Eye of the Beholder 2 Walkthrough - The Azure Tower, Level 3
By Daniel D'Agostino, 2011-11-06 / EOB2 Walkthrough / EOB2 Info
Starting Area
From the stairs from Level 2, you reach a transparent barrier blocking access to a staircase going up. You need a shell key and a crystal key to get past it.
There is an illusionary wall to the west that brings you to a room with two doors, three pressure plates, and a plaque on either side. The pressure plates don't do anything. Press the button on the wall to open the door on the left. Go through the teleporter and enter the room. Pick up the shell key before going through a second teleporter that will take you back to the room with pressure plates.
Press the button on the wall again, and this time the door on the right will open. Go past the pits and through the teleporter. This will take you to a new area.
Brahma Area
Here you can see two creatures like the hairy beast you faced at the end of the Level 2 Challenge, which are commonly referred to as just guards. They will not attack immediately, but you have no option but to go over their dead bodies.
As you attack them, other guards will pour out of the east and west rooms to help them. One of the initial guards will drop a crystal key. In the east room you will find a polished shield, and in the west room there is an illusionary north wall. This leads to more guards and the passage forks. To the east, a mouth calls the guards (that you just mauled) and you end up behind the locked door that the first two guards were guarding.
The west fork leads to this blue circle on the floor. As you step on it, you suffer lightning damage and the door opens. Guards will attack you from the north room as you enter, and a pressure plate will seal the door behind you.
In the north room, a party member alerts you to the presence of "a secret button", which you will find on the west wall.
Before you proceed, check out the large room in this area. Fireballs orbit the pressure plate in the middle, but will not hit you as long as you stay along the outer wall. In the middle you will find +1 Brahma's boots (which provide no AC bonus) as well as a mage scroll of Ice Storm. These two items are weighing down the pressure plate in typical Indiana Jones fashion, so you may leave something else to weigh it down, but if you step off without leaving anything on it, the trap springs. What happens is that walls materialise at the diagonals around you, and fireballs are shot at you from four directions. You may avoid these fireballs by quickly taking two steps forward and one sideways.
Starfire Area
Take the passage revealed by the secret button in the north room. Along the way, a plaque suggests: "A little pain now, saves a lot later." Follow the passage and wait in the east alcove. Pressure plates in this corridor will shoot two fireballs at once. This is a great aid as guards start coming from the north; they will trigger fireballs against themselves and they will already be injured when they reach you.
Wait in the alcove until the guard visits become infrequent, and run north then east to massacre those that still remain. At the southeast end is a door and a particularly shaped hole. We'll come back here later.
Cross over to the west room, killing any remaining guards. Pick up the polished shield at the southern end. The lever to the north will open up the north section. There are more guards here, as well as a corridor enclosed in glass barriers which you can break. Take the Starfire wand and the Mage scroll of Stone to Flesh.
Put the Starfire wand in the hole by the southeast door you encountered earlier, and take it out to open the door. The Starfire wand has the ability to cast Mystic Defense - probably a high-level cleric spell that doesn't seem to be documented - and does not appear to ever run out of charges. It can be used by any character.
Near the end of the next passage, there is an illusionary wall to the west where you will find the last of the six polished shields, a parchment (map) and the +2 Jhonas' Cloak.
As you approach the door at the end of the passage, you see a vision from Khelben. He asks you to let yourself be killed while wearing a special Amulet of Resurrection that he gives you. There are several ways for you to realise it's a trap:
- He's asking you to let yourself be killed.
- Communication with Khelben is no longer possible since Silver Tower Level 4.
- The Amulet of Resurrection is cursed.
- By casting Improved Identify on the Amulet of Resurrection, you find out it's actually just a bauble (cheap jewellery).
Still, hold onto the amulet for a bit - you will need some junk you can throw away, in a minute.
The button on the left wall opens the door. As you step into the room, the pressure plate will close the door behind you. Use the button on the wall to open the next door. Obviously, ignore the vision's instructions, and kill the guards that come out. One of them will drop a tooth. Use the tooth in the monster face on the wall to trigger an apparition from a frustrated Dran and open up the passage. There is also a +1 sling in this room. Follow the passage to the next puzzle.
Pressure Plate Puzzle Area
This area is a little bit tricky to understand. There are three pressure plates on each side (east and west) blocked by glass barriers. On each of the other two sides of the room (north and south) is a teleporter blocked by a pit. There is no way you can reach the teleporters or the pressure plates, so you must throw items (that you don't need) through the teleporters so that they fall onto the pressure plates.
Now, which pressure plate they actually fall onto is controlled by the five pressure plates at the centre. The single pressure plates to the east and west control on which side of the room the item you throw will be teleported. The pressure plates running north to south control whether the item will fall on the first, second or third pressure plate on that particular side.
So basically, what you need to do is this. First step on the western pressure plate. For each pressure plate running north to south, step on it and throw an item through the southern teleporter. Then, step on the eastern pressure plate, and repeat with the north teleporter. The door to the north will open when all six side plates have been weighed down. Be sure not to throw any important item, as you won't get it back.
Pit Sub-levels
Once you reach the end of the passage, go downstairs. Observe the pits moving in the ceiling - it's a sign of what's to come and also an opportunity to develop a strategy for how best to cross it.
Go upstairs and you come to a room with moving pits. Skid Row's solution for this level illustrates how to get through - this will save you the trouble of actually studying the patterns that the pits go through.
Up another level is another room with moving pits. Again, do the dance as shown in Skid Row's map, and you reach a staircase going down. Before you run through the teleporter, though, pick up the Ring of Feather Fall and the crystal key from the niche right behind it.
The teleporter will take you back to the room at the beginning of the level with the three pressure plates and two doors. Head east, through the illusionary wall that brought you here, to the staircase blocked by the transparent barrier. Use a shell key and a crystal key on the respective keyholes to remove the barrier. The way is now open for Level 4.