you long enough.
Nice work though
/vote sticky (contains more then just a guide imo)

/vote sticky
This is great! I might be able to get my friend in my guild to do UW w/ me for once.

Oops! I had forgotten to put in 1.a.

I also added a pic with Underworld chest in Last Words section!

Thanks for the comments people!

YAY!!! Time to ruin the market!! Chop chop!

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Uber guide...pwnage...gonna copy paste it into Word!

edit: Beastiery images are so cooooool...^^

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You are amazing

Pure awsomness! All hail Cerb and his crew!

perfect guide and i like what you did with the beastery :P /vote on sticky

Was worth waiting for the guide, thank you very much ;p Gotta force one of the guild's Necromancer to do full UW run.