Warning, spoilers ahead. This document is mostly for folks who have finished the module or need help getting through it.

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Once again you find yourself in the royal castle, ready to partake another adventure. Dawn notes that shennanigans are goin' down at PassGate, but she's not sure you can get there in time.

The Advent will show up, and suggest you pick a henchman before he transports you there himself. (You won't be using the front door of the castle this time.) Let's rundown who you should hench up with and why.

• Zachary offers a simple subquest -- he wants to give the troops a morale boosting pep talk. If you've got a female character, this expands his romance subplot.
  
• Sally doesn't have a whole lot of subquesty stuff, but taking her will net you a Spin-o-Taur for free at one point.
  
• Talya has an important subquest for her romance plot, particularly if you completed the romance subplot in PR2. If you didn't take her in PR2 you can begin her romance plot here instead.
  
• Grandma has a heavy hack and slash orc trashing subquest, when she applies her own unique logic to the problem at hand.
  
• Whisper has an unusual encounter with an old friend, which nets her a nice AC upgrade that'll last for the rest of the campaign, and introduce future important events for her subplot.
  
• ALL of the henchmen allow you to partake in a contest which will get you your choice of prizes. Details below.
  
• No henchman means you can't access any hench subquests, and you may have to tough it out a bit in fights, but obviously you can still complete the game. You can't partake in the contest without a henchman.

After a brief, mysterious cut-scene with the Advent and some very difficult to program lighting effects (try zooming out and watching for awhile!) you'll arrive at PassGate. Set your sound options with the karoke machine; if you have the custom soundtrack you get the sweet PassGate music once you go underground.

Step one is to gain admittance to the fortress itself. If you take a ticket from the dispenser, it won't help; you're too far back in line. You'll have to get the first person in line, the oddly familiar Ragpicker, to give up her ticket.

If you have Grandma with you, she'll give it up immediately for her old friend. Otherwise you have to bully, cajole, and provoke her into giving it up. Pick any of the 'skill checks', do a bunch of 'em, and eventually she'll get frustrated and give it up. Talk to the bureaucrat, answer his questions, and he'll let you in. It is not suggested that you say 'Yes' to 'Are you a terrorist?'.

Talking to the guard by the row of stones grants you access to the military side of PassGate, where most of your quest transpires. But before we get there, let's talk about the many optional subquests available through your henchmen and the PassGate Hostel.

First up, Talya and Grandma will want to talk once you reach this point...

Talya's Subquest: Petty Larceny..?: After getting past the bureaucrat, Talya will want to talk. Yep, she's keen to steal something again. If you don't want to help her, she won't ditch you, but you won't be able to complete her subquest. Agree and you'll be able to complete this errand later on in the game; more details to follow.

Grandma's Subquest: Orcbusters II: Return of the Orcs: Seems granny's got a rather unique take on the PassGate situation. Sure, you still have to uproot the traitor and restore the barricade, but why not go lay the everlovin' smackdown upon the orcs yourself first? Then you're garunteed a safe mission and can take your time.

If you agree to help, you can then use the area transition through the double doors of the PassGate's main gate to the west. That will take you to a long mountain pass full of nooks, crannies, ramps, and orcs, orcs, orcs. This is a very hack and slash subquest; your reward is XP based. Once you whack the orc leader, the quest is over.

You have to complete this quest before completing the main quest; after that the barricade is up and you can't enter Claustrophobia Pass.

Now, let's study the hostel.


You don't technically need to visit the hostel at any point to complete the main quest, but what kind of adventurer would you be if you passed up all the reward-rich subquests?

First up is the water elemental floating around in the pool outside the Hostel...

Water Elemental Subquest: Talk to the elemental, and when it asks you to find a carrier so it can get to the ocean, agree to help.

Enter the hostel. Head upstairs, and talk to the dwarf in one of the hostel rooms. She'll agree to carry him; go back to the water elemental and tell him the good news in order to get a ring that gives you great AC bonuses against constructs (which you will be fighting a large amount of in this module). Return the bottle to the dwarf to get some money.

Next we have the folks inside the hostel itself, and the various ways your henchman can react to them.

Anvil Subquest: The dwarf in the rooms upstairs collects anvils. You wouldn't happen to have one of the deluxe anvils sold in Penultima City, would you? If you do, this is your lucky day -- she'll pay top dollar for one! Only one, though, and she won't buy a normal anvil.

