Dreaming City Comprehensive Guide

Image free overview of everything to do in the Dreaming City.

Introduction

The Forsaken Pack includes:

• A large number of exotics. See my steam guide on exotics for which ones.
  
• Bounty access from Petra
  
• Last Wish raid
  
• Shattered Throne dungeon

Currently

All players can visit the Dreaming City and do the open world activities such as public events, the lost sectors, and the Blind Well.

Curse Cycle

The Dreaming City changes on a three week cycle.[imgur.com] This cycle began after the world's first clear of the Last Wish raid. Lore wise, killing the final raid boss was the first in a complicated series of events resulting in the Dreaming City being stuck in a three week time loop. The curse week determines what enemy types spawn, what ascendant chests can be found around the city, and whether you can enter Queen Mara's throne room.

The quests Broken Courier, The Oracle Engine, and Dark Monastery are available depending on the week of the curse cycle and have a lot of dialogue if you are the sort of person who cares about story. If you are an Awoken, there's some unique dialogue lines.

Petra

When you talk to Petra, you will see in her inventory:

• 2 quest steps, one to do daily bounties, and one story mission that rotates with the three week curse cycle. This is the only way to get the Dreaming City sparrow. The story mission requires Forsaken ownership.
  
  
• 2 weekly bounties, one to do the blind well to get legendary gear and an offering to the oracle, and one to do the ascendant challenge.
  
  
• A row of daily bounties. The “legendary gear” ones give Dreaming City exclusive items.
  
  
• Charge of light consumables for use in the blind well
  
  
• Raid banners for use in raids, dungeons, and various other activities.
  

Blind Well

From the fast travel point, go through the huge cliffside doorway to enter the Blind Well, a horde mode. Like open world areas, you will randomly be placed in an instance with other players in Blind Well. One player manually starts a tier of the blind well by depositing a charge of light in the middle, where there is a slot for tier 1, tier 2, and tier 3. Higher tiers give more progress on the “Gateway Between Worlds” weekly bounty. Kill enemies while standing inside a safe zone, and kill anathema enemies to get a harmony orb, which allow you to break Servant of the Plague shields. A chest will spawn at the end tier.

As of the December 7, 2021 update, the Blind Well can now be farmed endlessly for Dreaming City gear.

As of the November 28, 2023 update, the Blind Well can now be launched directly from the map! No need to physically walk there any more.

Upon successful completion of tier 3, your ghost will say something, and any player can deposit an unstable charge at the center to start tier 4. Tier 4 gives one legendary item from the chest each week, and the tier 4 bosses have different mechanics than the lower tier bosses.

The scorn bosses’ shields must be taken down using screeb explosions and the hive boss’s by throwing orbs just like The Corrupted strike. You can charge the orbs for extra damage by throwing them to a teammate in both the blind well and The Corrupted.

Free to play players can do Blind Well and get Dreaming City gear from it.

Gateway Between Worlds bounty

When you hover over the Gateway Between Worlds bounty, you will see it gives an offering to the oracle. The introductory mission to the Dreaming City shows how to use this item. You travel to the oracle engine, accessed from the upper left corner of the Divalian Mists, and give the offering to the oracle to spawn a chest. On week 3, a portal to Mara’s throne room opens instead, and the chest is inside. This gives a Dreaming City item each week, and on the third week, pages from the Truth to Power lore book. You can only get one Truth to Power lore page per account per third curse week.

Tinctures, Ascendant challenges, and Chests

There are six different ascendant challenges that rotate in order. Toland’s quote on the bounty will give you a hint where to go, and when you first enter the right area, there is a message in the lower left corner saying “the seams between realities weaken.” To see and enter the portal, you must use a tincture of queensfoil consumable that gives you a 30 minute Ascendance buff. You have as many tries as you wish to do the ascendant challenge, but it only drops loot once per week per character. They are the only way to get the Dreaming City ghost shell. See this for a short text guide describing each Ascendant Challenge. [www.thegamer.com]

Tinctures of queensfoil also allow you to see some shortcut platforms around the Dreaming City and see and open ten chests each week that are in different locations based on the curse week. Tinctures can drop from a variety of activities in the City and can be purchased for 50 baryon boughs from a hidden vendor.

If you complete the Time Trial triumph for every ascendant challenge, you will be granted the Secret Victory emblem, which is required for the Cursebreaker title. A variation of this emblem can also be acquired from the Blind Well as a random drop on completion, but as of the Season of the Worthy update, the Blind Well version no longer counts for the Cursebreaker title.

Shattered Throne

Used to be only during week 3, but as of year 3 it is available 24/7 and can be launched from the map. Shattered throne is a 1 to 3 person dungeon. It is in between the difficulty of a strike and a raid. Each section drops one Dreaming City legendary item per class per week, and this is the only place the Dreaming City ship will drop.

