Getting into Mordor via Shelobs Lair

(This does not award a quest point.)

Quest Info

Recommended Level
Unknown
  • Description

    How to get into Mordor via Shelobs Lair.

  • From the Eastern Osgiliath signpost (A bridge over the Morgulduin).

    do n,ne,3e,n,25u

  • Follow the stairs to reach the entrance to Shelobs lair, cross the lair to get into Mordor.

  • The information below is a guide only, even when using this information you may still die. There are other methods of getting through Shelob's lair, however these are the ones I found the most reliable. If you have one you feel is more reliable, feel free to submit it via a correction and I will update the page with more information.

    It has been pointed out that if you are stuck behind the door, you could ask a friend to go to the place you entered the lair and go inside (on the opposite side of the lair to you). They then wait for Shelob and lure her away from you so that you can get some more time to cut the webs.

    When the mud has rebooted an array of equipment can appear in Shelob's lair (It's also where the gear of anyone who dies in the lair is left), so running through the lair can be quite profitable.

  • First you will have to go up the stairs, the directions for this change every reboot, however you can repeat the following to get to the top.

    do ne,se,u

    Once you reach The top of some long winding stairs, you can stop.

    e

    Now you are at the entrance to Shelobs lair.

    Do not underestimate the danger of crossing the pair, Shelob is an incredibly dangerous monster and if you get confused or panic you are very likely to die and be eaten. That said, careful preperation will help you and allow you to cross without even seeing Shelob.

    Now there are two ways to cross the lair, one of which requires cutting through some webs with a weapon (requiring you to stay in the same room for a whole) the other of which will require you to take quite a large amount of damage once, but will not require you to stop.

    First however, we will explain how Shelob works, and how movement within the lair works.

    Shelob is a powerful monster who (at full health) attacks 5 times per round, however she is relatively simple to understand.

    Shelob's lair is a large labyrinth of tunnels, however Shelob herself will normally stay in the heart of her lair. When someone enters the lair, she will gradually start moving towards them through the tunnels until she gets to the room they are in, where she will then attack them and hunt them directly, from a fresh start this will take 30-45 seconds. If everyone leaves the lair, she will wait for a while and gradually return to her inner lair to wait for a new target. What makes this somewhat easier if you are running through the lair is that Shelob will try to take the quickest route to where you entered, however you will be moving away from that room in a direction which will then take Shelob longer to get to you

    The other thing that makes running through the lair quite difficult is that whilst Shelob is still alive she is capable of interfering with your movement, sometimes you will be blocked with a message such as You seem to get nowhere as you welcome and dwell on the delicious thought of endless sleep. or The air seems to be running out in this tunnel. Your muscles refuse to work., this means you need to pay attention and retry directions if you fail (so a simple do command will almost certainly fail).

    The first route

    If you wish to take the first route (cutting through the webs), you should obtain a weapon which is of Elven design (for example An elven short sword from Mirkwood: Elven Short Sword). Once you have this, you are ready.

    The exact route we will be taking through the lair to (relative) safety is as follows.

    do in,e,ne,2e,ne,2e,ne,2e,ne,2e,ne,2e,ne,3e,ne,2e,ne,2e,ne,2e,ne,2e,3ne,climb over door

    You could try running this by hand, however reacting to being blocked manually can take some time.

    Since all the directions are east or northeast we could simple spam those directions, however there is one room where we will have to pause for a few seconds or else fall down, this makes spamming impossible.

    There is a trick you can use however, do the following.

    help nuke

    You will notice that (unless you have turned the setting off) the MUD will ask you about --More-- and will wait for you to send a blank newline in. If we make this happen during a do command, it will terminate the command (temporarily breaking your do command in the process). So we are going to do the following.

    trigger ^A ledge todo help nuke

    Then we are going to do the following until the trigger fires.

    do 2e,ne

    Once the trigger has fired you need to very quickly do the following.

    Terminate the help screen.

    q

    Unbreak our do command.

    do done

    Now we need to run these directions manually one at a time (and retry any directions which fail).

    do e,ne,2e,3ne,climb over door

    Once you are more comfortable with these instructions you may wish to go straight to the webs and start cutting, if so then you can adjust the directions to the following.

    do e,ne,2e,ne,2e,cut webs

    This following is for people who went straight to safety.

    Once you have done this you are in relative safety (Shelob cannot get you) so you can take a short breather (However, remember you are in Mordor and as such can be attacked at any time).

    Once you are ready, you should wield whichever weapon you decided to bring. We now need to cut through the webs which are blocking our exit.

    Once we start cutting the webs (which will take a little while) if you see Shelob enters. and Shelob, spider of darkness starts attacking you, you will need to quickly (again, one room at a time) do the following.

    do 2w,2ne,climb over door

    Once you are prepared and know which directions to escape, we can start to cut the webs. Once again, due to blocked movement you will have to run these commands one at a time retrying any which fail.

    do climb over door,2sw,2e,cut webs

    Now you will need to keep trying to cut the webs. If you try too quickly you will see The webs are still springing around from the last time they were attacked., however there is no endurance cost to this, so you can simply keep trying until you cut the webs again.

    cut webs

    Keep doing this until either Shelob comes, or the webs are cut through. If Shelob comes first, run to the safety of the door as we explained before then wait a few minutes for Shelob to leave (and you to heal). Once you see a message to the effect of You <damage> the east web apart. you have finished cutting the web (the hint there is apart, the normal cutting responses are similar) simply do the following to get into Mordor (and away from Shelob).

    e

    The second route

    The second way of running through the lair is as follows. The first part of the route is the same, we need to head to A ledge. Once we have gotten to that ledge the route differs. First you need to get to the ledge (you can use the same "help nuke" trick as the previous route if you like).

    do in,2e,ne,2e,ne,2e,ne,2e,ne,2e,ne,3e,ne,2e,ne,2e,ne,e,

    Once you get to the ledge.

    jump north

    You will now be falling through the air, and after a short period you should see You hit the ground with a CRACK! and you will take roughly 100 HP damage. Once you have seen that you need to run the following directions (once again, you will need to run these one at a time as you may be blocked).

    do 5n,2se,2ne,4e,2ne,6e,2ne,4e,2se,out

    After you have finished running these commands you will be in Mordor in A cave opening.

If any of the information here is missing, or wrong, please let us know.