Sally's Subquest: Ylonda the Stage Magic Assistant: Simply talk to Ylonda when you have Sally in your employ, and you get a Spin-o-Taur. Score!

Whisper's Subquest: An Itch to Scratch: The man selling items in the back room of the hostel is no mere one-liner NPC. If you have Whisper with you, he'll immediately recognize her -- and you get a peek into her past history, and perhaps her future. Not only will he slash his prices for you after that, he'll give Whisper an amulet to grant an AC boost, which she keeps for the remainder of the campaign! (Via a plot token you'll get which you better keep track of...) For some extra developments, talk to Whisper after this encounter.

Finally, you'll want to check out the Interplane access point here. It lets you access EndlessAdventures.plane, handy if you skipped it in PR2, and you can also learn more about PassGate... and partake in a contest at DragonBites.plane that varies for every henchman! You must have a henchman to complete this.

Zachary's Contest: History of Penultima: You can call upon Zachary for help once and only once; otherwise you have to get all the questions right. The answers are: Breatheable Air Tax, Death Metal, Melwind Spiro, The Light.

Sally's Contest: Magical Mystery Tour: You answer questions about PUTS! You call upon Sally for one question only; otherwise you have to get all of them right. The answers are: Bardic Lore, Three Fairies, Remy Streets, and anything except 'If He Truly Flunked, Punishment.'

Talya's Contest: The Dating Game: You are asked three questions about Talya. You have to get at least one right. She has some interesting responses if you get it wrong, so feel free to fail two. What she says varies if you have a love token for her romance subplot already. The answers are: stealing something expensive, rocky road, a family heirloom.

Grandma's Contest: Battle Tactics Challenge: This one's easy. After you bungle the first question, Grandma takes over and gets the rest right; you automatically win.

Whisper's Contest: Staring Contest: If you have a high concentration skill you can win this yourself. If you fail, Whisper will win it for you automatically.

Once you win your contest, you get your pick of prizes. Some of them are booby prizes, so here's a rundown:

• RING: The "Pull My Finger," a single use stinking cloud weapon. Not particularly amazing.
  
• AMULET: Spell Eater, which grants you magical resistance against weak to midlevel spells! Nice, if you can sacrifice your amulet slot to it, but you can't sell it since it's marked as stolen.
  
• CLOAK: Booby prize; it's a novelty "I Won The Dragonbites Challenge And All I Got Was This Lousy Cloak" Cloak that actually reduces your charisma.
  
• CASH: 1000 gold.

Your best bet is either Spell Eater, or the gold. The ring may be sold for a little bit more than 1000, if you know where to sell it.

Okay, enough subquest crap. Let's get back to work.


Nobody will talk to you until you speak to Captain Rafael. He'll explain the situation about the orcs, the missing control lever, and the bezerk gearwork robots. It's a good idea to thoroughly investigate and talk to the captain, the Sarge, and Kris Spanners in the small workshop to the NE. You can also talk to the soldiers in the barracks, for what good that is.

Zachary's Subquest: Motivationally Speaking: When you talk to the soldiers, if you have Zachary with you, he'll launch into a speech that will properly motivate them to fight instead of deserting camp. You have an opportunity for a love token here if you're female and you compliment him after his speech.

Proceed by talking to Kris Spanners. She'll mention that if only she had her RetroTemporal Scope, she could identify the traitor easily. This sends you on a quest back to familiar territory -- you're going to fetch the scope from Glod Gloddson.


Along the way to Glod's place you'll encounter a few waves of wintery animals gone nuts. Don't underestimate them; high level adventurers will find them to be more than pesky annoyances. Once you reach the camp, enter the main tent, and talk to Glod.

He'll explain that the animals are part of a backstabber's grand plot to take over his mine! And I won't spoil who's the traitor for you. You have two options here -- either agree to help, and plow your way through an oddly familiar mine area to defeat a boss, or blow him off. You don't get the XP earning opportunities if you blow him off, and you'll be a big fat jerk loser stupid-head for not helping... but either way, you'll get the RetroTemporal Scope. Return to PassGate.

Now it's time to delve into the GearWorks, so we can look at the Master Control Box through the scope and find the traitor.