• The Wish Ender quest has been significantly shortened since release. Check the Quest Archive to see if you can get the Awoken Talisman. If not, you will need to interact with a statue after Vorgeth inside the dungeon. Once you have the quest, you will need to find three statues inside Shattered Throne. From here onward the quest is unchanged, so every guide that shows the three statues and what to do after will still work.
  
  
• First, travel around an area killing bosses. After each boss, a symbol will be displayed showing where the next is located. Map here[imgur.com]
  
  
• Drop down a hole in the ground leading to Vorgeth, widely regarded to be the most difficult. Map here[i.imgur.com], made by reddit user ApproximatelyC. Four wizards with a retinue of adds spawn around the room and drop a debuff on death. Upon pickup of the debuff, you will die if the timer reaches 0 and must pick up another to refresh the timer. Once all four wizards' debuffs are collected, dunk the debuff on one of the four glowing spots near the center of the room to begin the boss damage phase. Repeat until dead.
  
  
• For the final encounter, kill three large knights. Each drops a damage buff against the final boss. Once one knight is killed, the others go immune after a few seconds. Get them all weak and then try to kill all three at once. The knights and waves of psions are the biggest threats. When you have the damage buff against the final boss, you will die if the timer reaches 0, so you must either kill her or jump on the glowing blue table in the center of the room to cleanse yourself before this happens.
  

Last Wish Raid

Available only to owners of Forsaken. You can enter this raid without completing Forsaken or unlocking the Dreaming City if you are in a fireteam with someone who has access. This is the largest raid so far, and I recommend planning at least 3 or 4 hours for your first try. My guide to getting in to raiding. There are a variety of Last Wish guides you can find on the internet, in addition to players who will teach it to you known as "sheraps." A major patch on October 1 changed pretty much every weapon, so take weapon advice older than that time with a grain of salt.

Miscellaneous Secret Objectives

See an in depth interactive map here[lowlidev.com.au] on the site lowlidev.

• Small lore crystals and ahamkara bones can be found around the city. Picking these up unlocks lore pages you can read from your character menu.
  
  
• Small gifts that smell faintly of mint can be given to cat statues with glowing eyes. You can do this once per cat per character, ever. You will still get small gifts, though they have no known purpose after all the cats have been given a gift. You get a neat emblem from giving gifts to all 9 cats.
  
  
• Glowing rock circles around the entrance of the blind well will summon two high value targets if one player stands in each circle at the same time. This gives a secret triumph. If the rocks are not glowing, nothing will happen.
  
  
• In Rheasilvia, there will occasionally be a text prompt in the lower left corner saying a saboteur is roaming the City. This is a taken miniboss that spawns in one of the circular pools at the end of walkways in this area, completely unrelated to the Black Armory saboteurs. Killing it will drop a ball that gives a debuff when picked up. You must cleanse yourself by carrying the ball to a glowing spot that appears around the area, and then carry it to a statue. Putting the ball in front of this statue summons a large ogre boss.
  
  
• In the Gardens of Esila, a chest will sometimes appear that is guarded by “the wormhost.” There are some small hive worms hidden around the area. Killing them all unlocks the chest, which gives very mediocre loot.
  
  
• In the three main areas, a chest locked by wayward magicks will randomly spawn. You must find arc charges in three bowls around the area and bring them to the chest to unlock it before the chest disappears. The chest and the arc charges are in the same spots in each area. They give very mediocre loot.
  
  
• Scorn will randomly drop a quest called Corsair Down. Hover over it in your pursuits inventory and it will say you hear a distress signal from a certain area. The body of a downed corsair will be somewhere in this area. Interact with her to reclaim her badge from the scorn who killed her and return it to the living corsairs for some very mediocre loot. Note that there are multiple possible spawn locations for the corsair's body, so you will have to search around a bit.
  
  
• You may spot some lumpy taken eggs that say “immune” when you shoot them. These give legendary gear and lore when shot with the exotic quest bow Wish Ender. Once all of them have been shot, you will get a sparrow. Some are in the Shattered Throne and each ascendant challenge, meaning you must wait at least 6 weeks to get the sparrow after getting Wish Ender. The eggs do not respawn. Four are in the Last Wish raid and three can be gotten solo, though one is only accessible after fighting the third boss, Morgeth.
  
  

[Heliopteryx]

I've thought of making a moon comprehensive guide, but so far I haven't been able to figure out everything there. I could probably make a good start, but there's still hidden stuff there I haven't managed to find or I haven't gotten around to tracking the rotation of.

[Dankquan]

When will there be a moon comprehensive guide?

[Maximus]

y e s