Quest Guide: Darkwater

Welcome to Darkwater, a very atmospheric and fun area full of folklore and creepy quests. So far this is my favorite area in the game. What follows is a quest guide to help you through the many twists and turns of this shadowy wood. While you're there you may want to check out the reputation guide for more information on the zone's repeatable reputation quests.

Before going to Darkwater insure you have the following quests in your quest log. They're all World Mysteries so don't miss them! The quests are:

• The final quest from Frozen Frontier: Great Tree Seeds
• Talk to the Elven leadership in Novograd to pick up: A Sensitive Matter
• Visit the top of the tower in Novograd to pick up: Darkwater

To get to Darkwater, exit Novograd through the east gates, and go past the sawmill and through the caverns in the cliffs beyond. After winding your way through the caves (and if you're anything like me, spending too much time trying to find the path through), you'll find yourself in the Border Outpost on the edge of Darkwater. Turn in the quest you have for this location and pick up any quests offered here, then follow the road to Valir Settlement. Along the way be sure you pick up the escort quest, A Miraculous Escape near the destroyed wagons on the road. If the quest-giver isn't present, wait a few minutes and he should reappear.

When you arrive at the main settlement, you can immediately pick up a bunch of quests, including two raid quests for the zone: The Bog Monster and The Deep-Seated Horror. You can also grab Trading Chitin from the Gibberling merchants here, but hold off on that one for now; you get more termite killing quests later on that can be combined with this one. There are two reputation quests available as well:

• Crowbane - A relatively easy quest involving poisoning corpses back along the road you arrived on. This is the repeatable reputation quest and is best accomplished with a large group, since everyone in range gets credit for each poisoned corpse.
• Ghost Hunt - A daily reputation quest, which you can complete in a few minutes right around the main settlement. The trick to Ghost Hunt is being close enough to the revealed spirits when you use the Soulsucker.

You also pick up the first slightly tricky quest of the zone, No Room for Error. To complete this quest, you need to hunt down the spiders and vipers around camp, reduce their hit points below 30%, stun them with the Paralyzing Staff, THEN use the Poison Remover to harvest the creature's venom gland. This quest can be a little frustrating as the creatures tend to die before you can harvest their body parts, so patience is required. Be sure you put the two quest items on your action bar in a convenient location. Also make sure you have the quest Reptilian Invasion in your quest log, so you can complete both quests at the same time.

On a similar note you can combine efforts on From the Frying Pan into the Fire  and The Demolished Wagon Train, since the sacks of goods you need for the latter are surrounded by the monsters you need to kill for the former. Darkwater is a pretty big zone, so be sure you check your map often for conveniently clustered quests.

Darkwater quests seem to run well in pairs. Next up: Insatiable Boars and The Hunt for the Great Gray Wolf. You'll probably need to kill some extra boars for meat to complete The Hunt, since the named wolf is a random spawn from the baited traps.

After some mundane crab and bat killing, and a brief underwater treasure hunt, you should be ready to take on the next tricky quest A Lousy Shot. This quest isn't hard, but the location is not shown on your map. To find the lost arrow you'll have to find an unusual but friendly NPC in the Fusty Bog. On your way to the Bog, be sure you stop by the Great Tree to speak with the quest givers there and possibly kill tree slugs, including the easy to solo Fatso.

At this point you hit a whole ream of drop, gather and kill quests that are very easy to do. Just push on through until you reach your next challenges.

First, the termite quests. There are several quests for the termite mounds:

• Trading Chitin
• Wilds on Fire
• Termite War
• The Renegade Druid

When you have all these quests in your log, head to the termite nests. First do the burning quest at the smaller mounds north of the main mound. Warning: burning these smaller mounds can aggravate several workers and soldiers, including somewhat buggy termites who cluster inside the structures. Clear some space and bring a friend along. Next head into the big mound, where you'll be able to kill the remaining termites needed, complete your chitin collection, break the eggs (which are tucked away in small chambers inside the main mound, and kill the druid and termite queen (also inside the main mound).

Kaah is your next challenge. You must kill this demon-dog-thing for the quest Serpent Bane. He's a bit tougher than the average quest monster, so help might be wise. You may also have a bit of trouble finding the The Xadaganian Rug, which is located way up north in the depths of the Werebear Grove. Be sure you have the drop quest Idol Worshippers, which requires you to kill Werebears and gather their totems.

By this point you should be pretty well done with the southern half of Darkwater. Your remaining quests are pretty straightforward, but be prepared for some tougher fights. Here are the highlights:

• The Ritual in the Witches' Circle can be a bit buggy, especially with pet-using characters. Bring a friend.
• After you've freed the unicorn spirits, collected their tears and dealt with the first parts of the Aviak threat, be on the lookout for a unique unicorn, Rageranter, that wanders the Amalthia Woods. When you kill him his spirit will give you The Unicorn Slayer. Note that the turn in for this quest is revealed when you slay Baba Yaga as one of the last quests in the zone.
• Brothers is a bit convoluted, but easy. Gather nettles along the banks of the Rasberry River (look out for the elite mobs that roam the woods of Rookmore), make shirts from the nettles, then find the non-hostile Aviaks (also in Rookmore) and apply the shirts.
• The White Knight is well protected in his lair, so bring a friend and clear his guards away before engaging him. He can be hard to solo for some classes.
• Finally face off against Baba Yaga, who also guards the amulet for Liberation. The 'druid' for The Unicorn Slayer will also be revealed when Baba Yaga is slain.

That about wraps up Darkwater. Next stop Tenebra, which can be reached via the June Stone near the Great Tree.

As a final note, Darkwater has one quest for a Cash Shop item. The Astral Extract. This quest can take quite a while to accomplish as the demon-summoning item can only be used once every 30 minutes, and there's no guarantee the demon summoned will have the item drop required to complete the quest. One way to tackle this is to log out at a summoning location (any coast that shows as Astral Beach will do), then log back in every half-hour to summon a demon.