Location:

Sleep at the roots of Old Man Willow. After a while, you will be dragged into him and affected by 'sleep' (cannot wake up until it wears off).

Strategy:

Once Willow drags you inside, his soul will remove all eq from you and place it on the ground. You cannot pick up any item in here while Willow's Soul is still alive - if you try, the Soul will move all the items in the room from the ground into its inventory (minus the black sword, so don't worry).

The first person to wake up should wake the rest of the group - either bash disengage them, or just hit them. The inside of Willow is mudlled so that it is easy to 'escape' even if you don't have the skill practiced - so don't worry about being engaged to a groupmate in a no-exit room. Just have both people fighting 'escape'.

After all of the party wakes up from Willow's magical sleep, sanc your buffer and nuke soul - he hits almost as hard as Willow, but has fewer hps. After the soul is dead, you will be able to pick up your eq again, but DO NOT type “get leather”, “get all.leather” etc, because black sword loads in leather satchel! This sword is mudlled - it auto attacks EVERYONE who is in the same room as you. Once you get the satchel, it will jump into your hands and you will instakill your naked friends.

Anyone who wants black sword must remove his weapon first - because sword will force him to drop it otherwise. Then cleric must blind him. Then blinded he must get sword from satchel, it will jump in his hands - but as it is cursed, impossible to remove it. Cast remove curse on person with sword, and call Tom Bombadil to get out.

One with sword must SPAM “remove sword” all the time while his friends and (especially!) Bombadil is in his room. If something goes wrong, and the person with the sword hits someone inside willow before the blind goes in - both engaged should try to 'escape' (see above).

NOTE: If someone outside starts killing Willow while you are still inside, YOU WILL MOBDIE! Make sure to check 'where' occasionally while inside, just to head off any Willow groups that show up.

The ONLY way to get out from inside Willow is to call Tom Bombadil. This means that there is NO WAY to get out as a dark-side player - so this smob is not do-able by the dark side.

Level: Hero+ buffer and a Hero+ mage or cleric. If you want the black sword, the caster needs blind (also works if the buffer has an opal jewelled ring - just remove the ring and you're affected by blind for a short time), and the caster needs remove curse as well.

Loads: The Black Sword.

Mobs unique to the zone:

• The Willow's Soul