The GearWorks are vicious little bastard constructs, of various makes and models. Completing the water elemental's quest helps here, since you'll get a ring to protect you, but it's going to be a series of fights in close quarters regardless. Brawl your way around the north or the south side, they're virtually identical, and both lead to the western room with a large GearWork and the Master Control Box.

After clearing the area out, use the scope's power on the control box... and you'll see the Sarge! Whaaa? Okay, this merits further investigation. You can make a shortcut through the middle of the level by stepping on the pressure plates which open previously sealed doors. Handy since you'll be coming back this way again.

Talking to the Captain and the Sarge will get you nowhere, but you should anyway just to hear what they think of this. Then talk to Kris, who will tell a secret about the Sarge... he's a construct! And the remote control is tucked away in her footlocker so he couldn't be the culprit. Right?

Time for some detective work.

If you go to the women's bedroom above the barracks, you'll notice Kris's locker is unlocked and empty. This will upset Kris to discover, but the real discovery here is exactly WHO stole the remote control for the Sarge... use the RetroTemporal Scope on the footlocker. It's Captain Rafael! And Eve, of the d20 Gang!

Now when you talk to Kris, she'll make the connection that Rafael's the true traitor, and give you a key. This key opens up access to the storage rooms below PassGate, where the captain is likely hiding. Enter the gearworks again, back to the master control box, and this time take the stairs down.

Welcome to the lower levels. Three doors confront you -- rooms 1, 2 and 3. Kris gave you the key to 2, but first...

Talya's Subquest: Petty Larceny..?: Don't forget, what Talya wants is in storage room #1. Try the door -- locked, but once you try, she'll give you a key to open it. Inside are an incredible amount of traps, so go slowly and let Talya deal with them. She might miss one or two, so this is a good time to save your game.

Once you finally get the chest open, one of two things will happen. If you didn't complete PR2's Talya subquest, it's just a golden necklace which she snatches away with intent to sell later, but you can earn a love token for helping her.

If you DID complete PR2's quest and got Talya's family heirloom back, this is her payback for you -- you receive the Amulet of the Heart, a nice protective item, and get to share a tender moment that shows Talya's nicer side.

Anyway, the rooms are completed in sequence...

ROOM #2: You face a Goliath Gearwork. Not too difficult, kick it around a bit and get the key to room #3 out of the chest. The doors to rooms #4 and #5 are here, but ignore them for now.

ROOM #3: You take on two robots with good knockdown skill and an array of traps in the room. AVOID THE STAIRS (not too hard to do) and take them on. This is much easier with a henchman, or with summoned animals.

You can go through either room #4 or room #5 to get to room #6. Or beat both for XP rewards. Your call.

ROOM #4: Filled with FemGears! Sultry silver tempresses! Not too difficult but they do swarm in a pack; a lone fighter would have problems here. Or you can sneak in stealthy-like and snatch the key to room #6 from the base of the bed.

ROOM #5: Whack-a-Gear! Out of the nine holes in the floor, a training dummy will pop up randomly. It casts a fireball at you and then vanishes. You have to kill it before it vanishes -- and ideally before it can get the spell off. Beat down nine of these and the key to room #6 will appear.

ROOM #6: Time to take on the Sarge! He will go down quickly if you can damage him fast enough, but look out -- he does heavy damage if he can land a hit on you. Alternatively you can sneak past him, since he's not holding any keys; the metal portcullis in the back of the room is unlocked.


Finally, you have your obligatory d20 boss encounter. First talk to Rafael; he'll say some cryptic but important things before vanishing. Hint: he didn't go far. In fact, he's approaching quickly from behind to lop off your head.

Rafael deals out a lot of punishment, but he soaks up punishment too. If you're unlucky, he can get off a heal spell and completely restore his health; if you can cut him down fast enough this won't happen. Next Eve will talk to you, making an odd request, and will attack head on. Take her down, steal some swords from the nearby chest, get your d10 die from Eve's body and the lever... oh, and Something Happens which I won't mention.

Leave via the door and we'll shortcut you back to the machine. Use the machine and the lever gets plugged in, and you are done the main quest! Talk to the Advent (who appears) for some interesting responses and a bonus item as your grand reward. All the items are of near equal value, so if you don't see something you can use, pick anything and then sell it later.

Don't forget that you can still complete sidequests (except Grandma's) after you finish the main. The Plot Fairy back at the eastern gate will take you home. Good work!